42
I knew that you always hear me, but I said this for the benefit of the people standing here, that they may believe that you sent me.”
43
When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice,
“Lazarus, come out!”
44
The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face. Jesus said to them,
“Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
The Plot to Kill Jesus
45 Therefore many of the Jews who had come to visit Mary, and had seen what Jesus did, believed in him.
46
But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Jesus had done.
47
Then the chief priests and the Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin. “What are we accomplishing?” they asked. “Here is this man performing many signs.
48
If we let him go on like this, everyone will believe in him, and then the Romans will come and take away both our temple and our nation.”
49
Then one of them, named Caiaphas, who was high priest that year, spoke up, “You know nothing at all!
50
You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.”
51
He did not say this on his own, but as high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus would die for the Jewish nation,
52
and not only for that nation but also for the scattered children of God, to bring them together and make them one.