Big Idea: Jesus has come not to collude with Satan but rather to confront and dispossess him. Jesus is far greater than any prophets or kings who have come before, bringing the light that we now must shine to the world.

Understanding the Text

There have been indications throughout Jesus’s ministry in Galilee that not everyone is favorably impressed by him. Now the opposition is focused in two specific lines of attack (11:15–16). The first concerns his deliverance of those who were demon-possessed, a major theme of Luke’s account of Jesus’s ministry so far (see 4:31–37, 41; 6:18; 7:21; 8:2, 26–39; 9:37–43). An attempt to turn his exorcisms against him now leads to a “debate” in which the underlying spiritual significance of this ministry is explored. Jesus is not merely a successful villa…