John 1:43-48 (ESV) The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Follow me.” 44 Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”6 Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.” Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, “Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit!” Nathanael said to him, “How do you know me?” Jesus answered him, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.”
I have come to love this passage of Scripture all the way from verse 35 to the end of the chapter, but this portion especially. In verse 43, we see Philip didn’t come to Jesus; Jesus came to Philip. The idea that Jesus “found” Philip is awesome. For some of us, Jesus pursues us and asks us to “Follow Me.”
And, what was Philip’s quick response? He went and found Nathanael. Notice what Philip said to Nathanael: “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote,”
I think Nathanael was a learned man, a proud man, proud to be an Israelite. There are only three individuals identified as Israelites in all of Scripture. The first is in Lev. Chapter 24 where an Israelite woman is identified as having a son with an Egyptian. The son is not named but is just called the son of the Israelite woman to imply the boy was not fully Israeli.
The second individual identified as an Israelite is Paul in Romans chapter one after he has explained God’s gift of salvation is for all people, he asks the question “Has God rejected His people?” Then Paul says “no,” that he is an Israelite, a son of Benjamin citing His Israelite heritage.
So, when Jesus calls Nathaniel an Israelite He also is referring to Nathaniel’s pure and proud Israelite heritage.
My wife is pure Norwegian, a proud people. In 1944, the Norwegian underground blew up a Nazi shipment of heavy water needed to make the first atomic bomb. This gave the Allies more time to overthrow Hitler before he could develop the bomb. Were it not for the Norwegian underground, World War II would have ended quite differently.
Just like the Norwegians, the Israelis have much to be proud of, and Jesus pointed that out in His addressing of Nathanael.
I think Nathanael was also a rabbi or Old Testament scholar. Jesus mentioned he was sitting “under the fig tree,” a common saying of the time for rabbis deep in their studies. Philip approached Nathanael citing evidence from “Moses in the Law and also all the prophets.” This struck home with Nathanael, but he retorted he’d heard nothing of someone important coming from Nazareth. Nathanael was right. Nazareth is not mentioned in the Old Testament. This was something only scholars might know. To be fair, Nazareth was a small town, a military outpost with the sorts of illicit businesses supporting the wants of soldiers. That might have been what Nathanael meant.
Why is this important?
I think the way Philip handles his witness to Nathanael is very instructive for us. Since Nathanael might have been a scholar, Philip approached him with scholarship. When Nathanael answered with a scholar’s question about Nazareth being unimportant, Philip who was not a scholar, simply said, “Come and see.”
I think too often I have gotten into a discussion with someone who is antagonistic or disbelieving when I might say something as simple as what Philip did, “Come and see.”
Many believe Nathanael is really just another name for Bartholomew who is mentioned in the other three gospels and the book of Acts. “Bar” is usually saved to mean “son of” as in Jesus-bar-Joseph. So, the argument goes, Bartholomew might really be a family name “The son of tolomai.”
It seems possible also Philip and Nathanael/Bartholomew might be brothers. They are paired up often in Scripture, and church tradition/history states Philip and Nathanael were missionaries together and crucified upside down together in Hieropolis, Greece. Church tradition also says Philip’s preaching convicted his executioners and onlookers such they released Nathanael from his cross though Philip elected to die a martyr there.
Church history is not science and so has a few stories of how Nathanael died. He was crucified and/or beheaded in Armenia, he was skinned alive in Armenia, or he was crucified upside down in India. No one knows. What we do know is they were witnesses for our Lord.
Jesus will bring us to the point of salvation whether He seeks and finds us as He did with Philip, sends others to bring us as with Nathanael, or has others point the way as John the Baptist did. Ultimately, though, we are only planters and waterers. It is God Who brings forth the increase. (1 Cor. 3:7)
Believers Armed and Dangerous 