7Then a cloud covered them all and God talked to them from the cloud and said, “This is my son. I love him very much. You have to listen to him.”
8Then Peter, James and John looked around for those old men, but they couldn’t see them any more. They were gone. Only Jesus was there with them.
9Then they all started to come down from the hill, and as they walked along Jesus told them really straight, “Don’t tell anyone what you just saw. You have to wait till after I die. I’m God’s special man, and I will die and then come back alive again. After that you can talk about what you saw.”
10So Peter, James and John kept quiet about it. They didn’t tell anyone, but they talked to each other about the words Jesus said, “I will die and then come back alive again.” They wondered what Jesus meant.
11And they asked Jesus about the Jewish law teachers. They said, “Those law teachers say that first of all a man from long ago has to come back, that man called Elijah, and after that God will send his special man.”
12Jesus said, “Those law teachers are teaching the true message. A man did come, and he told them God’s message just like Elijah did long ago. That man got things ready for me, but bad people killed him. And they will do the same to me, God’s special man from heaven. They will turn their backs and laugh at me, and they will not listen to my message. All of this is already in God’s book.”
14After they came back down the hill they found the other followers of Jesus arguing with the Jewish law teachers. There were lots of people standing around.
15They looked up and saw Jesus and they were surprised, and they all ran to him and said hello to him.
16Jesus asked them, “What are you mob all arguing about?”
17One of the men there said to Jesus, “Teacher, my son has a bad spirit inside him and it stops him from talking.
18It pushes the boy down on to the ground, his body goes stiff and he rubs his teeth together and spit comes out of his mouth. I asked your followers, ‘Please force that bad spirit out of him.’ But they can’t do it.”
19Jesus said, “How come you mob that are alive today can’t believe? Do I have to always stay here and do everything for you? Bring the boy here to me.”
20The people brought the boy to Jesus. As soon as that bad spirit saw Jesus it shook the boy and pushed him down so that he wriggled around on the ground, and a lot of spit came out of his mouth.
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.”