Gospel according to John 3

¹ There was one of the Pharisees called Nicodemus, a leading Jew,

² who came to Jesus by night and said, ‘Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who comes from God; for no one could perform the signs that you do unless God were with him’.

³ Jesus answered: ‘I tell you most solemnly, unless a man is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God’.

⁴ Nicodemus said, ‘How can a grown man be born? Can he go back into his mother’s womb and be born again?’

⁵ Jesus replied: ‘I tell you most solemnly, unless a man is born through water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God:

⁶ what is born of the flesh is flesh; what is born of the Spirit is spirit.

⁷ Do not be surprised when I say: You must be born from above.

⁸ The wind blows wherever it pleases; you hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. That is how it is with all who are born of the Spirit.’

⁹ ‘How can that be possible?’ asked Nicodemus.

¹⁰ ‘You, a teacher in Israel, and you do not know these things!’ replied Jesus.

¹¹ ‘I tell you most solemnly, we speak only about what we know and witness only to what we have seen and yet you people reject our evidence.

¹² If you do not believe me when I speak about things in this world, how are you going to believe me when I speak to you about heavenly things?

¹³ No one has gone up to heaven except the one who came down from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven; and the Son of Man must be lifted up

¹⁴ as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert,

¹⁵ so that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.

¹⁶ Yes, God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may have eternal life.

¹⁷ For God sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world, but so that through him the world might be saved.

¹⁸ No one who believes in him will be condemned; but whoever refuses to believe is condemned already, because he has refused to believe in the name of God’s only Son.

¹⁹ On these grounds is sentence pronounced: that though the light has come into the world men have shown they prefer darkness to the light because their deeds were evil.

²⁰ And indeed, everybody who does wrong hates the light and avoids it, for fear his actions should be exposed;

²¹ but the man who lives by the truth comes out into the light, so that it may be plainly seen that what he does is done in God;’

²² After this, Jesus went with his disciples into the Judaean countryside and stayed with them there and baptised.

²³ At the same time John was baptising at Aenon[*a] near Salim, where there was plenty of water, and people were going there to be baptised.

²⁴ This was before John had been put in prison.

²⁵ Now some of John’s disciples had opened a discussion with a Jew about purification,

²⁶ so they went to John and said, ‘Rabbi, the man who was with you on the far side of the Jordan, the man to whom you bore witness, is baptising now; and everyone is going to him’.

²⁷ John replied: ‘A man can lay claim only to what is given him from heaven.

²⁸ ‘You yourselves can bear me out: I said: I myself am not the Christ; I am the one who has been sent in front of him.

²⁹ ‘The bride is only for the bridegroom; and yet the bridegroom’s friend, who stands there and listens, is glad when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. This same joy I feel, and now it is complete.

³⁰ He must grow greater, I must grow smaller.

³¹ He who comes from above is above all others; he who is born of the earth is earthly himself and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven

³² bears witness to the things he has seen and heard, even if his testimony is not accepted;

³³ though all who do accept his testimony are attesting the truthfulness of God,

³⁴ since he whom God has sent speaks God’s own words: God gives him the Spirit without reserve.

³⁵ The Father loves the Son and has entrusted everything to him.

³⁶ Anyone who believes in the Son has eternal life, but anyone who refuses to believe in the Son will never see life: the anger of God stays on him.’