Fourth Sunday of Lent

For you were once darkness, but are now light in the Lord. Walk as children of light, ⁹for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth, ¹⁰proving what is well pleasing to the Lord. ¹¹Have no fellowship with the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but rather even reprove them. ¹²For it is a shame even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret. ¹³But all things, when they are reproved, are revealed by the light, for everything that reveals is light. ¹⁴Therefore he says, “Awake, you who sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”

¹⁵Therefore watch carefully how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise, ¹⁶redeeming the time, because the days are evil. ¹⁷Therefore, don’t be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. ¹⁸Don’t be drunken with wine, in which is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit, ¹⁹speaking to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs; singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord;

One of the multitude answered, “Teacher, I brought to you my son, who has a mute spirit; ¹⁸and wherever it seizes him, it throws him down; and he foams at the mouth, grinds his teeth, and becomes rigid. I asked your disciples to cast it out, and they weren’t able.”

¹⁹He answered him, “Unbelieving generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I bear with you? Bring him to me.”

²⁰They brought him to him, and when he saw him, immediately the spirit convulsed him and he fell on the ground, wallowing and foaming at the mouth.

²¹He asked his father, “How long has it been since this has been happening to him?” He said, “From childhood. ²²Often it has cast him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him. But if you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”

²³Jesus said to him, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.”

²⁴Immediately the father of the child cried out with tears, “I believe. Help my unbelief!”

²⁵When Jesus saw that a multitude came running together, he rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to him, “You mute and deaf spirit, I command you, come out of him, and never enter him again!”

²⁶After crying out and convulsing him greatly, it came out of him. The boy became like one dead, so much that most of them said, “He is dead.” ²⁷But Jesus took him by the hand and raised him up; and he arose.

²⁸When he had come into the house, his disciples asked him privately, “Why couldn’t we cast it out?”

²⁹He said to them, “This kind can come out by nothing but by prayer and fasting.”

³⁰They went out from there and passed through Galilee. He didn’t want anyone to know it, ³¹for he was teaching his disciples, and said to them, “The Son of Man is being handed over to the hands of men, and they will kill him; and when he is killed, on the third day he will rise again.”