5Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for a Jewish feast. ²In Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate is a pool. In the Aramaic language it is called Bethesda. It is surrounded by five rows of columns with a roof over them. ^3/4Here a great number of disabled people used to lie down. Among them were those who were blind, those who could not walk, and those who could hardly move.

⁵One person who was there had been disabled for 38 years. ⁶Jesus saw him lying there. He knew that the man had been in that condition for a long time. So he asked him, “Do you want to get well?”

⁷“Sir,” the disabled man replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when an angel stirs the water up. I try to get in, but someone else always goes down ahead of me.”

⁸Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.”

⁹At once the man was healed. He picked up his mat and walked.

The day this happened was a Sabbath. ¹⁰So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath. The law does not allow you to carry your mat.”

¹¹But he replied, “The one who made me well said to me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’ ”

¹²They asked him, “Who is this fellow? Who told you to pick it up and walk?”

¹³The one who was healed had no idea who it was. Jesus had slipped away into the crowd that was there.

¹⁴Later Jesus found him at the temple. Jesus said to him, “See, you are well again. Stop sinning, or something worse may happen to you.” ¹⁵The man went away. He told the Jews it was Jesus who had made him well.

Life Because of the Son

¹⁶Jesus was doing these things on the Sabbath day. So the Jews began to oppose him.

¹⁷Jesus said to them, “My Father is always doing his work. He is working right up to this very day. I am working too.”

¹⁸For this reason the Jews tried even harder to kill him. Jesus was not only breaking the Sabbath. He was even calling God his own Father. He was making himself equal with God.

¹⁹Jesus answered, “What I’m about to tell you is true. The Son can do nothing by himself. He can do only what he sees his Father doing. What the Father does, the Son also does. ²⁰This is because the Father loves the Son. He shows him everything he does. Yes, you will be amazed! The Father will show him even greater things than these.

²¹“The Father raises the dead and gives them life. In the same way, the Son gives life to anyone he wants to.

²²“Also, the Father does not judge anyone. He has given the Son the task of judging. ²³Then all people will honor the Son just as they honor the Father. Those who do not honor the Son do not honor the Father, who sent him.

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