Bible Memory Verse
“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” James 4:7
Matthew 12:43-45
"When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. 44 Then it says, `I will return to the house I left.’ When it arrives, it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and put in order. 45 Then it goes and takes with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first. That is how it will be with this wicked generation."
Luke 11:24-26
"When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, `I will return to the house I left.’ 25 When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order. 26 Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first."
1. Where does the evil spirit come from, go to and where does it plan to go?
2. Why is it able to return to the house it left?
3. What does it mean “swept clean and put in order?”
4. What does the evil spirit take with it when it returns?
5. What is the final condition of the man? Why?
6. Matthew 12:25 “…That is how it will be with this wicked generation." What does this tell us about this wicked generation? Give examples of this being fulfilled.
7. What can we learn about evil spirits from this parable?
“The subject of the parable is a house occupied by an undesirable tenant. When the tenant vacates or is evicted, the house is swept and made neat and clean. However the house is left unoccupied. The tenant who left, unable to find anywhere else to live, sneaks back to the house bringing seven other homeless with him, and they all move in and become squatters.
What makes this parable unusual is that the tenant is a demon and the house is a human being. Most parables picture simple physical things –vineyards, houses, sheep, business, banquets, and suchlike. This parable enters into the metaphysical. Only one other parable, the Rich Man and Lazarus, does that. In this parable of the Empty House, Jesus simply describes some familiar facts about demon possession. The people listening to Jesus would not find the parable strange, because they knew from experience that demons could enter into a person and do him harm.
The background to the parable is explained in earlier verses. When we learn the circumstances in which Jesus told this parable, we understand why Jesus chose demon possession as an illustration. Jesus had cast out a demon from a man who was both blind and dumb, and the man was then able to see and hear (Mtt 12:22-24). Some debate and discussion arose out of this miracle, and this led Jesus to utter the parable of the Empty House.
The point of the parable is aimed at the Pharisees who were maligning Jesus in the discussion (Mtt 12:24-28). The typical Pharisee was certainly like a house "swept clean and put in order", for he lived in a most orderly, scrupulous, and religious manner. The problem was that he was an empty house, a house "unoccupied". For though he might zealously purify himself by religious rituals, he neglected to fill himself with justice, mercy, compassion, and such like. So he was a nice neat house but untenanted, just waiting for evil to come back and squat. Since the discussion had been about casting out demons, Jesus used that topic as an analogy of an even worse problem suffered by the Pharisees.
We learn the lesson from this parable that, when we get rid of evil, we must fill the void with good, otherwise the evil will come back with a vengeance. It is like weeding a garden but neglecting to fill it with good plants and leaving the ground bare. Many more weeds will soon infest the soil than you removed.
To make ourselves ready for judgment day, we cannot be satisfied with merely ridding ourselves of evil. We must also fill ourselves up with good. When we consider the "deeds of the flesh" (Gal 5:19-21), we should make up our minds to be rid of such as these. Yet we must also go on to consider "the fruits of the Spirit" and make up our minds that we will be filled with such as these (Gal 5:22-25). Taken from Internet