John 1
The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is the one I told you about: ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me, because he existed before me.’ I didn’t know him, but I came baptizing with water so that he might be revealed to Israel.” And John testified, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and he rested on him. I didn’t know him, but he who sent me to baptize with water told me, ‘The one you see the Spirit descending and resting on—he is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God.”
The next day, John was standing with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”
The two disciples heard him say this and followed Jesus. When Jesus turned and noticed them following him, he asked them, “What are you looking for?”
They said to him, “Rabbi” (which means “Teacher”), “where are you staying?”
“Come and you’ll see,” he replied. So they went and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day. It was about four in the afternoon.
Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of the two who heard John and followed him. He first found his own brother Simon and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated “the Christ”), and he brought Simon to Jesus.
When Jesus saw him, he said, “You are Simon, son of John. You will be called Cephas” (which is translated “Peter”).
The next day Jesus decided to leave for Galilee. He found Philip and told him, “Follow me.”
Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the hometown of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael and told him, “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the law (and so did the prophets): Jesus the son of Joseph, from Nazareth.”
“Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Nathanael asked him.
“Come and see,” Philip answered.
Then Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said about him, “Here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit.”
“How do you know me?” Nathanael asked.
“Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you,” Jesus answered.
“Rabbi,” Nathanael replied, “You are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel!”
Jesus responded to him, “Do you believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than this.” Then he said, “Truly I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”
John 1:29-51
I’ve loved watching The Chosen, and seeing the artistic license they give to creating a back story for the disciples, especially some of the lesser known ones, like Nathanael. No one truly knows what Nathanael was doing under the fig tree where Jesus saw him. Some scholars speculate that perhaps he was deep in prayer, praying that the Messiah would soon come. Some speculate that he had some significant event happen beneath the fig tree. And others, take a more simplistic approach and believe that Jesus simply meant that He had literally seen Nathanael earlier in the day or week sitting under a fig tree. Because of Nathanael’s response, I tend to think the later is the least likely. Clearly, Nathanael was struck by Jesus’ claim, because he knew only God Himself could have seen him in that moment. Jesus, though fully man, was also fully God, and He was able to see into the hearts and souls of those He encountered, much like the woman at the well. He knew Nathanael’s heart, and His claim to Nathanael seemingly revealed to him that He was indeed the Messiah, the King of Israel.
This reminds me of Genesis 16, where Hagar has been sent away with her son Ishmael. The Angel of the LORD appears to her and promises that her son will become a great nation. Hagar declares, “You are the God who sees me,” for she said, “I have now seen the One who sees me.”
I also think of what David writes in Psalm 139:
“Lord, you have searched me and known me.
You know when I sit down and when I stand up;
you understand my thoughts from far away.
You observe my travels and my rest;
you are aware of all my ways.
Before a word is on my tongue,
you know all about it, Lord.
You have encircled me;
you have placed your hand on me.
This wondrous knowledge is beyond me.
It is lofty; I am unable to reach it.
“Where can I go to escape your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to heaven, you are there;
if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
If I fly on the wings of the dawn
and settle down on the western horizon,
even there your hand will lead me;
your right hand will hold on to me.
If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me,
and the light around me will be night”—
even the darkness is not dark to you.
The night shines like the day;
darkness and light are alike to you.
“For it was you who created my inward parts;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I will praise you
because I have been remarkably and wondrously made.
Your works are wondrous,
and I know this very well.
My bones were not hidden from you
when I was made in secret,
when I was formed in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw me when I was formless;
all my days were written in your book and planned
before a single one of them began.
“God, how precious your thoughts are to me;
how vast their sum is!
If I counted them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand;
when I wake up, I am still with you.”
In Christ, we were seen and chosen, long before we ever fell down before the LORD as our King and Savior. Paul writes in Ephesians 1: “For he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless in love before him. He predestined us to be adopted as sons through Jesus Christ for himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace that he lavished on us in the Beloved One.”
God saw us and knew us before we ourselves knew Him. He sees us now in our present circumstances. And He knows what the future holds for us. I can struggle with fear and anxiety when I look at the world around me, but I find comfort in knowing that God has put me in this specific time and place in history for a reason.
God knew that Nathanael, the man many scholars believe to be Bartholomew, would be chosen as one of Jesus’ disciples. He was put in a specific time and place in history for a reason. He would follow Christ, learn from Him, abandon Him at the crucifixion, watch Him ascend to heaven, and then go into the world to preach the Gospel. Many scholars believe he, as most of the 12 apostles, died a martyr’s death for the sake of preaching Christ.
I loved what another commentator wrote about this first interaction between Jesus and Nathanael: “Oh how he knows the sincerity of our hearts! And with that knowing reveals more of Himself to us. He promised Nathanael he would see greater things! He would from that moment on see Jesus in full revelation as the stairway to heaven, Genesis 28. Jesus would from that moment be someone who stood in the Gap between heaven and earth fulfilling the longing of Nathanael’s heart indeed.“
Every couple of days I try to read from the book Piercing Heaven, a collection of Puritan prayers. I love this excerpt from a prayer by Robert Hawker: “So when my poor heart is afflicted, when satan storms, or the world frowns, when I suffer sickness, or when Your waves and storms seem to go over me, what relief is it to know that You, Jesus, see me. And that You care!”
Perhaps there are still greater things that I will yet get to see in the time that God has me here on earth. I certainly hope and pray that one of those things is the heavens opening up at Christ’s Triumphant Return! But until that day, or until He calls me home, I pray that I will find comfort and peace in knowing that God sees me. AMEN!
Living Stone 