Mark 9:21-40

²¹Jesus asked the boy’s father, “How long has your boy been like this?” The man said, “For a long time, from when he was little kid.

²²Lots of times the bad spirit pushes him into fires and into water. That bad spirit is trying to kill him. Please feel sorry for us and help him if you can.”

²³Jesus said, “You said to me, ‘If you can.’ Don’t you know that God is strong enough to do anything if you trust him to do it?”

²⁴That boy’s father yelled out, “I believe God can do it. But please help me believe more.”

²⁵Jesus looked around and saw a big mob of people coming to watch, so he growled at the bad spirit. He said, “Hey. You bad spirit that stops people from talking and hearing, I’m telling you now, come out of this little boy, and stay out of him. You can never go back into him.”

²⁶Then the bad spirit screamed and forced the boy to take another bad fit and fall down on the ground, then it went out of the boy. The boy looked like he was dead, and a lot of people said, “Poor boy, he is finished.”

²⁷But Jesus just got hold of the boy’s hand and helped him stand up. Then his father took the boy home.

²⁸After that Jesus and his followers went into a house, and his followers asked him quietly, “Why couldn’t we force that bad spirit out of the boy?”

²⁹Jesus told them, “The only way you can force that kind of bad spirit out of anyone is to pray and get God to force it out.”

³⁰Later Jesus and his followers left that place and went through Galilee country. As they walked along he was teaching his followers. He didn’t want everyone to know where he was going, so they went along secretly and quietly. He told them about what was going to happen to him. He said, “I’m God’s special man from heaven, but bad men will grab me, and they will kill me. But after 3 days I will come alive again.”

³²The followers of Jesus couldn’t understand what he was talking about, but they felt too ashamed to ask him any more questions.

³³While they walked along the road Jesus’s followers argued with each other about which one of them was the most important. After they got to Capernaum they went into the house that they were going to camp in, and Jesus asked them what they were arguing about on the road. His followers were ashamed and said nothing.

³⁵Jesus sat down and said, “If anyone wants to be the leader, that person has to think to himself, ‘I’m not important at all.’ And he has to be a workman for everybody else.”

³⁶There was a young kid in that house and Jesus picked him up and said, “Look at this little kid. If you follow me and you are friendly to little kids like this one and you help them, well really, you are friendly to me too. And if you are friendly to me, well really, you are friendly to my Father in heaven too. He is the one that sent me here.”

³⁸John said to Jesus, “Teacher, we saw a man using your power by saying your name to send bad spirits out of people. He’s not one of our mob, so we told him to stop.”

³⁹But Jesus said, “No. Don’t stop him. If somebody uses my power by saying my name to do good and powerful things for people, he can’t soon turn around and say bad things about me.

⁴⁰You see, if somebody is not trying to block us, well really, he is on our side.