Now Jesus seeks out a disciple, Philip. Philip was from the same town as Andrew and Peter, so may possibly have known something of Jesus. Otherwise, the command from Jesus, "Follow me", is completely out of the blue. Note that it is a command, not a suggestion or a request.
Philip obeyed and went to tell his brother. Based on what the Law and the Prophets said (ie the Old Testament), there was an expectation of the Messiah coming, and Philip believed that Jesus was the One. How did he come to this belief? Note that it ways "we", so presumably he had come to this conclusion together with Andrew and Peter. The belief may have been partly based on what John the Baptist had said about Jesus to Andrew. Philip knew that Jesus was part of the family of Joseph.
While Philip did believe, Nathaniel did not, but was very sceptical. This scepticism was based on a low opinion of Nazareth and its inhabitants. Philip urges Nathaniel to come along and see for himself. People will only become believers when they meet Jesus for themselves.
Despite Nathaniel's negative attitude Jesus greets him with positive words, declaring him to be a "true sonn of Israel with no deceit in him". We would have been critical of Nathaniel and said he needed to change his attitude. Jesus seemed to have a greater respect for him than we would have! Perhaps we can learn something from this about the attitude we should have towards unbelievers, particularly sceptical or atheistic ones.
Suddenly Nathaniel's attitude changes when he realises that Jesus knows more about him than he could naturally know. Belief comes in. Like Thomas, Nathaniel's unbelief is quickly turned to faith. Jesus then, in effect, tells Nathaniel that he "ain't seen nothing yet".
I think there are two key lessons from this passage for us to ponder on:
Philip obeyed and went to tell his brother. Based on what the Law and the Prophets said (ie the Old Testament), there was an expectation of the Messiah coming, and Philip believed that Jesus was the One. How did he come to this belief? Note that it ways "we", so presumably he had come to this conclusion together with Andrew and Peter. The belief may have been partly based on what John the Baptist had said about Jesus to Andrew. Philip knew that Jesus was part of the family of Joseph.
While Philip did believe, Nathaniel did not, but was very sceptical. This scepticism was based on a low opinion of Nazareth and its inhabitants. Philip urges Nathaniel to come along and see for himself. People will only become believers when they meet Jesus for themselves.
Despite Nathaniel's negative attitude Jesus greets him with positive words, declaring him to be a "true sonn of Israel with no deceit in him". We would have been critical of Nathaniel and said he needed to change his attitude. Jesus seemed to have a greater respect for him than we would have! Perhaps we can learn something from this about the attitude we should have towards unbelievers, particularly sceptical or atheistic ones.
Suddenly Nathaniel's attitude changes when he realises that Jesus knows more about him than he could naturally know. Belief comes in. Like Thomas, Nathaniel's unbelief is quickly turned to faith. Jesus then, in effect, tells Nathaniel that he "ain't seen nothing yet".
I think there are two key lessons from this passage for us to ponder on:
- The approach of Jesus to handling sceptics.
- The speed with which a sceptic can become a believer.
No comments:
Post a Comment