John's Story (22 page)

²⁷
John answered and said, “A man can receive nothing unless it has been given to him from heaven.
²⁸
You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ,’ but, ‘I have been sent before Him.’
²⁹
He who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is fulfilled.
³⁰
He must increase, but I
must
decrease.
³¹
He who comes from above is above all; he who is of the earth is earthly and speaks of the earth. He who comes from heaven is above all.
³²
And what He has seen and heard, that He testifies; and no one receives His testimony.
³³
He who has received His testimony has certified that God is true.
³⁴
For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God does not give the Spirit by measure.
³⁵
The Father loves the Son, and has given all things into His hand.
³⁶
He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.”

A Samaritan Woman Meets Her Messiah

4
Therefore, when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John
²
(though Jesus Himself did not baptize, but His disciples),
³
He left Judea and departed again to Galilee.
⁴
But He needed to go through Samaria.

⁵
So He came to a city of Samaria which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph.
⁶
Now Jacob’s well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied from
His
journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth hour.

⁷
A woman of Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.”
⁸
For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.

⁹
Then the woman of Samaria said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.

¹⁰
Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.”

¹¹
The woman said to Him, “Sir, You have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water?
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Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, as well as his sons and his livestock?”

¹³
Jesus answered and said to her, “Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again,
¹⁴
but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”

¹⁵
The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water, that I may not thirst, nor come here to draw.”

¹⁶
Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.”

¹⁷
The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.”

Jesus said to her, “You have well said, ‘I have no husband,’
¹⁸
for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; in that you spoke truly.”

¹⁹
The woman said to Him, “Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet.
²⁰
Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, and you
Jews
say that in Jerusalem is the place where one ought to worship.”

²¹
Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father.
²²
You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews.
²³
But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him.
²⁴
God
is
Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”

²⁵
The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming” (who is called Christ). “When He comes, He will tell us all things.”

²⁶
Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am
He.
”

The Whitened Harvest

²⁷
And at this
point
His disciples came, and they marveled that He talked with a woman; yet no one said, “What do You seek?” or, “Why are You talking with her?”

²⁸
The woman then left her waterpot, went her way into the city, and said to the men,
²⁹
“Come, see a Man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ?”

³⁰
Then they went out of the city and came to Him.

³¹
In the meantime His disciples urged Him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.”

³²
But He said to them, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.”

³³
Therefore the disciples said to one another, “Has anyone brought Him
anything
to eat?”

³⁴
Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to finish His work.
³⁵
Do you not say, ‘There are still four months and
then
comes the harvest’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest!
³⁶
And he who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together.
³⁷
For in this the saying is true: ‘One sows and another reaps.’
³⁸
I sent you to reap that for which you have not labored; others have labored, and you have entered into their labors.”

The Savior of the World

³⁹
And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, “He told me all that I
ever
did.”
⁴⁰
So when the Samaritans had come to Him, they urged Him to stay with them; and He stayed there two days.
⁴¹
And many more believed because of His own word.

⁴²
Then they said to the woman, “Now we believe, not because of what you said, for we ourselves have heard
Him
and we know that this is indeed the Christ,
a
the Savior of the world.”

Welcome at Galilee

⁴³
Now after the two days He departed from there and went to Galilee.
⁴⁴
For Jesus Himself testified that a prophet has no honor in his own country.
⁴⁵
So when He came to Galilee, the Galileans received Him, having seen all the things He did in Jerusalem at the feast; for they also had gone to the feast.

A Nobleman’s Son Healed

⁴⁶
So Jesus came again to Cana of Galilee where He had made the water wine. And there was a certain nobleman whose son was sick at Capernaum.
⁴⁷
When he heard that Jesus had come out of Judea into Galilee, he went to Him and implored Him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death.
⁴⁸
Then Jesus said to him, “Unless you
people
see signs and wonders, you will by no means believe.”

⁴⁹
The nobleman said to Him, “Sir, come down before my child dies!”

⁵⁰
Jesus said to him, “Go your way; your son lives.” So the man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him, and he went his way.
⁵¹
And as he was now going down, his servants met him and told
him,
saying, “Your son lives!”

⁵²
Then he inquired of them the hour when he got better. And they said to him, “Yesterday at the seventh hour the fever left him.”
⁵³
So the father knew that
it was
at the same hour in which Jesus said to him, “Your son lives.” And he himself believed, and his whole household.

⁵⁴
This again
is
the second sign Jesus did when He had come out of Judea into Galilee.

A Man Healed at the Pool of Bethesda

5
After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
²
Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep
Gate
a pool, which is called in Hebrew, Bethesda,
a
having five porches.
³
In these lay a great multitude of sick people, blind, lame, paralyzed, waiting for the moving of the water.
⁴
For an angel went down at a certain time into the pool and stirred up the water; then whoever stepped in first, after the stirring of the water, was made well of whatever disease he had.
a
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Now a certain man was there who had an infirmity thirty-eight years.
⁶
When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he already had been
in that condition
a long time, He said to him, “Do you want to be made well?”

⁷
The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”

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Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.”
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And immediately the man was made well, took up his bed, and walked.

And that day was the Sabbath.
¹⁰
The Jews therefore said to him who was cured, “It is the Sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your bed.”

¹¹
He answered them, “He who made me well said to me, ‘Take up your bed and walk.’”

¹²
Then they asked him, “Who is the Man who said to you, ‘Take up your bed and walk’?”
¹³
But the one who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had withdrawn, a multitude being in
that
place.
¹⁴
Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, “See, you have been made well. Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you.”

¹⁵
The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.

Honor the Father and the Son

¹⁶
For this reason the Jews persecuted Jesus, and sought to kill Him,
a
because He had done these things on the Sabbath.
¹⁷
But Jesus answered them, “My Father has been working until now, and I have been working.”

¹⁸
Therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill Him, because He not only broke the Sabbath, but also said that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God.
¹⁹
Then Jesus answered and said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He sees the Father do; for whatever He does, the Son also does in like manner.
²⁰
For the Father loves the Son, and shows Him all things that He Himself does; and He will show Him greater works than these, that you may marvel.
²¹
For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to
them,
even so the Son gives life to whom He will.
²²
For the Father judges no one, but has committed all judgment to the Son,
²³
that all should honor the Son just as they honor the Father. He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent Him.

Life and Judgment Are Through the Son

²⁴
“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.
²⁵
Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live.
²⁶
For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself,
²⁷
and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man.
²⁸
Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice
²⁹
and come forth—those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation.
³⁰
I can of Myself do nothing. As I hear, I judge; and My judgment is righteous, because I do not seek My own will but the will of the Father who sent Me.

The Fourfold Witness

³¹
“If I bear witness of Myself, My witness is not true.
³²
There is another who bears witness of Me, and I know that the witness which He witnesses of Me is true.
³³
You have sent to John, and he has borne witness to the truth.
³⁴
Yet I do not receive testimony from man, but I say these things that you may be saved.
³⁵
He was the burning and shining lamp, and you were willing for a time to rejoice in his light.
³⁶
But I have a greater witness than John’s; for the works which the Father has given Me to finish—the very works that I do—bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me.
³⁷
And the Father Himself, who sent Me, has testified of Me. You have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form.
³⁸
But you do not have His word abiding in you, because whom He sent, Him you do not believe.
³⁹
You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me.
⁴⁰
But you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life.