John 8:12-22

12 Jesus once again addressed them: "I am the world's Light. No one who follows me stumbles around in the darkness. I provide plenty of light to live in."
13 The Pharisees objected, "All we have is your word on this. We need more than this to go on."
14 Jesus replied, "You're right that you only have my word. But you can depend on it being true. I know where I've come from and where I go next. You don't know where I'm from or where I'm headed.
15 You decide according to what you can see and touch. I don't make judgments like that.
16 But even if I did, my judgment would be true because I wouldn't make it out of the narrowness of my experience but in the largeness of the One who sent me, the Father.
17 That fulfills the conditions set down in God's Law: that you can count on the testimony of two witnesses.
18 And that is what you have: You have my word and you have the word of the Father who sent me."
19 They said, "Where is this so-called Father of yours?" Jesus said, "You're looking right at me and you don't see me. How do you expect to see the Father? If you knew me, you would at the same time know the Father."
20 He gave this speech in the Treasury while teaching in the Temple. No one arrested him because his time wasn't yet up.
21 Then he went over the same ground again. "I'm leaving and you are going to look for me, but you're missing God in this and are headed for a dead end. There is no way you can come with me."
22 The Jews said, "So, is he going to kill himself? Is that what he means by 'You can't come with me'?"

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Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.