John 1:43-51

Jesus Calls Philip and Nathanael

43 The next day Jesus decided to leave for Galilee. Finding Philip, he said to him, "Follow me."

44 Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida. 45 Philip found Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph."

46 "Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?" Nathanael asked.

"Come and see," said Philip.

47 When Jesus saw Nathanael approaching, he said of him, "Here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit."

48 "How do you know me?" Nathanael asked.

Jesus answered, "I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Philip called you."

49 Then Nathanael declared, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel."

50 Jesus said, "You believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You will see greater things than that." 51 He then added, "Very truly I tell you, you will see 'heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man."



Dig Deeper

A few years ago (actually it was almost twenty, but it'll help my ego to say "a few") a group of my friends decided that we were going to play in a major summer basketball tournament for college-aged basketball players. We saw the tournament as an opportunity to have a little fun together, but it really was a pretty serious thing for most teams. Our first game in the tournament we wound up playing a team comprised of players from the University of Marquette. They had a very good team that year, including a center that was 6'10 (2.1 m) and about 280 pounds (127 kilos). We had, of course, heard of this young man but none of us had played against him before. We didn't have anyone nearly that big and we knew that he was strong, so I felt that we needed to send a message to him early that we came to play hard and physical. The first time he caught the ball, I was going to act as an enforcer, of sorts, and foul him hard. As he caught the ball, I came down across his his forearms with everything I had with a karate-style chop. I knew he was big and strong, but I had no clue as to just how strong this guy was. I hit him with a force that might literally have broken some people's arm, but I barely even knocked his arms down more than an inch or two. He looked at me, chuckled, and said, "nice try, son." That was his way of telling me that we had no idea of just how strong and good he was. We went on to lose that game by twelve points, due in large part to the inside power of this one tree trunk of a man.

As John's disciples and others begin to encounter Jesus for the first time, they know that he is a force to be reckoned with. They understood that he was someone special and was someone to be listened to and followed, but they really had no clue what they were in for. Watch John's Gospel as we see individual after individual approaching Jesus, thinking they have a pretty good idea of who he is and what is he about, only to find out that they may be right in a sense, but in full reality, they have no clue just exactly who he is, what he is doing, and what they are in for.

On the fifth day of John's seven-day description of the beginning of Jesus' ministry, Jesus decided to set out for Galilee. What is translated "finding" can also be understood as "found by" which seems to make a little more sense, as in these opening scenes of John's Gospel, everyone else he describes, sought Jesus out. Either way Jesus gives Philip a clear call as he tells Philip to "follow me." Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida, a town that would later be denounced by Jesus as having a great deal of miracles done in it but where evidently not many people repented (Matt. 11:20-24; Luke 10:13-14).

Philip is so impressed with Jesus that, like Andrew, he goes and calls another to come to Jesus. We are not told explicitly whether Philip and the man he went to fetch, Nathanael, were disciples of John, but that is a safe assumption at this point. Philip, like Andrew and John, had been waiting and looking for the one that was to come. This would make sense if he was another of John's disciples that had been taught by the man in the wilderness to be ready for the coming of the Messiah. Philip rushes towards Nathanael, and we can almost hear him breathlessly proclaim that we (he seems to already be including himself in a new community that is forming around Jesus) have found the one written about in the Old Testament Scriptures (commonly referred to as Moses and the prophets, or something similar).

Nathanael, as so many of us were at one time or another, seems to be rather skeptical about this whole situation. Nazareth wasn't much of a town and people wouldn't have really expected that a Messiah would come from there. In addition, there are some historians who assert that there was a bit of small town rivalry between Cana (Philip's hometown) and Nazareth. Whether his skepticism was serious or more good-natured, it is clear that Philip didn't have much of a response. Instead, he offers us a brilliant example of what to do when someone presents a question that is beyond our ability to answer. He bids Nathanael to simply come and see for himself.

As Jesus sees Philip approaching him, he declares that Nathanael is a true Israelite. There is a bit of a play on history here, as the father of the nation of Israel, Jacob's name meant the deceiver. Just as Jacob left his deceit in order to become Israel, there is no deceit in Nathanael, a true Israelite. Basically, Jesus mean's that Nathanael is a straightforward individual who is sincerely seeking God. He is a true son of Israel. The identity of this son of Israel is a bit mysterious as he is not mentioned in any of the other Gospels. It was fairly common in the first century, though, for people to have or go by several different names or nicknames, and that seems to be the key to determining who Nathanael is. It seems that Nathanael and Philip are good friends here and in the synoptic Gospels, and we see the Apostle Bartholomew paired with Philip (Matt. 10:3; Mark 3:18; Luke 6:14). Likewise, Bartholomew is mentioned immediately after Thomas in Acts 1:13, while Nathanael occupies that same position in John 21:2. To add to that is the fact that Bartholomew is not a name, it is a term that means "son of Tholomaios." It appears then, that Bartholomew and Nathanael are one in the same, with John using his given name.

Nathanael doesn't just take the compliment from Jesus but continues his skepticism. How can Jesus make a judgment concerning what kind of an individual he is? What Nathanael doesn't know, of course, John expects us as his readers to know already. We know how Jesus knows this, but Nathanael is still in the dark.

As with so many things with Jesus, there seems to be more to his response about the fig tree than would at first meet the eye. The fig tree was a regular symbol of home in the Jewish culture (cf. Isa. 36:16; Mic. 4:4; Zech. 3:10). The shade of a fig tree was typically thought of as a place for prayer and meditation and study (it became a symbol for a place of special encounter with God). Biblical scholar, Leon Morris, writes, "It seems probable that Nathanael had had some outstanding experience of communion with God in the privacy of his own home, and that it is this to which Jesus refers." It is possible, then, that Nathanael had had a recent experience with God that probably only he and God knew about.

Whatever it was, when Jesus references it, it is enough for Nathanael. He is convinced. He calls Jesus the Son of God and the king of Israel. Nathanael certainly meant "Messiah" by using these terms. He doesn't yet understand the full implications of these statements, as John expects his readers to at this point. Yet, in calling Jesus the Messiah and the king of Israel, Nathanael is giving Jesus the highest level of respect that he possibly can. Philip, based on his limited understanding can do no better or use any terms of higher respect. Yet even with that, he is not yet close to understanding the full magnitude of the one with whom he is dealing.

Jesus is not condescending at all but, in effect, says "nice try son." Nathanael has tried to grasp who Jesus is but he has no idea. He will see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man. Jesus uses language here that hearkens us back to Jacob's vision of the stairway or ladder that stretched between heaven and earth (Gen. 28:12). The point of Jacob's vision at Bethel (the house of God) was that God was present. He was spanning the divide between His space (heaven) and Jacob's space (earth) and making Himself known. Jesus himself, he was telling Nathanael, was the new Bethel. He was the new Jacob's ladder. He was the place and the manner through which God was spanning the divide between heaven and earth. Nathanael thought that he had found the Messiah but he never imagined that he had found what it looked like when heaven and earth were opened up to one another. Jesus probably wasn't implying that he would literally see heaven or angels, but he was certainly going to see things happening that would show beyond a shadow of a doubt that they were real and were there. Nathanael had thought he had found God's sent one, but had not the slightest clue that he had found the living, breathing house of God.




Devotional Thought

Do you tend to approach Jesus as a mere source of doctrinal truth or have you approached him as the conduit between heaven and earth? Jesus is more than doctrinal truth, just as he was more than Nathanael's understanding of the Messiah. He is the place between heaven and earth where we can ascend into heaven on a daily basis. Spend some special time with him today and you just might find more than you bargained for.