Mark 9:38-50

John's Only Question

While Peter sucks up all the oxygen in the room with loads of questions, John only gets one direct question to Jesus recorded in the Gospels. In the passage immediately preceding our text today, Jesus told the disciples that the greatest in the kingdom of heaven must be the servant of all. In response, John asks about a recent encounter and how they should have responded.

Apparently the disciples saw someone successfully performing miracles in the name of Jesus, but this person wasn’t one of the twelve, wasn’t in Jesus’ inner circle, wasn’t “one of us” to use John’s wording. In essence, John’s question boils down to this: “How should we handle people who aren’t just like us?”

Jesus’ response to John’s question…