John

After this, there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

Now, near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem, there is a pool called Bethzatha in Hebrew, surrounded by five covered colonnades.

In these colonnades, there was a multitude of sick people: the blind, the lame, and the paralyzed.

[[Everyone was waiting for the water to move, from time to time an angel of the Lord would descend into the pool and stir the water; and the first person to enter the pool after this movement of the water would be healed of whatever disease he had.]]

There was a man who had been sick for thirty-eight years.

Jesus saw him and, knowing how long he had been lying there, he asked:

“Do you want to be well?”

The sick man replied:

“Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; while I am trying to get in, someone else steps down before me.”

Jesus then said to him:

“Rise, take your mat and walk!”

Immediately, the man was healed, took up his mat, and walked.

Now that day happened to be the Sabbath.

So the Jews said to the man who had just been healed:

“It is the Sabbath, and the law doesn’t allow you to carry your mat.”

He answered them:

“The man who healed me told me, ‘Take up your mat and walk!’”

They asked him:

“Who is the man who told you: Take up your mat and walk?”

The man who was healed had no idea who it was, for Jesus had slipped away among the crowd that filled the place.

Later, Jesus met him in the temple courtyard and said:

“Now you are well; don’t sin again, so that nothing worse happens to you.”

The man went and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.

Jesus’ Authority

So the Jews began to persecute Jesus because he performed healings like that on the Sabbath.

But Jesus answered them:

“My Father is still working, and I also am working.”

For this reason, the Jews tried even harder to kill him, because Jesus not only broke the Sabbath rules but also claimed to be equal with God by calling God his own Father.

Jesus answered and said to them:

“Truly, I assure you, the Son cannot do anything on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing. And whatever the Father does, the Son also does.

For the Father loves his Son and shows him everything he himself does; and he will show him even greater things than these, so that you will be amazed.

As the Father raises the dead and grants them life, so the Son gives life to those he chooses.

Similarly, the Father does not judge anyone, because he has entrusted all judgment to the Son.

He desires everyone to honor the Son just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.

Truly, I tell you, anyone who hears my words and believes in the one who sent me has eternal life, and does not come under judgment, but has passed from death to life.

Truly, the hour is coming—and is already here—when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live.

For just as the Father has life in himself, so also, he gave to his Son to have life in himself.

He gave him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man.

Do not be surprised at this: a time is coming when all who are in their graves will hear his voice

and come out; those who have done good will rise to live, and those who have done evil will rise to be condemned.

I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, so I judge, and my judgment is correct because I do not seek my own will but the will of him who sent me.

If I testify on my own behalf, my testimony would be worthless.

But Another One is bearing witness to me, and I know that his testimony on my behalf is true.

John also bore witness to the truth when you sent messengers to him.

But I do not rely on human testimony; I say this for you, so that you may be saved.

John was a burning and shining lamp, and for a while, you were willing to enjoy his light.

But I have greater evidence than that of John—the works, which the Father entrusted to me to carry out. The very works I do bear witness that the Father has sent me.

And the Father who sent me has himself testified on my behalf. You have never heard his voice or seen his form.

Therefore, as long as you do not believe in the one whom he has sent, his word is not in you.

You search the scriptures, thinking that in them you will find life; even they testify on my behalf.

But you refuse to come to me to have life.

I am not seeking human praise;

but I know that the love of God is not within you,

for I have come in my Father’s name and you do not accept me. If another comes in his own name, you will accept him.

As long as you seek praise from one another, instead of seeking the glory, which comes from the only God, how can you believe?

Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father. Moses himself, in whom you placed your hope, accuses you.

For if you had believed Moses, you would have believed me, for he wrote about me.

But if you do not believe what he wrote, how will you believe what I say?