1In the beginning there was the Word. ⁿ The Word was with God, and the Word was God. ²He was with God in the beginning. ³All things were made by him, and nothing was made without him. ⁴In him there was life, and that life was the light of all people. ⁵The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overpowered ⁿ it.

⁶There was a man named John ⁿ who was sent by God. ⁷He came to tell people the truth about the Light so that through him all people could hear about the Light and believe. ⁸John was not the Light, but he came to tell people the truth about the Light. ⁹The true Light that gives light to all was coming into the world!

¹⁰The Word was in the world, and the world was made by him, but the world did not know him. ¹¹He came to the world that was his own, but his own people did not accept him. ¹²But to all who did accept him and believe in him he gave the right to become children of God. ¹³They did not become his children in any human way—by any human parents or human desire. They were born of God.

¹⁴The Word became a human and lived among us. We saw his glory—the glory that belongs to the only Son of the Father—and he was full of grace and truth. ¹⁵John tells the truth about him and cries out, saying, “This is the One I told you about: ‘The One who comes after me is greater than I am, because he was living before me.’ ”

¹⁶Because he was full of grace and truth, from him we all received one gift after another. ¹⁷The law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. ¹⁸No one has ever seen God. But God the only Son is very close to the Father, ⁿ and he has shown us what God is like.

John Tells People About Jesus

¹⁹Here is the truth John ⁿ told when the leaders in Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him, “Who are you?”

²⁰John spoke freely and did not refuse to answer. He said, “I am not the Christ.”

²¹So they asked him, “Then who are you? Are you Elijah?” ⁿ

He answered, “No, I am not.”

“Are you the Prophet?” ⁿ they asked.

He answered, “No.”

²²Then they said, “Who are you? Give us an answer to tell those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?”

²³John told them in the words of the prophet Isaiah:

“I am the voice of one

calling out in the desert:

‘Make the road straight for the Lord.’ ”

²⁴Some Pharisees who had been sent asked John: ²⁵“If you are not the Christ or Elijah or the Prophet, why do you baptize people?”

²⁶John answered, “I baptize with water, but there is one here with you that you don’t know about. ²⁷He is the One who comes after me. I am not good enough to untie the strings of his sandals.”

²⁸This all happened at Bethany on the other side of the Jordan River, where John was baptizing people.

Read in Logos

John 1:1: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Footnotes

nWord The Greek word is “logos,” meaning any kind of communication; it could be translated “message.” Here, it means Christ, because Christ was the way God told people about himself.
noverpowered This can also be translated, “understood.”
nJohn John the Baptist, who preached to people about Christ’s coming (Matthew 3, Luke 3).
nBut … Father This could be translated, “But the only God is very close to the Father.” Also, some Greek copies read “But the only Son is very close to the Father.”
nJohn John the Baptist, who preached to people about Christ’s coming (Matthew 3, Luke 3).
nElijah A prophet who spoke for God. He lived hundreds of years before Christ and was expected to return before Christ (Malachi 4:5–6).
nProphet They probably meant the prophet that God told Moses he would send (Deuteronomy 18:15–19).