The testimony of the disciples, John 1:35-51

 As we continue in our study of the book of John, I would remind you that John has given a theological treatise, or opening argument in the first 18 verses that is unparalleled in scripture establishing the divinity of Jesus Christ.  And then starting in vs. 19 he brought forth his first witness to testify to his premise which is stated in chapter 20vs.11, “but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.” That is the purpose of his epistle.  To show that Jesus is the Christ, that is the Messiah, and that He is the Son of God, and as a result to illuminate men to the saving knowledge of that truth, so that we might have life, eternal life, in His name.

So as John proceeds to lay out his gospel he first brings John the Baptist to give testimony as to the eternal nature of Jesus, to give testimony that God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit, to testify that Jesus the Christ, that is the Messiah, to testify that Jesus was the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world, and to testify that Jesus was the Son of God.  That was the testimony of John the Baptist.

Now according to Jewish law, every fact was to be corroborated by two or three witnesses.  So starting in vs. 35, John introduces three more testimonials from ordinary common men who would become  disciples of Christ.  And we are going to look at these men’s testimony.  But in the process of hearing their testimony, we will also see revealed the ultimate goal of John which is to show the way of salvation, so that one might have life in Christ.  And in the process of showing the way of salvation, we will also see the method of evangelism.  So you might break down this passage by saying there are three points that are interwoven in the narrative; the testimony of the disciples presented, the way of salvation presented, and the method of evangelism presented.

Let’s begin with the testimony of the disciples presented and we will see the other two elements interwoven in the process as we go along. The apostle has already introduced John the Baptist and his testimony.  But as a means of introducing the next witnesses he says that John the Baptist was standing with two of his disciples when he sees Jesus walking by, and he said, “Behold the Lamb of God,” and his disciples left him and followed Jesus.  Now this is a restatement of John the Baptist, having already declared this the previous day as we see in vs.29.  But the day before day Jesus was walking towards him, and on this day Jesus is walking away from him.  And John’s declaration at this time is to point to Jesus as the one that they should follow. John came to prepare the way for Him who was to come, and when He comes, to point men to follow Him. 

Now we know from the other gospels that John came preaching a gospel of repentance.  So his disciples had learned his message of sin and repentance and the need to get their hearts right before the coming of the Messiah.  So when John the Baptist sees Jesus coming in vs.29, he declares that this is the Messiah, the Lamb of God who will take away their sin.  It is one thing to know that you need to repent of your sins, it is another to recognize that Jesus is the Lamb of God appointed by God to be the Savior of the world, the substitute who will bear the penalty of sin that we deserve.

And that is the way of salvation presented. Repent and believe.  The two lynch pins of salvation, faith and repentance.  Repentance will not save you unless you recognize the One who has the power to forgive your sins, to take away your sins, to bear your sins.  And John pointed them to Jesus Christ as the Lamb who takes away the sins of the world.

And I just want to point out one Old Testament reference which foretells that Jesus would be the Lamb of God who would be our substitute. There are many illustrations in the OT, particularly the Lamb which took the place of Isaac when Abraham was about to sacrifice his son, as well as the  Passover Lamb, and the sacrificial lambs used in the temple sacrificial system, but I want to reference a few verses in Isaiah 53:4-7 which attribute this title directly to Christ. “Surely our griefs He Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him. He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth…,vs.11, By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities.”   There it is; the Lamb of God led to the slaughter, who will take our punishment upon Himself, and who will bear our sins on the cross.  What a tremendous picture of our Savior, as the Lamb of God.

Now these two men had been John’s disciples, but now John the Baptist is directing them to become Jesus’ disciples.  Only one of the disciples is named here, that being Andrew, but practically all Bible scholars agree that the apostle John is actually the other disciple.  His humility keeps him from ever naming himself in his writings, but there are a number of hints that this is John the author himself. 

So they left John the Baptist and followed Jesus.  And Jesus seeing them following Him turned to them and asked, “What do you seek?” and they answered, “Rabbi, which is translated Teacher, where are You staying?”  And this further illustrates the way of salvation.  Salvation is marked by following in the footsteps of Christ. 1Peter 2:21-22, 24 says,  “For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps, WHO COMMITTED NO SIN, NOR WAS ANY DECEIT FOUND IN HIS MOUTH; ... and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.” 

Listen, the way of salvation is not merely to acknowledge certain facts about God, or even to claim certain benefits because of what Christ has done, but to become a disciple of Christ, to follow in His footsteps, to be joined to the body, the head of whom is Christ, and so then doing the works of Christ.

And that is seen in the text; they first follow Jesus, calling Him Rabbi, meaning He is their teacher and they will do what He tells them to do, and then they enter into communion/fellowship with Him.  They respond to His question of what do you seek, with “Rabbi, where are you staying?”  I love that they didn’t see the way of salvation as a once a week visit with Christ, but 24/7 living with Christ.  They moved in with Him.  To live with Him and He with them.  That is the communion we have as  believers.  Christ in us and we in Christ.

So Jesus says, “Come and you will see.” Now it was the 10^th hour, that is 4pm, and so they stayed with Him that day.  They were being taught by Christ now, and it’s a constant, 24/7 experience that will go on for 3 years, and then when He leaves and the Holy Spirit comes at Pentecost, He continues with them forever.   And this is the reality of our salvation.  We become one with God because He lives in us.  And He is with us constantly, forever, leading us, guiding us, and helping us.  Making His word live in us and giving us eternal life.  That’s what is involved in becoming saved, it’s becoming disciples.  That is the great commission by the way.  Not to make converts, but to make disciples.  I think there are a lot of people that consider themselves Christians today as opposed to being Muslim, or Atheists.  But that is not salvation, nor is it discipleship.  We are told to go make disciples.  And before we can make a disciple we must first be a disciple, a follower of Christ’s example.

Now finally we come to the first testimony of the disciples, and in the wonderful economy of the scriptures we also see evangelism presented.  And this example is especially instructive, for we see that after his experience with Jesus, Andrew goes and finds his brother Peter.  And he says, ““We have found the Messiah” and he brought Peter to Jesus.  We hear a similar expression often in the church, “leading someone to the Lord.”  If we are not careful, we sometimes think of it in terms of us takings someone through steps to salvation.  That is not something we can do, nor should we try to do.  What we should do is lead someone to Christ.  We tell them about Christ. He does the saving.  We just make the introduction.  We should testify of Him, even as Andrew does to his brother, that he has found the Messiah.  And I would just add that our families should be the first people we share the gospel with. Our families are the first frontier of evangelism. That should be natural; if you truly love people you will share the gospel with them.  What’s the point of going  on a foreign mission trip if we haven’t first evangelized our loved ones here at home? 

So Peter comes to Christ.  I believe that is a literal and figural statement.  To come to Christ is to come in repentance and faith that He is our Savior, our Lord and King.  He is the Son of God. And we know that Peter also becomes at that moment a disciple and follows Jesus.

So in response Jesus gives Peter a new name.  That is another aspect of salvation.  Jesus sees not only who we are, but who we are going to become in Him.  And so Jesus gives Peter a name which indicates what he will be.  Peter will be a stone, a foundation stone as part of the foundation of the other apostles upon which the church will be built as stated in Eph. 2:20.  When you come to Christ He will change your life, He will change your purpose, He will change your desires. He gives you a new name. Rev. 2:17 “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, to him I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone which no one knows but he who receives it.”

Now the next day, Jesus found another man named Philip from Andrew and Peter’s hometown of Bethsaida, and he says to Philip, “follow Me.”  This is a familiar expression of Christ, 20 times in the gospels He will say that to someone, “follow Me.” You want to know what salvation looked like in Jesus’ day?  He didn’t give an invitation and play 7 stanzas of Just As I Am, have them raise their hand and repeat the sinner’s prayer.  He just says “Follow Me.”  And they step out in faith, believing in Him, learning of Him, learning who He is and what He says, and being obedient to what He says.  That is discipleship and discipleship is equivalent to salvation.

Somewhere between vs.43 and 45 Philip discovers enough to become convinced that Jesus was the Messiah and so he goes to tell Nathaniel. He is referred to most often as Bartholomew. Only John calls him Nathanael. He lived in another little village in that region called Cana at the north end of the Sea of Galilee. And something very special is going to happen in Cana that we will look at  in chapter 2. That’s where there’s a wedding and Jesus does His first miracle.

And this is the pattern of evangelism most often laid out in the scripture.  I would even suggest that this the normal pattern of evangelism - one on one.  One person introducing another to Jesus as Savior, Lord and Messiah.  One person leading another to Christ.  There are a couple of examples of a few large scale conversions such as the day of Pentecost, but I think they are the exception rather than the rule.  We are not going to reach the beach community by outreaches and crusades necessarily, but by individual evangelism, one by one. One person at a time.

Now we see another man’s testimony concerning Jesus;  Philip tells Nathanael, “We have found Him of whom Moses in the Law and also the Prophets wrote—Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”  This testimony again is no less than that Jesus is the Messiah, we have found the Messiah as described in scripture. And he adds that Jesus is from Nazareth, which is a short distance from Cana, and that He was in human terms at least, the son of Joseph.

But I want to point out just one of the many OT references to the Messiah, so that we might get the full intent of what Philip is saying about Jesus being the One, that is the Anointed One, or the Messiah.  And especially at this time of year I think this passage is apropos; Isaiah 9:6-7  fleshes out the full magnitude of the title Messiah.  And this scripture is the basis for the famous Handel’s Messiah. “For a child will be born to us, a son will be given to us; And the government will rest on His shoulders; And His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace, On the throne of David and over his kingdom, To establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness From then on and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will accomplish this.”  Jews who knew this very familiar prophecy would know that the Messiah who was prophesied not only would be King, but He was also Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.  That is the full import of the title Messiah or Christ.

Now Nathanael seems to reflect a common prejudice towards Nazareth.  I’m not sure why.  There was a national prejudice about Galileans in general, and Nazareth in particular.  But I’m not sure that it was prejudice that prompted his remark, because Jesus does not rebuke him, but rather commends him for being without guile or deceit.  Not a light compliment. But rather it’s a possibility that Nathanael is amazed that someone like the Messiah could come from such a humble place, even a place with such a bad reputation. And we are reminded that this was God’s strategic purpose in demonstrating the extreme humility of Christ, as it says in Phil. 2:7-8  “But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”  Let us not forget that He is our example.  And we should walk in His footsteps, humbleness being a foremost characteristic of a disciple of Christ.

Vs.47, Jesus saw Nathanael coming to Him, and said of him, “Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit!” Now this is an amazing statement.  In it Jesus is saying that Nathanael is a true believer from an Old Testament perspective.  He is a true Jew which according to Romans 2 is circumcised in his heart.  A penitent believer in the true God in whom there is no deceit--no guile, no hypocrisy, no duplicity, no phoniness. Now this is a rare thing in a nation which for the most part had become apostate, that was awash in hypocrisy.  But this is how Jesus describes Nathanael.

And Nathanael is surprised that Jesus knew him.  It’s probable that Jesus knew his name, but even more surprising is that Jesus knew him.  Knew who he was.  What kind of man he was. And so Nathanael says, ““How do You know me?” Jesus answered and said to him, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.”

Now Bible scholars tell us that the phrase under a fig tree was a Jewish way of referring to a place where one retired  to meditate on the scriptures and pray.  And so Jesus is saying that He saw him under a fig tree, and He heard his prayers.  What a great picture to remind us that God hears every prayer, even silent prayers, even prayers when we think no one sees, no one hears, yet God hears and takes notice.  And He responds to our prayers.  Nathanael, who Jesus said is a true Israelite would have been looking and praying for the coming of the Messiah, now finds himself  standing before Jesus the Messiah in answer to his prayers.

And when Nathanael hears Jesus’ answer, his heart awakens to the truth of God that Jesus must be no less than the King of Israel, that is the  Messiah, and the Son of God. Vs.49, Nathanael answered Him, “Rabbi, You are the Son of God; You are the King of Israel.” He echoes what John the Baptist also said, that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God.  That title Son of God means nothing less than that Jesus is God.  To be the son of something or someone is to have the same nature as them.  My son has my nature, my characteristics, but most significantly he is human because I am human. And Christ is God because He is God’s Son. Christ is not an angel, as Hebrews 1:3-6 so eloquently states: “And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become as much better than the angels, as He has inherited a more excellent name than they. For to which of the angels did He ever say, "YOU ARE MY SON,TODAY I HAVE BEGOTTEN YOU"? And again, "I WILL BE A FATHER TO HIMAND HE SHALL BE A SON TO ME"? And when He again brings the firstborn into the world, He says, "AND LET ALL THE ANGELS OF GOD WORSHIP HIM." 

So if He is God’s Son, then He is God in human form. Thus the angels worship Him. And He is the exact representation of God’s nature in human flesh.

Then Jesus responds to Nathanael’s faith, and says, “Because I said to you that I saw you under the fig tree, do you believe? You will see greater things than these.” And He said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see the heavens opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

Now some people think that what Jesus was saying referred to the dream of Jacob in Genesis 28:12, where Jacob saw a ladder from earth to heaven, and the angels ascending and descending upon it. They see in that symbolism that  Jesus is the ladder, the link, between heaven and earth. That Jesus is the way to God.  And that when Nathanael comes to understand that Jesus is the mediator between God and man, it will be an even greater sign than the sign of Jesus seeing him under the fig tree.  And I am willing to concede that is a possible explanation.  But I think a more obvious explanation is that Jesus is referring to His ascension into heaven after His resurrection.  When Jesus ascends into heaven in plain view of 400 witnesses, and the angels of God are there to testify that He is coming again just as He was taken up into heaven, that is the greatest sign that Jesus is God’s Son, and He is sitting at the right hand of the Father on His throne, and all rule and authority have been given unto Him.

And perhaps Jesus Himself alludes to that ascension by referring to Himself by yet another title; the Son of Man.  Don’t be misled into thinking that this title is any less divine than others.  It refers specifically to Dan 7:13-14, which says “I kept looking in the night visions, And behold, with the clouds of heaven One like a Son of Man was coming, And He came up to the Ancient of Days And was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, Glory and a kingdom, That all the peoples, nations and men of every language Might serve Him.  His dominion is an everlasting dominion Which will not pass away; And His kingdom is one Which will not be destroyed.”  This title of Son of Man then is one that Christ uses of Himself to show affinity with mankind.  God became man and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. God so loved man that He Himself became Man that He might be the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, so that whosoever believes in Him might have life and have it more abundantly.  I pray that you have believed the testimony of the disciples and know Him as your personal Savior, and decided to follow Him and have fellowship with Him.  That is the only way to life.  And Jesus has provided the way for you to receive eternal life in Him and He in you.  I hope that you will receive Him today, if you have not already made that decision. 

And if you do know the Lord as your Savior, then I hope that you will be about the Lord’s business, testifying to loved ones and friends that you have found the Savior.  Introduce them to the Light of the world.  There is no better time to do that than at Christmas.  I hope you will fulfill your calling as a disciple and show people Jesus Christ.