Daily Devotion Monday for 12th May 2025

The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, ‘Follow me.’  Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter.  Philip found Nathanael and said to him, ‘We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth.’  Nathanael said to him, ‘Can anything good come out of Nazareth?’ Philip said to him, ‘Come and see.’  When Jesus saw Nathanael coming towards him, he said of him, ‘Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!’  Nathanael asked him, ‘Where did you come to know me?’ Jesus answered, ‘I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you.’  Nathanael replied, ‘Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!’  Jesus answered, ‘Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these.’  And he said to him, ‘Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.’

Reflection

 ‘Seeing is believing but feeling is truth’.  Nathanael’s preconceptions could have kept him from seeing and experiencing the Son of God. 
 
The question of Jesus’ origins permeates John’s Gospel, beginning with the prologue that speaks into the expectations many had for the arrival of God’s incarnated Word. Surely, God’s Son would appear in Jerusalem, site of political and economic power, religious authority, and God’s own dwelling place in the Temple.  Perhaps that is why Nathanael is surprised that something good has come out of the small insignificant town of Nazareth. Who would imagine that God’s anointed one could come from a place so distant from the centre of power? 
 
We know so little about Nathanael that could help to put his remark into narrative context. He appears nowhere else in the New Testament, except here and again after the resurrection.  He is from Cana when Jesus appears to him and other disciples whilst fishing. Yet the silence in the text invites us to imagine possibilities for Nathanael’s negativity.
 
Whatever it was, Philip simply invites Nathanael to come and see. And in his seeing Jesus, Nathanael believes!  But more than that!  His experience, his feeling of Jesus leads him into truth declaring Jesus is Son of God and King of Israel.
 
Why are we always surprised by the God of surprises? God uses the resources open to him even if it is people we might dismiss. Nor should we be surprised by the possibilities of what might happen when God is at work. 
 
In imagery reminiscent of Jacob’s ladder Jesus tells Nathanael and his friends that those with open eyes will see in Jesus the full glory of God’s heavenly Messiah. God has given (Nathanael’s name in Hebrew) and shortly at a wedding in his hometown, Nathanael will see the first of Jesus’ signs, through which Jesus “revealed his glory and his disciples believed in him” 
 
Come and see.

Prayer

May the God of Surprises delight you,
inviting you to come and experience 
renewal and truth
that we may see God in all things, all people and all moments.
Come and see. Amen.