John 1:22-51 ▼

22 |Who are you?| they asked him. |We must give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?|

23 He replied, |I am '...a voice crying out in the wilderness, |Prepare the Lord's highway,|' as the prophet Isaiah said.|

24 Now those men had been sent from the Pharisees.

25 They asked him, |Why, then, are you baptizing if you are not the Messiah, or Elijah, or the Prophet?|

26 John answered them, |I am baptizing with water, but among you stands a man whom you do not know,

27 the one who is coming after me, whose sandal straps I am not worthy to untie.|

28 This happened in Bethany on the other side of the Jordan, where John was baptizing.

29 The next day, John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, |Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!

30 This is the one about whom I said, 'After me comes a man who ranks above me, because he existed before me.'

31 I didn't recognize him, but I came baptizing with water so that he might be revealed to Israel.|

32 John also testified, |I saw the Spirit coming down from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him.

33 I didn't recognize him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water told me, 'The person on whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.'

34 I have seen this and have testified that this is the Son of God.|

35 The next day, John was standing there again with two of his disciples.

36 As he watched Jesus walk by, he said, |Look, the Lamb of God!|

37 When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus.

38 But when Jesus turned around and saw them following, he asked them, |What are you looking for?| They asked him, |Rabbi,| (which is translated |Teacher|), |where are you staying?|

39 He told them, |Come and see!| So they went and saw where he was staying, and they remained with him that day. It was about four o'clock in the afternoon.

40 Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, was one of the two who heard John and followed Jesus.

41 The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and say to him, |We have found the Anointed One!| (which is translated |Messiah|).

42 He led Simon to Jesus. Jesus looked at him intently and said, |You are Simon, John's son. You will be called Cephas!| (which is translated |Peter|).

43 The next day, Jesus decided to go away to Galilee, where he found Philip and told him, |Follow me.|

44 Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the hometown of Andrew and Peter.

45 Philip found Nathaniel and told him, |We have found the man about whom Moses in the Law and the Prophets wrote—Jesus, the son of Joseph, from Nazareth.|

46 Nathaniel asked him, |From Nazareth? Can anything good come from there?| Philip told him, |Come and see!|

47 Jesus saw Nathaniel coming toward him and said about him, |Look, a genuine Israeli, in whom there is no deceit!|

48 Nathaniel asked him, |How do you know me?| Jesus answered him, |Before Philip called you, while you were under the fig tree, I saw you.|

49 Nathaniel replied to him, |Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!|

50 Jesus told him, |Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than that.|

51 Then he told him, |Truly, I tell all of you emphatically, you will see heaven standing open and the angels of God going up and coming down to the Son of Man.|