We miss the point. It is easy for us to miss the point that Luke is attempting to make. Our sympathies lie all over this story.
For example: It is so easy for us to focus on the demoniac. A man of great strength. Big. Scary. Out of his mind. Living in the tombs among the dead. Naked. Totally naked. Breaking chains and fetters with shear strength…pulling links of metal apart like they were nothing at all. He was frightening to practically everyone! It is easy for us to feel sorry for him… He was – after all, according to the story – possessed.
Or we focus on the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals or Peta… or the ASPCA (The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals)… those poor pigs, they lost their lives and they did absolutely nothing deserving death…whatever happened to the commandment that says, “Thou shall not kill?” Unlike animals in movies – with all the disclaimers that they are unharmed…these pigs end up bloated and floating…in the lake. It was not a pretty picture! And more importantly, it was not their fault.

Was it the fact that they were “unclean pigs” – “ritually unclean” for Jews that sealed their fate?

And what about the swine-herdsmen, they did nothing as well and yet they lost their livelihood. It is easy for our sympathies to lie with them. All of a sudden they were jobless, with no income to support either them or their families…what about them? Does anybody care about these poor souls?

And then, there were the townspeople. Their entire socio-economic world was just turned topsey-turvey. They asked for none of this. We understand their fear. They feared “what” this “healer” – might do to them. Jesus was the real “unknown” not the demoniac…the demoniac was “known.” Jesus was the question. They did not “know” him!

These poor people even feared the demoniac sitting in his right mind, clothed at the feet of Jesus. How did he become healed? Where did his clothes come from? Just “what” is going on here? And can they “trust” the healing – to be something more than just temporary?

Certainly these were all good questions. What about the “poor townspeople?”

Well it would seem if our sympathies lie in any of these places, we are missing Luke’s point.
Luke is following Mark’s outline of astonishing and astounding miracles…
Jesus has just commanded the winds and the storm. With just “his word” – he was able to still the storm, calm the winds, and reduce the size of the waves. “That storm” was believed to be caused by a demon. It too – was a possession. And it was Jesus who commanded it to “be still.”
In Jesus’ world, and in the world of Luke, demons roamed freely…and especially in the uninhabited areas of the wilderness, the desert or in places – like among the tombs. These were the traditional haunts of demons and evil spirits.
It was believed that the demoniac actually “slept among the demons.” It was a scary day and an even scarier world.
And, “it all goes down” in “Gentile territory” in a gentile region…
It would seem that Luke’s concern is to show that the power of God is effective “beyond the Palestinian orbit.”
God’s love, God’s concern knows no boundaries.
In the event that you are wondering about the “abyss” – the abyss here is symbolized by the depths of the lake, representing hell, or the underworld or the place where evil powers are kept captive for the final judgment.
It is an immeasurable place and could also mean a chasm or a gorge, a ravine, canyon, fissure, rift, crevasse, hole, a gulf, a pit, a cavity, a void and a bottomless pit. It was a place that no one wanted to go, including a demon…or a spirit.
When Luke tells us that the people in the surrounding country were seized with great fear…this probably should not be construed to suggest that they are worried about their economic losses—but rather that they are in AWE of the mighty acts of God.
Just as the demons were driven into perdition…or into the abyss…so a man has received salvation. He has been not only healed, but saved.
Salvation came to their area, at the hands of a Jewish rabbi…a Jewish teacher…a healer…a man of God…and that’s why they are afraid and scared.
Who is this man? What does he want with them? And “how” is he able to accomplish the deeds that he does…
So they are not sure “how” they are supposed to feel, so they send him away. Because he is an “unknown.”