John 5:1-7 ▼

1 Later on there was a Jewish feast (festival), and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

2 Now in Jerusalem, near the Sheep Gate, there is a pool, which is called in Hebrew (Jewish Aramaic) Bethesda, having five porticoes (alcoves, colonnades).

3 In these porticoes lay a great number of people who were sick, blind, lame, withered, [waiting for the stirring of the water;

4 for an angel of the Lord went down into the pool at appointed seasons and stirred up the water; the first one to go in after the water was stirred was healed of his disease.]

5 There was a certain man there who had been ill for thirty-eight years.

6 When Jesus noticed him lying there [helpless], knowing that he had been in that condition a long time, He said to him, “Do you want to get well?”

7 The invalid answered, “Sir, I have no one to put me in the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am coming [to get into it myself], someone else steps down ahead of me.”