Matthew Henry

If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you about heavenly things?

“Thus the Lord of glory, as such, could not be crucified, nor could God, as such, shed his blood; yet that person who was the Lord of glory was crucified ( 1 Cor. ii.”

No one has ascended into heaven except the One who descended from heaven—the Son of Man.

“First, None but Christ was able to reveal to us the will of God for our salvation. Nicodemus addressed Christ as a prophet; but he must know that he is greater than all the Old-Testament prophets, for none of them had ascended into heaven.”

Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up,

“It was the last miracle that passed through the hand of Moses before his death. Now in this type of Christ we may observe, First, The deadly and destructive nature of sin, which is implied here.”

Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in Him may have eternal life.

“(2.) As one that is justly condemned to die for an unpardonable crime is a dead man, he is dead in law; and, in reference to this part of our danger, Christ came to save as a prince or judge, publishing an act of indemnity…”

For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that everyone who believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.

“Salvation has been of the Jews, but now Christ is known as salvation to the ends of the earth, a common salvation.”

For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him.

“Ever since man sinned, he has dreaded the approach and appearance of any special messenger from heaven, as being conscious of guilt and looking for judgment: We shall surely die, for we have seen God.”

For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him.

“An act of indemnity is passed and published, through Christ a remedial law made, and the world of mankind dealt with, not according to the rigours of the first covenant, but according to the riches of the second; that the world through him might be…”

Whoever believes in Him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.

“Though he has been a sinner, a great sinner, and stands convicted ( habes confilentem reum--by his own confession ), yet, upon his believing, process is stayed, judgment is arrested, and he is not condemned.”

After this, Jesus and His disciples went into the Judean countryside, where He spent some time with them and baptized.

“Let it not be said that all Christ's followers are unlearned and ignorant men. The principles of the Pharisees, and the peculiarities of their sect, were directly contrary to the spirit of Christianity; yet there were some in whom even those high thoughts were cast…”

When Jesus realized that the Pharisees were aware He was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John

“The souls which they had gotten, which they had made (so the word is), which they had made proselytes. Note, It is Christ's prerogative to make disciples, first to bring them to his foot, and then to form and fashion them to his will.”

Now He had to pass through Samaria.

“Some think that Christ must needs go through Samaria because of the good work he had to do there; a poor woman to be converted, a lost sheep to be sought and saved.”

When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Give Me a drink.” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

“This woman's meeting with Christ at the well may remind us of the stories of Rebekah, Rachel, and Jethro's daughter, who all met with husbands, good husbands, no worse than Isaac, Jacob, and Moses, when they came to the wells for water.”

“You are a Jew,” said the woman. “How can You ask for a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)

“Two things this woman wonders at, 1. That he should ask this kindness; for it was the pride of the Jews that they would endure any hardship rather than be beholden to a Samaritan.”

But whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a fount of water springing up to eternal life.”

“The principles and affections which Christ's holy religion forms in the souls of those that are brought under the power of it are this well of water. [ a.”

The woman said to Him, “Sir, give me this water so that I will not get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

“Even those that are weak and ignorant may yet have some faint and fluctuating desires towards Christ and his gifts, and some good wishes of grace and glory. Carnal hearts, in their best wishes, look no higher than carnal ends.”

“Sir,” the woman said, “I see that You are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews say that the place where one must worship is in…

“It was agreed between the Jews and the Samaritans that God is to be worshipped (even those who were such fools as to worship false gods were not such brutes as to worship none), and that religious worship is an affair of great importance: men…”

“Believe Me, woman,” Jesus replied, “a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.

“Note, The worship of God is not now, under the gospel, appropriated to any place, as it was under the law, but it is God's will that men pray every where.”

Some time later there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

“The sermon was Christ's vindication of himself before the sanhedrim, when he was prosecuted as a criminal for healing the man on the sabbath day, in which, 1. He asserts his authority as Messiah, and Mediator between God and man,”

Now there is in Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate a pool with five covered colonnades, which in Hebrew is called Bethesda.

“How it was called: It was a pool (a pond or bath), which is called in Hebrew, Bethesda--the house of mercy; for therein appeared much of the mercy of God to the sick and diseased.”

On these walkways lay a great number of the sick, the blind, the lame, and the paralyzed.

“The evangelist specifies three sorts of diseased people that lay here, blind, halt, and withered or sinew--shrunk, either in one particular part, as the man with the withered hand, or all over paralytic.”

“Secondly, It was a type of the Messiah, who is the fountain opened; and was intended to raise people's expectations of him who is the Sun of righteousness, that arises with healing under his wings.”

One man there had been an invalid for thirty-eight years.

“Mr. Baxter's note on this passage is very affecting: "How great a mercy was it to live thirty-eight years under God's wholesome discipline!”

When Jesus saw him lying there and realized that he had spent a long time in this condition, He asked him, “Do you want to get well?”

“There was a great multitude of poor cripples here at Bethesda, but Christ fastened his eye upon this one, and singled him out from the rest, because he was senior of the house, and in a more deplorable condition than any of the rest; and…”

“Sir,” the invalid replied, “I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred.

“None had the charity to say, "Your case is worse than mine, do you go in now, and I will stay till the next time;" for there is no getting over the old maxim, Every one for himself.”

Then Jesus told him, “Get up, pick up your mat, and walk.”

“The conversion of a sinner is the cure of a chronic disease; this is ordinarily done by the word, a word of command: Arise, and walk; turn, and live; make ye a new heart; which no more supposes a power in us to do it…”