John 5:1-9

New International Reader's Version

Jesus Heals a Man at the Pool

5 Some time later, Jesus went up to Jerusalem for one of the Jewish feasts. ² In 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. ^3-4 Here 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. ⁵ One person was there who had not been able to walk for 38 years. ⁶ Jesus 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 up the water. I try to get in, but someone else always goes down ahead of me.”

⁸ Then Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” ⁹ The man was healed right away. He picked up his mat and walked.

This happened on a Sabbath day.