In chapter 11:21 the Lord indites the parable of the strong man to show that it was by the finger of God He cast out devils. The strong man only gets his house rifled by a stronger than himself. God alone is stronger than Satan. We have already been conquered and made slaves by the devil, so that when we get him bound in this world, God alone has done it, for no child of man could. If I see anyone stronger than Satan in this world, I have a witness that God is here.
The Lord shows that what Satan is doing, he is doing in collision with God—that his bruiser has appeared. That is what He taught Satan in the wilderness. Satan is not afraid of us, but he has more than his match in the Son of God. He is bold as a lion when he comes to you and me, but he trembles in the presence of Christ.
In chapter 11:23 the Lord Jesus draws a very solemn conclusion. The battle is proclaimed and there is no neutrality. God has made the world the scene of the conflict in which the question between Himself and Satan is to be decided, the fruit of which is to occupy eternity.
The voice goes forth: “He that is not with Me is against Me.” Then when the Lord had thus solemnly sounded the voice of the trumpet across the field—the blast of the silver trumpet proclaiming war in verse 24—He sketches a very solemn sight.
It is an awful picture—one which has already been illustrated in Israel, and which, I believe, will be illustrated in Christendom too. The besom (broom) of Babylon may have swept the house of Israel, and to this day they may abominate idols, but a clean house may be just as fit for Satan as an unclean one. So it is with Christendom. Reformation will not do.
We are thankful for the privilege of meeting together in peace, but mere Protestantism will not do. The Lord teaches us that the swept and garnished house may be worse than before. What has taken the place of idols in reformed Christendom? Is it the knowledge of Jesus? Yes, in His own elect, but human vanities have conducted man in Christendom by the same path as the Jew. It is only hurrying on to a matured form of apostate iniquity.
Then He turns to those requiring a sign, telling them such should not be given (vs. 29). Worldliness dictated their desire for a sign from heaven. They wanted a Christ that would astonish the world. The Lord would not and could not answer that. If you and I could not accept our Jesus in rejection, we shall never have Him in glory.
Shall I think to see my Lord glorified in a defiled world, in the midst of such moral elements as fill it? He will give no sign here. If He is accepted, it must be under the sign of the prophet Jonas—not with a crown of glory on His head, but a crown of thorns. He was buffeted and spit upon, rather than worshipped and adored. Instead of giving a sign from heaven, He gives one from the bowels of the earth, in death and humiliation.
J. G. Bellett (adapted from Notes on the Gospel of Luke)