John 1:35-51
The next day after John the prophet announced Jesus as the Lamb of God and the Son of God, Jesus came to the place again, and John again called, “Behold the Lamb of God!”
Two men were standing with John who wanted to know more of One sent by God to take away sin, and they followed after Jesus. He turned and asked them, “What seek ye?” They said, “Rabbi ... where dwellest Thou?” A rabbi was a man who taught the people of God, and was the most respectful title they knew to address Him.
Jesus invited them to “come and see.” It is not told where He stayed — it may have been an outside shelter — but they were welcomed to stay with Him. It was “about the tenth hour,” or near night. They counted twelve hours to a day, beginning at sunrise.
Telling Others
When we know a great event, we want to tell someone. Those two men had found Him who was the Holy One sent by God to take away their sins. This was the very greatest event to them, and they wanted others to know Him. One man, Andrew, went to tell his brother and brought him to Jesus.
Jesus knew the brother’s name, Simon, but gave him a second name, Cephas, which means a stone in Aramaic. Later the Greek language was used more and their word for stone is “petros,” translated into our language, Peter. Peter is the word most often used for him, though Cephas is also used, as in 1 Corinthians 15:5.
All great buildings were then made of stone, as the temple in Jerusalem. That was no longer used in honor to God. Peter was to be one of a new “temple,” not of real stones but of people who believed the Lord Jesus. Peter later wrote of others who believed as “lively (or living) stones” (1 Pet. 2:4-5).
Come and See
Jesus was going to Galilee and told a man named Philip to follow Him. Philip went to a man named Nathanael to tell him they had found the One written of in the Scriptures, and that He was Jesus of Nazareth.
Nathanael knew the writings which showed the One to come would be from Bethlehem Judea (Micah 5:2). Nazareth was not in Judea but in Galilee, and he thought the good and holy One could not come from there. But Philip said, “Come and see.”
When Nathanael found that Jesus knew him before and knew what he thought in his heart, he also believed Jesus to be the promised One. He would learn that Jesus had first come from Judea, just as the prophets had written.
All these men lived in Galilee, and were of the twelve chosen by Jesus to be with Him and to tell others about Him. They began to tell others as soon as they knew who Jesus was. It seems Nathanael had another name, Bartholomew, as that name is given in the other gospels and Nathanael is given in this gospel (see Matt. 10:3; Mark 3:18; Luke 6:14; also, John 21:2).
The titles of the Lord Jesus in the first Chapter of John, are: the Word, the Life, the Light, the Lamb, the Son of God, the Messias, Christ, the King of Israel, and the Son of Man.
Further Meditation:
1. What was a rabbi’s job?
2. How many different sets of brothers were part of the Lord’s disciples? What can we learn from this?
3. If you’ve just been enjoying some of the names and titles of the Lord Jesus Christ you might enjoy The Names of God by P. Wilson.