The Perspective of One

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B: , , John 12:20-22.

Housekeeping Stuff & Announcements:

Welcome guests, introduce yourself. Thank the band. Invite guests to parlor after service.

We are going to again have our Independence Day church-wide picnic on Thursday evening, July 4, beginning at 6pm out front in the courtyard. You can bring your food to eat, and we will have hot dogs, chips, watermelon, and drinks. Bring a summer dessert or some homemade ice cream to share, and your safe and legal fireworks to set off. We’ll have some lawn games and we’ll have a great time together! Feel free to invite your friends, and maybe even your one.

Call2Fall?

We are going to again have our Independence Day church-wide picnic on Thursday evening, July 4, beginning at 6pm out front in the courtyard. You can bring your food to eat, and we will have hot dogs, chips, watermelon, and drinks. Bring a summer dessert or some homemade ice cream to share, and your safe and legal fireworks to set off. We’ll have some lawn games and we’ll have a great time together! Feel free to invite your friends, and maybe even your one.

I have been giving some thought to the makeup of the church, and one thing I want to encourage everyone in is to get involved in a Sunday morning Bible study, if you possibly can. This is the best vehicle we have for the whole church to connect people to one another in a smaller environment. Bible studies are at 9am on Sundays throughout the building. If you’re not already in a study, grab a Bible study card at the Welcome table in the foyer, and find a study or two to visit. Feel free to look at several and find the folks and the study that fit you well.

Call2Fall?

Opening

Today, will more likely than not be the end of our series called “Who’s Your One?” We’ve been considering evangelism as a church body, desiring that evangelism become a part of who we are, a part of our DNA so to speak, and we are asking the question “Who’s Your One?” Who is one person in your circle of influence that God would have you share the message of the hope of the Gospel of Jesus Christ with this year? Today, we are going to almost come full circle to where we started back on May 19.

Rather than us focusing on a particular passage of Scripture this morning, we’re going to focus on a particular individual in Scripture: the Apostle Andrew.

John 1:35–42 CSB

35 The next day, John was standing with two of his disciples. 36 When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!” 37 The two disciples heard him say this and followed Jesus. 38 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?” 39 “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. 40 Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of the two who heard John and followed him. 41 He first found his own brother Simon and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated “the Christ”), 42 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”).

john 1:

If we were to make a list of the Twelve Apostles, I doubt that anyone’s list would begin with Andrew. In fact, in the four times in Scripture that we have a complete list of the Twelve, Andrew is listed second (immediately after his brother Simon Peter) twice, and he is listed fourth (after Peter, James, and John) twice. However, he is considered to be in sort of the “inner circle” of Jesus’s disciples, even though he’s not mentioned as being at some very pivotal personal moments in Jesus’s life: the transfiguration and being one of those closest to Jesus during His prayers in the Garden of Gethsemane. One commentary I read referred to him as holding a “swing role” in the inner circle.

He didn’t write anything that we know of. The last time that he is mentioned by name in Scripture is in , and that is in just a list of the apostles. Neither Paul, nor Peter, nor John refer to Andrew in their epistles. He’s kind of in the background.

So, what do we know about Andrew?

What do we know about Andrew?

I like the name, Andrew. Oddly enough, he’s the patron saint of several countries, including Scotland. His name just sounds Scottish, doesn’t it? And do you know what his name means? It means manliness or manly. It’s literally a manly name. If that’s your name, gentlemen, hold your head a little higher, back a little straighter. You are “manly.” =o)

Andrew, like his brother Peter, was a fisherman. Andrew and Peter were originally from Bethsaida, a small fishing village on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee. He worked for a living with his brother, and probably with James, John, and their father Zebedee, likely out of Capernaum, another fishing town on the other side of the north shore of the Sea of Galilee, across the Jordan river.

Andrew does have one impressive distinction, however: he was the first Apostle recorded to have believed in Christ as the Messiah, and one of the first two disciples (along with Peter), to give up what they were doing to follow Jesus, which is where we started this series six weeks ago.

In the passage that we just read, Andrew and some other unnamed disciple of John the Baptist were standing there when their teach (John) pointed out Jesus and said, “Look, the Lamb of God!” That other unnamed disciple, whom many believe to be the Apostle John (although we cannot know for sure), follow Jesus and spend the remainder of the day with Him. The two of them become Jesus’s first disciples, even before they were called to give up everything to follow Him as their rabbi.

However, Andrew’s presence in the Scriptures is nearly always a minor one, as he is kind of always in the shadow of his more gregarious brother, Peter. But the reach of Andrew’s ministry was massive. Why? Because he reached one, who in turn reached many.

“In the Johannine Gospel Andrew is mentioned in two contexts other than in chapter 1. In 6:8 he brings to Jesus the lad with the five loaves and two fish, and in 12:22 he is linked with Philip in bringing Jesus a message of interest from the Greeks. He is thus pictured in John as a model helper or aid.”

Gerard L. Borchert wrote in his commentary on John: “In the Johannine Gospel Andrew is mentioned in two contexts other than in chapter 1. In 6:8 he brings to Jesus the lad with the five loaves and two fish, and in 12:22 he is linked with Philip in bringing Jesus a message of interest from the Greeks. He is thus pictured in John as a model helper or aid.”

We will look at each of these passages this morning.

1: Andrew saw the value of individual people

John 1:40–42 CSB

40 Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of the two who heard John and followed him. 41 He first found his own brother Simon and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated “the Christ”), 42 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”).

1: Andrew saw the value of individual people

1: Andrew saw the value of individual people

Andrew was a disciple of John the Baptist.

John the Baptist was standing with Andrew and another disciple (John?) and when he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!: (35-36).

The two follow Jesus, and spend the day with Him.

Focal part (40-42):

Andrew “first” (41) found his own brother (Simon Peter) and told him that he had found Messiah, and brought Peter to Jesus. Peter’s name, and his life, get changed.

Parables of the one ()

God-fearing Greeks came to the Passover festival (20). They went to Philip (Greek name), and he took them to Andrew (also a Greek name), and then Andrew took them to Jesus.

2: Andrew saw the value of insignificant gifts

Feeding of the Five Thousand

Lots of people, not lots of food.

v8: Andrew found the boy with his little lunch, and brought him to Jesus.

“There’s a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish - but what are they for so many?” If he truly felt that the gift was without value, he wouldn’t have brought it up.

Jesus miraculously multiplies the lunch.

From NAC at :

Andrew, the helper, tried to solve the problem in another way. he began immediately to search for picnic resources in that barren place, but his search also ended in failure, according to his thinking. All he found was a boy in the crowd who had a lunch with barley loaves (the bread of the poor) and two small, dried fish (emphasis on small). Andrew’s answer was also hopelessness.

3: Andrew saw the value of personal faithfulness

Tradition holds that he was crucified in Patras in Achaea, bound instead of nailed to a cross. Traditionally, this cross was X-shaped, supposedly because he deemed himself unworthy to be crucified on the same type of cross as Jesus had been.

This X-cross, called the crux decussata (Latin), is now commonly referred to as “St. Andrew’s Cross,” and appears on the flag of Scotland, and makes up the background of the Union Jack of England.

Tradition also holds that he traveled around the Black Sea, sharing the Gospel. It also holds that he traveled up the Dnieper River to the future location of Kiev.

Closing