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¹Now there was a certain man among the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler (member of the Sanhedrin) among the Jews,

²who came to Jesus at night and said to Him, "Rabbi (Teacher), we know [without any doubt] that You have come from God as a teacher; for no one can do these signs [these wonders, these attesting miracles] that You do unless God is with him."

³Jesus answered him, "I assure you and most solemnly say to you, unless a person is born again [reborn from above—spiritually transformed, renewed, sanctified], he cannot [ever] see and experience the kingdom of God."

⁴Nicodemus said to Him, "How can a man be born when he is old? He cannot enter his mother's womb a second time and be born, can he?"

⁵Jesus answered, "I assure you and most solemnly say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot [ever] enter the kingdom of God.

⁶That which is born of the flesh is flesh [the physical is merely physical], and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.

⁷Do not be surprised that I have told you, 'You must be born again [reborn from above—spiritually transformed, renewed, sanctified].'

⁸The wind blows where it wishes and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it is coming from and where it is going; so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit."

⁹Nicodemus said to Him, "How can these things be possible?"

¹⁰Jesus replied, "You are the [great and well-known] teacher of Israel, and yet you do not know nor understand these things [from Scripture]?

¹¹I assure you and most solemnly say to you, we speak only of what we [absolutely] know and testify about what we have [actually] seen [as eyewitnesses]; and [still] you [reject our evidence and] do not accept our testimony.

¹²If I told you earthly things [that is, things that happen right here on earth] and you do not believe, how will you believe and trust Me if I tell you heavenly things?

¹³No one has gone up into heaven, but there is One who came down from heaven, the Son of Man [Himself—whose home is in heaven].

¹⁴Just as Moses lifted up the [bronze] serpent in the desert [on a pole], so must the Son of Man be lifted up [on the cross],

¹⁵so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life [after physical death, and will actually live forever].

¹⁶"For God so [greatly] loved and dearly prized the world, that He [even] gave His [One and] only begotten Son, so that whoever believes and trusts in Him [as Savior] shall not perish, but have eternal life.

¹⁷For God did not send the Son into the world to judge and condemn the world [that is, to initiate the final judgment of the world], but that the world might be saved through Him.

¹⁸Whoever believes and has decided to trust in Him [as personal Savior and Lord] is not judged [for this one, there is no judgment, no rejection, no condemnation]; but the one who does not believe [and has decided to reject Him as personal Savior and Lord] is judged already [that one has been convicted and sentenced], because he has not believed and trusted in the name of the [One and] only begotten Son of God [the One who is truly unique, the only One of His kind, the One who alone can save him].

¹⁹This is the judgment [that is, the cause for indictment, the test by which people are judged, the basis for the sentence]: the Light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.

²⁰For every wrongdoer hates the Light, and does not come to the Light [but shrinks from it] for fear that his [sinful, worthless] activities will be exposed and condemned.

²¹But whoever practices truth [and does what is right—morally, ethically, spiritually] comes to the Light, so that his works may be plainly shown to be what they are—accomplished in God [divinely prompted, done with God's help, in dependence on Him]."

²²After these things Jesus and His disciples went into the land of Judea, and there He spent time with them and baptized.

²³Now John was also baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because there was an abundance of water there; and people were coming and were being baptized—

²⁴for John had not yet been thrown into prison.

²⁵Therefore there arose a controversy between John's disciples and a Jew in regard to purification (ceremonial washing).

²⁶So they came to John and said to him, "Rabbi (Teacher), the Man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan [at the Jordan River crossing]—and to whom you have testified—look, He is baptizing too, and everyone is going to Him!"

²⁷John replied, "A man can receive nothing [he can claim nothing at all] unless it has been granted to him from heaven [for there is no other source than the sovereign will of God].

²⁸You yourselves are my witnesses that I stated, 'I am not the Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed),' but, 'I have [only] been sent ahead of Him [as His appointed forerunner and messenger to announce and proclaim His coming].'

²⁹He who has the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, who stands by and listens to him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's voice. So this pleasure and joy of mine is now complete.

³⁰He must increase [in prominence], but I must decrease.

³¹"He who comes from [heaven] above is above all others; he who is of the earth is from the earth and speaks [about things] of the earth [his viewpoint and experience are earthly]. He who comes from heaven is above all.

³²What He has [actually] seen and heard, of that He testifies; and yet no one accepts His testimony [as true].

³³Whoever receives His testimony has set his seal [of approval] to this: God is true [and he knows that God cannot lie].

³⁴For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God [proclaiming the Father's own message]; for God gives the [gift of the] Spirit without measure [generously and boundlessly]!

³⁵The Father loves the Son and has given and entrusted all things into His hand.

³⁶He who believes and trusts in the Son and accepts Him [as Savior] has eternal life [that is, already possesses it]; but he who does not believe the Son and chooses to reject Him, [disobeying Him and denying Him as Savior] will not see [eternal] life, but [instead] the wrath of God hangs over him continually."

¹So when the Lord learned that the Pharisees had been told that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John

²(although Jesus Himself was not baptizing, but His disciples were),

³He left Judea and returned again to Galilee.

⁴Now He had to go through Samaria.

⁵So He arrived at a Samaritan town called Sychar, near the tract of land that Jacob gave to his son Joseph;

⁶and Jacob's well was there. So Jesus, tired as He was from His journey, sat down by the well. It was then about the sixth hour (noon).

⁷Then a woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, "Give Me a drink"—

⁸For His disciples had gone off into the city to buy food—

⁹The Samaritan woman asked Him, "How is it that You, being a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?" (For Jews have nothing to do with Samaritans.)

¹⁰Jesus answered her, "If you knew [about] God's gift [of eternal life], and who it is who says, 'Give Me a drink,' you would have asked Him [instead], and He would have given you living water (eternal life)."

¹¹She said to Him, "Sir, You have nothing to draw with [no bucket and rope] and the well is deep. Where then do You get that living water?

¹²Are You greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well, and who used to drink from it himself, and his sons and his cattle also?"

¹³Jesus answered her, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again.

¹⁴But whoever drinks the water that I give him will never be thirsty again. But the water that I give him will become in him a spring of water [satisfying his thirst for God] welling up [continually flowing, bubbling within him] to eternal life."

¹⁵The woman said to Him, "Sir, give me this water, so that I will not get thirsty nor [have to continually] come all the way here to draw."

¹⁶At this, Jesus said, "Go, call your husband and come back."

¹⁷The woman answered, "I do not have a husband." Jesus said to her, "You have correctly said, 'I do not have a husband';

¹⁸for you have had five husbands, and the man you are now living with is not your husband. You have said this truthfully."

¹⁹The woman said to Him, "Sir, I see that You are a prophet.

²⁰Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews say that the place where one ought to worship is in Jerusalem [at the temple]."

²¹Jesus replied, "Woman, believe Me, a time is coming [when God's kingdom comes] when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.

²²You [Samaritans] do not know what you worship; we [Jews] do know what we worship, for salvation is from the Jews.

²³But a time is coming and is already here when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit [from the heart, the inner self] and in truth; for the Father seeks such people to be His worshipers.

²⁴God is spirit [the Source of life, yet invisible to mankind], and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth."

²⁵The woman said to Him, "I know that Messiah is coming (He who is called Christ—the Anointed); when that One comes, He will tell us everything [we need to know]."

²⁶Jesus said to her, "I who speak to you, am He (the Messiah)."

²⁷Just then His disciples came, and they were surprised to find Him talking with a woman. However, no one said, "What are You asking about?" or, "Why are You talking to her?"

²⁸Then the woman left her water jar, and went into the city and began telling the people,

²⁹"Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done! Can this be the Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed)?"

³⁰So the people left the city and were coming to Him.

³¹Meanwhile, the disciples were urging Jesus [to have a meal], saying, "Rabbi (Teacher), eat."

³²But He told them, "I have food to eat that you do not know about."

³³So the disciples said to one another, "Has anyone brought Him something to eat?"

³⁴Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to completely finish His work.

³⁵Do you not say, 'It is still four months until the harvest comes?' Look, I say to you, raise your eyes and look at the fields and see, they are white for harvest.

³⁶Already the reaper is receiving his wages and he is gathering fruit for eternal life; so that he who plants and he who reaps may rejoice together.

³⁷For in this case the saying is true, 'One [person] sows and another reaps.'

³⁸I sent you to reap [a crop] for which you have not worked. Others have worked and you have been privileged to reap the results of their work."

³⁹Now many Samaritans from that city believed in Him and trusted Him [as Savior] because of what the woman said when she testified, "He told me all the things that I have done."

⁴⁰So when the Samaritans came to Jesus, they asked Him to remain with them; and He stayed there two days.

⁴¹Many more believed in Him [with a deep, abiding trust] because of His word [His personal message to them];

⁴²and they told the woman, "We no longer believe just because of what you said; for [now] we have heard Him for ourselves and know [with confident assurance] that this One is truly the Savior of [all] the world."

⁴³After the two days He went on from there into Galilee.

⁴⁴For Jesus Himself declared that a prophet has no honor in his own country.

⁴⁵So when He arrived in Galilee, the Galileans welcomed Him, since they had seen all the things that He did in Jerusalem at the feast; for they too came to the feast.

⁴⁶So Jesus came again to Cana of Galilee, where He had turned the water into wine. And there was a certain royal official whose son was sick in Capernaum.

⁴⁷Having heard that Jesus had come back from Judea to Galilee, he went to meet Him and began asking Him to come down and heal his son; for he was at the point of death.

⁴⁸Then Jesus said to him, "Unless you [people] see [miraculous] signs and wonders, you [simply] will not believe."

⁴⁹The royal official pleaded with Him, "Sir, do come down [at once] before my child dies!"

⁵⁰Jesus said to him, "Go; your son lives!" The man believed what Jesus said to him and started home.

⁵¹As he was already going down [the road], his servants met him and reported that his son was living [and was healthy].

⁵²So he asked them at what time he began to get better. They said, "Yesterday during the seventh hour the fever left him."

⁵³Then the father realized that it was at that very hour when Jesus had said to him, "Your son lives"; and he and his entire household believed and confidently trusted [in Him as Savior].

⁵⁴This is the second sign (attesting miracle) that Jesus performed [in Cana] after He had come from Judea to Galilee [revealing that He is the Messiah].