Now Philip was from Bethsaida, of the city of Andrew and Peter.

 In the time of John this kind of belief was widespread. Men believed that the world was evil and that an evil God had created it. It is to combat this teaching that John here lays down two basic Christian truths. In point of fact the connection of Jesus with creation is repeatedly laid down in the New Testament, just because of this background of thought which divorced God from the world in which we live. In Colossians 1:16 Paul writes: "For in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth ... all things were created through him and for him." In 1 Corinthians 8:6 he writes of the Lord Jesus Christ "through whom are all things." The writer to the Hebrews speaks of the one who was the Son, "through whom also God created the world" ( Hebrews 1:2). John and the other New Testament writers who spoke like this were stressing two great truths. 