Mark 9:38 Commentary and Bible Study

John now interrupts. ‘And John’ – the disciple John – ‘answered him.’ Why is the word ‘answer’ used? Because it connects with verse 37 – Christ's words, ‘Whosoever shall receive one of such children in my name receiveth me.’ John answered, ‘Master, we saw one casting out devils in thy name.’ Those are the key words: ‘in my name’. ‘In my name’, said Christ. ‘Yes, that reminds me,’ says John, ‘we saw one casting out devils in your name. We forbad him. Did we do wrong? He was doing it in your name.’ He had just heard Christ saying those words. Were we wrong? ‘Yes, you were’, says Christ. ‘Master, we saw one casting out devils in thy name, and he followeth not us: and we forbad him, because he followeth not us.’ ‘Were we right in that, or were we wrong?’ ‘You were wrong.’ And John, unwittingly, has given the reasons why he was wrong. ‘We saw one casting out devils.’ That's one reason why he was wrong. This man was successfully casting out devils. It wasn't like the false people who tried to cast out demons, but they couldn't, or who claimed to, when they weren’t. He was actually successful, this man. He was working miracles in the name of Christ. That's one reason why they shouldn't have forbidden him. They should have paused: ‘But he is successful!’ And another reason is that he did it ‘in thy name.’ He believed in Christ. He was doing it in Christ's name. He was a believer and he was working miracles. Who was this man? Well there are various guesses. Perhaps he was a disciple of John, who believed the message of John, that Christ was ‘the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world’ (John 1:29). He hadn't detached himself from John and from his disciples and followed Christ personally, but he was a believer, and amazingly he was successful. Perhaps (though this may have been before they were sent out) he was one of the seventy, who were given by Christ power to cast out demons. But although he wasn't in the band that followed Christ, he had actually been given the power and given the commission.