1 Among the Pharisees there was a man named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews.
2 He came to Jesus at night and said to him, "Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one could do the signs you are doing unless God were with him."
3 Jesus answered him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless someone is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."
4 Nicodemus said to him, "How can anyone be born when he is old? He cannot go back into his mother's womb a second time and be born, can he?"
5 Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless someone is born of water and Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
6 What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit.
7 Do not be amazed that I told you, 'You must be born again.'
8 The wind blows wherever it pleases; you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going. That is how it is with everyone born of the Spirit."
9 Nicodemus replied, "How can these things happen?"
10 Jesus answered him, "You are the teacher of Israel, and you do not know these things?
11 Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen, and yet you people do not accept our testimony.
12 If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly ones?
13 No one has gone up into heaven except the one who came down from heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven.
14 Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so the Son of Man has to be lifted up,
15 so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life.
17 God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but so that the world might be saved through him.
18 The one who believes in him is not condemned; the one who does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19 And this is the condemnation: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness more than the light, because what they did was evil.
20 For everyone who practices wickedness hates the light and does not come to the light, so that his deeds will not be exposed.
21 But the one who does the truth comes to the light, so that it may be made plain that his deeds have been done in God."
22 After this Jesus went with his disciples into the Judean countryside, and he spent time with them there and was baptizing.
23 John too was baptizing, at Aenon near Salim, because water was plentiful there; and people kept coming and were baptized.
24 John had not yet been put in prison.
25 A dispute about purification broke out between some of John's disciples and the Jews.
26 They came to John and told him, "Rabbi, the man who was with you across the Jordan, the one you testified about, look, he is baptizing, and everyone is going to him."
27 John answered, "A person cannot receive even one thing unless it has been given to him from heaven.
28 You yourselves can testify that I said, 'I am not the Christ; rather, I have been sent ahead of him.'
29 The bride belongs to the bridegroom. The bridegroom's friend, who stands by and listens for him, is overjoyed at the bridegroom's voice. So this joy of mine is now complete.
30 He must grow greater, and I must grow less.
31 The one who comes from above is above all. The one who is from the earth belongs to the earth and speaks as one from the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all.
32 He testifies to what he has seen and heard, and yet no one accepts his testimony.
33 The one who has accepted his testimony has put his seal on this: God is true.
34 For the one whom God sent speaks God's words, since God does not give the Spirit in limited measure.
35 The Father loves the Son and has put everything into his hands.
36 The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; the one who refuses to obey the Son will not see life, but God's wrath remains on him."