Christ and Nicodemus
3
📚✭There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. 2 📚✭This man came to Jesus at night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no man can do these miraculous signs that you are doing, unless God is with him”. 3 📚✭Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly I say to you, unless a man is born again,✭ he cannot see the kingdom of God”.
4 📚✭Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born?”
5 📚✭Jesus answered, “Truly, truly I say to you, unless a man is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 📚That which is born of the flesh is flesh,✭ and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. 7 📚Do not be surprised that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 📚The wind blows✭ where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but cannot tell from where it comes and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit”.
9 📚✭Nicodemus answered and said to him, “How can these things be?”
10 📚✭Jesus answered and said to him, “You are a teacher of Israel, and do you not know these things? 11 📚✭Truly, truly I say to you, we speak what we know, and testify to what we have seen. And you do not receive our testimony. 12 📚✭I have told you earthly things, and if you do not believe them, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? 13 📚✭And no man has gone up to heaven except he who came down from heaven, that is, the Son of man who is in heaven.✭
14 📚✭“And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up, 15 📚so that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
16 📚✭“For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son,✭ that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
17 📚✭“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. 18 📚✭He who believes in him is not condemned, but he who does not believe is already condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 📚✭And this is the condemnation: Light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 📚For everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come to the light, so that his deeds will not be exposed. 21 📚✭But he who practices truth comes to the light so that it may be revealed that his deeds have been done through God”.
Further testimony of John the Baptist
22 📚After these things Jesus and his disciples came to the land of Judea, and there he spent time with them, and baptized. 23 📚✭And John also was baptizing in Aenon near Salim, because there was much water there. And people came and were baptized. 24 📚For John had not yet been thrown into prison.
25 📚Then an argument began between some of John’s disciples and the Jews about purification. 26 📚And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi✭, he who was with you beyond the Jordan, about whom you testified, the same man is baptizing, and everyone is coming to him”.
27 📚✭John answered and said, “A man can receive nothing unless it is given to him from heaven. 28 📚✭You yourselves can testify for me that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I was sent before him.’ 29 📚He who has the bride is the bridegroom. But the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and listens to him, greatly rejoices because of the bridegroom’s voice. So this joy of mine is complete. 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 he testifies to what he has seen and heard, and no man 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 to him by measure.