In Sunday’s gospel reading, Jesus intentionally sets out to travel to the other side and when he steps out on the other shore, he is immediately met by a man with demons that leave him naked, exposed, bound in chains, and living in a place of death.

If Jesus hopped into your car today and asked you to navigate to the other side – where would you end up? The implication in today’s gospel is that whatever that other side may be, it’s the opposite of what we know and are most familiar with. For the apostle, Paul who was Jewish, free, and a man, the opposites were Greek, enslaved, and a woman.

What about us? For those who spend their days driving country roads, the other side might be an urban neighborhood. For those who are fed by a traditional worship service, the other side might be a suburban megachurch with stadium seats and a full worship band. For those of us who hold deeply held positions on any number of issues, the other side is . . . well, the other side of said issue.

When Jesus steps out on the opposite shore, he encounters a man who is completely other. And what does Jesus do? He doesn’t label him or seek to avoid him. He engages him – what is your name? And then Jesus releases him from the demons which hold him captive and sets the oppressed man free.

And how does the community respond? They asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear.

Maybe we know what that kind of fear feels like. Maybe we know what it’s like to prefer the familiarity of what we know, even when it’s hard, to the uncertainty of something different. Maybe we know what it’s like to count the cost and recognize that we’d rather hold on to what we have.

But church, here’s the thing that Paul reminds us in his letter to the Galatians – in our baptism we now wear Christ’s crown and share in his inheritance. In our baptism into Christ’s death and resurrection, we have been released from whatever holds us captive. Christ has removed the shackles that keep us enslaved and keep us from fully embracing the independence that is ours and we are free to travel to whatever other side we identify, trusting that Jesus travels before us as we do the hard work of building relationships, forging connections, doing the work of asking questions as simple as “what is your name?”

Wherever the other side is for you – Jesus travels there with you.