Nathanael - The Genuine
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Introduction:
This guy is Philip’s clostest companion, Nathanael or Bartholomew. In John’s gospel he is always referred to as Nathanael.
Bartholomew is a Hebrew surname that means “son of Tolmai”.
Nathanael means “God has given”.
In the synoptic gospels (Matt, Mark, and Luke) and the book of Acts there are no details of Nathanael’s background and each only mention him once and that is when listing the 12 disciples.
John’s Gospel tells of Nathanael in just two passages:
where his call is recorded
where he is names as one of those who returned to Galilee and went fishing with Peter after Jesus’ resurrection and before His ascension.
Several of the disciples were there—Simon Peter, Thomas (nicknamed the Twin), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples.
Nathanael is from Cana a small town in Galilee, the place where Jesus performed His first miracle, changing water into wine. Cana eas very close to Jesus’ hometown, Nazareth.
Nathanael was brought to Jesus immediately after Philip was sought and called by Christ. Philip brought his best buddy to Jesus beacuse he wanted him to get in on meeting and knowing the Messiah.
These guys were close friends and we see this reflected in every list of the disciples their names are linked.
Apparently they were friends throughout the years and were always side by side, not as brothers but as close friends.
His call happened after the call of Peter, James, John, Andrew and Philip. Where Philip, his best friend, brought him to Christ.
Philip and Nathanael’s relationship is not disclosed. We don’t know if they were close due to business, family, or just a social relationship. But we do know they are close and Philip knew his friend would be interested in getting to know the long-awaited Messiah. He could not wait to share the news with him. So immediately Philip sought him out.
Nathanael was found iby Philip in the same place where Philip was found by Jesus. How Nathanael came to Jesus gives us a lot of insight about his character.
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Come, follow me.”
Philip was from Bethsaida, Andrew and Peter’s hometown.
Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.”
“Nazareth!” exclaimed Nathanael. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” “Come and see for yourself,” Philip replied.
As they approached, Jesus said, “Now here is a genuine son of Israel—a man of complete integrity.”
“How do you know about me?” Nathanael asked. Jesus replied, “I could see you under the fig tree before Philip found you.”
Then Nathanael exclaimed, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God—the King of Israel!”
Jesus asked him, “Do you believe this just because I told you I had seen you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than this.”
Then he said, “I tell you the truth, you will all see heaven open and the angels of God going up and down on the Son of Man, the one who is the stairway between heaven and earth.”
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Come, follow me.”
Philip was from Bethsaida, Andrew and Peter’s hometown.
Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.”
“Nazareth!” exclaimed Nathanael. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” “Come and see for yourself,” Philip replied.
As they approached, Jesus said, “Now here is a genuine son of Israel—a man of complete integrity.”
“How do you know about me?” Nathanael asked. Jesus replied, “I could see you under the fig tree before Philip found you.”
John 1:43-
Prayer: Lord may we be challenged by Nathanael’s genuine heart to know you more, may that desire be ever present in our lives.
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Come, follow me.”
Philip was from Bethsaida, Andrew and Peter’s hometown.
Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.”
“Nazareth!” exclaimed Nathanael. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” “Come and see for yourself,” Philip replied.
His love of Scripture
His love of Scripture
:
Then Andrew brought Simon to meet Jesus. Looking intently at Simon, Jesus said, “Your name is Simon, son of John—but you will be called Cephas” (which means “Peter”).
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Come, follow me.”
Philip was from Bethsaida, Andrew and Peter’s hometown.
Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.”
One striking fact about Nathanael that comes from how Philip announced to him that he found the Messiah:
Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.”
The truth of scripture mattered to Nathanael and Philip knew that and that his friend would be intrigued by the news of Jesus. Jesus was the one prophesied by Moses and the prophets in scripture. When Philip told Nathanael about the Messiah he did so from the standpoint of the OT prophecy. Nathanael new the OT prophecies.
This shows these men were students of the word and studied together. In all likelihood they came to the wilderness together to hear John the Baptist. They had shared interest in the fulfillment of the OT prophecy. Philip knew the news of Jesus would excite his friend because of this shared search and interest.
We know this from how Philip spoke of Jesus fulfilling the OT prophecies, because that would peak his interest.
Philip didn’t tell him Jesus had a wonderful plan for his life, or that he found the man who would fix his marriage and personal problems and give your life meaning. He went to him and told him that he found who they had been searching for!
“
Nathanael was an eager student of the OT was seeking divine truth!
All the apostles, with the exception of Judas Iscariot, were true seekers after divine truth before they met Jesus.
They were already being drawn by the spirit of God. Their hearts were opened to the truth and hungry to know it. They were sincere in their love for God and their desire to know the truth and receive the Messiah.
These men were very different from the religious establishment at that time which was dominated by hypocrisy and piety. The disciples were the real thing.
Philip and Nathanael most likely spent long house over studying scripture together, searching the Law and the prophets to discern the truth about the coming of the Messiah.
The fact that they were well trained in scripture explains why they were so quick to respond to Jesus. They knew what to look for and when they met Him there was no denying it. In Nathanael’s case this would become especially evident.
He had a clear understanding of scripture and recognized the fulfillment when he saw it.
Philip told him:
And she will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”
“It is Jesus of Nazareth, son of Joseph”.
Jesus was a common name - Y’shua in its Aramaic form.
It is the same as Joshua in the OT.
It meant “Yahweh is salvation” - for He will save His people from their sins
And she will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”
There must have been a certain amount of surprise in Philip’s voice like he was saying “You will never believe this, but Jesus, son of Joseph, the carpenter’s son from Nazareth is the Messiah!”
Talk about an exciting moment for these friends
Next we see
His Prejudice
His Prejudice
verse 46 shows more of Nathanael’s character. Yes he was a student of scripture and searched for true knowledge of God, he had strong spiritual interests and had been faithful, diligent and honest in his devotion to the Word of God; he was human. He had certain prejudices. Here is where we see that coming through:
“Nazareth!” exclaimed Nathanael. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” “Come and see for yourself,” Philip replied.
He might have quoted
“But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Though you are little among the thousands of Judah, Yet out of you shall come forth to Me The One to be Ruler in Israel, Whose goings forth are from of old, From everlasting.”
He could have responded saying “But Philip, Messiah is identified with Jerusalem, because He’s going to reign in Jerusalem”.
But he did not say that instead the depth of his prejudice came through in the words he chose:
“Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”
This was not a rational nor a Biblical objection; it was based on sheer emotion and bigotry. It reveals what contempt Nathanael had for the whole town of Nazareth. But the thing is he was from Cana and this was not such a prestigious town either. Cana was off the beaten track, Nazareth was at the crossroads. To travel from the Mediterranean to Galilee you had to travel through Nazareth. One of the main routes going north and south between Jerusalem and Lebanon passed through Nazareth. No one ever passed through Cana, Cana was a sidetrip from everything. So the lack of anything attractive coming from Nazareth does not exmplain his prejudice.
Maybe it was some civic rivalry between Nazareth and Cana.
Nazareth was a rough towm. The culture was larely unrefined and uneducated. (It is still much the same today). Nazareth is not a picturesque place, although it has a nice setting on the slopes of the hills of Galilee. It is not a memorable town and even less so in Jesus’ time. The Judeans looked down on the Galileans but even the Galileans looked down on the Nazarenes.
Nathanael came from an even more lowly village was echoing the general contempt for Nazareth that the Galileans had.
We are looking at this because God takes pleasure in using the common, weak, and lowly things of this world to confound the wise and powerful.
But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.
He even calls people from the most despised locations. He can take a flawed person who is blinded by prejudice and He can change that person into someone used to transform the world.
It was not even in Nathanael’s mind that the Messiah could come from a place like Nazareth. It was evil, corupt and populated with sinful people. He didn’t think anything good could come from there.
Prejudice is ugly. Generalizations based on feelings of superiority can be spiritually debilitating. Prejudice cuts people off from the truth. Much of the nation of Israel rejected their Messiah because of prejudice. They did not believe their Messiah should come out of Nazareth, either. They mocked the apostles because they came from Galilee.
They replied, “Are you from Galilee, too? Search the Scriptures and see for yourself—no prophet ever comes from Galilee!”
Everyone spoke well of him and was amazed by the gracious words that came from his lips. “How can this be?” they asked. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”
Then he said, “You will undoubtedly quote me this proverb: ‘Physician, heal yourself’—meaning, ‘Do miracles here in your hometown like those you did in Capernaum.’
But I tell you the truth, no prophet is accepted in his own hometown.
“Certainly there were many needy widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the heavens were closed for three and a half years, and a severe famine devastated the land.
Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them. He was sent instead to a foreigner—a widow of Zarephath in the land of Sidon.
And many in Israel had leprosy in the time of the prophet Elisha, but the only one healed was Naaman, a Syrian.”
When they heard this, the people in the synagogue were furious.
Jumping up, they mobbed him and forced him to the edge of the hill on which the town was built. They intended to push him over the cliff,
Luke 4:22-
Everyone spoke well of him and was amazed by the gracious words that came from his lips. “How can this be?” they asked. “Isn’t this Joseph’s son?”
Prejudice skewed their view of the Messiah. The people of Israel were preudiced against Him as a Galilean and a Nazarene. They also were prejudiced against him because he was an uneducated person outside of their religious estabilishment. And then also about his message. They refused to hear Him because they were cultural and religious bigots.
Prejudice effectively caused the majority of the Jewish nation to remain deaf to the Messiah.
He came to his own people, and even they rejected him.
John 1:11
Nathanael lived in a society that was prejudicial by temperment. In reality all sinful people are. We make prejudicial statements and draw these types of conclusions about individuals, classes and people and whole societies. Nathanael like the rest of us had that sinful tendency.
Fortunately, his prejudice wasn’t strong enough to keep him from Christ. Philip said to him “Come and see”. That is the right way to deal with prejudice: Confront it with the facts!
Prejudice is feeling-based. It is subjective. It does not necessarily reflect the reality of the matter. So the remedy is a honest look at objective reality - come and see.
And the great thing is he went!
His Sincerity of Heart
His Sincerity of Heart
The most important aspect of Nathanael’s character is expressed from the lips of Jesus. Jesus knew Nathanael already.
No one needed to tell him about human nature, for he knew what was in each person’s heart.
Jesus’ first words upon seeing Nathanael were powerful commendation of Nathanael’s character.
As they approached, Jesus said, “Now here is a genuine son of Israel—a man of complete integrity.”
Can you imagine having these words said about you by Jesus himself??
We are all just longing to hear the words “Well done, good and faithful servant...”
But how would you like to hear these words about you from the very start of your relatioship with Him?
This says so much about Nathanael’s character. He was purehearted from the beginning. Yes he was human, he had sinful faults, his mind was tainted by prejudice but his heart was not poisioned by deceit. He was not a hypocrite. His love for God and his desire to see the Messiah were genuine. His heart was sincere and without guile.
Jesus refers to him as an “Israelite indeed”. In the Greek text alethos meaning “truly genuinely”.
He was an authentic Israelite.
His genuineness is defined him as a true Israelite.
Well then, has God failed to fulfill his promise to Israel? No, for not all who are born into the nation of Israel are truly members of God’s people!
Being descendants of Abraham doesn’t make them truly Abraham’s children. For the Scriptures say, “Isaac is the son through whom your descendants will be counted,” though Abraham had other children, too.
For you are not a true Jew just because you were born of Jewish parents or because you have gone through the ceremony of circumcision.
No, a true Jew is one whose heart is right with God. And true circumcision is not merely obeying the letter of the law; rather, it is a change of heart produced by the Spirit. And a person with a changed heart seeks praise from God, not from people.
His heart was right with God. Nathanael was an authentic Jew. Here was one who worshiped the true and living God without deceit and without hyprocisy.
To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples.
Nathanael was a true disciple from the very start. There was no hypocrisy in him. This was very rare and unusual in first century Israel. This man’s heart was circumcised, cleansed of defilement and faith was authentic.
His devotion to God was real. He was truly a righteous man - flawed by sins we all are - but justified before God through a true and living faith.
His Eager Faith
His Eager Faith
Because his heart was sincere and his faith was real Nathanael overcame his rejudice. His response to Jesus and the narrative that followed revealed his true character. At first he was simply amazed that Jesus knew anything about him.
“How do you know about me?” Nathanael asked. Jesus replied, “I could see you under the fig tree before Philip found you.”
We have to assume that he is in awe or actually still questioning if Jesus is the Messiah. It was not that he questioned Philip’s judgement, he was his friend and he trusted him. It was not that he questioned scripture or prone to be skeptical. It was that this man is from Nazareth and that did not seem to fit the picture of the Messiah in his mind.
Jesus was the son of a carpenter, a no name, a non descript man from a town that had no connection to any prophecy. Nazareth did not even exist in the OT.
And now Jesus had spoken to him as if he knew all about him and could even see inside his heart. Nathanael was just trying to come to grips with this supernatural encounter. It is not an everyday occurance is it?
When Jesus said he saw him under the fig tree I believe this meant I know the state of your heart because I saw you under the fig tree. This is where you would go to study and spend time and pray. I saw you in your secret place. It was not only that Jesus saw his location but He saw his heart as well. He knew the sincerity of Nathanael’s character because He saw right into him under the fig tree.
That was enough for Nathanael.
So he answered saying
John 1:
Then Nathanael exclaimed, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God—the King of Israel!”
John’s whole Gospel was written to prove thta Jesus is the Son of God. John’s first words are a powerful declaration of Jesus’ diety
In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Every point of his Gospel is designed to prove that Jesus is the Son of God! Sharing the same essence as God
He did this by highlighting his miracles, his sinless character, divine wisdom in his teching and his attributes, which are the cery sttributes of God.
Here in the first chapter is Nathanael’s testimony that his Jesus is the omnisient Son of God, of the very same essence of God.
This was the very same truth that Nathanael’s friend Philip still had not grasped two years later becasue he asked Jesus in the upper room “Show is the Father” ().
What Philip didn’t get until the very end Nathanael got at the very start.
Nathanael knew the OT and what the prophets said. He knew what to look for. And now regardless of the fact that Jesus came from Nazareth, His omniscience, His spiritual insight, His ability to reach the heart of Nathanael was enough to convince him.
Nathanael’s familiarity with the OT messianic prophecies is clearly seen in his reply to Jesus
You are the Son of God!
You are the King of Israel
clearly indicated that the Messiah would be the son of God
Many OT prophecies spoke of Him as the King of Israel
For the Lord will remove his hand of judgment and will disperse the armies of your enemy. And the Lord himself, the King of Israel, will live among you! At last your troubles will be over, and you will never again fear disaster.
Rejoice, O people of Zion! Shout in triumph, O people of Jerusalem! Look, your king is coming to you. He is righteous and victorious, yet he is humble, riding on a donkey— riding on a donkey’s colt.
But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, are only a small village among all the people of Judah. Yet a ruler of Israel whose origins are in the distant past, will come from you on my behalf.
Nathanael was like Simeon who lifted up the infant Jesus and said
Luke 2:29-
“Sovereign Lord, now let your servant die in peace, as you have promised.
I have seen your salvation,
which you have prepared for all people.
He is a light to reveal God to the nations, and he is the glory of your people Israel!”
He recognized Jesus instantly as the one who he had been waiting for. He was not half committed he was all in from day one.
Jesus’ repsonse to all this
Jesus asked him, “Do you believe this just because I told you I had seen you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than this.”
Then he said, “I tell you the truth, you will all see heaven open and the angels of God going up and down on the Son of Man, the one who is the stairway between heaven and earth.”
Jesus affirmed his faith and promised that he woud see even greater things than a simple show of Jesus’ omniscience. Nathanael was in for the ride of his life and he had not seen nothing yet!
What he would see would enlarge his faith and enrich his life.
Conclusion:
Most disciples struggled and questioned and found it hard to come to the place where Nathanael stood after his first meeting with Christ.
The ministry of Christ only affirmed what Nathanael already knew to be true. How wonderful to see this kind of faith in action!
May we learn from this! May we be so trustworthy and trusting from the very beginning so that we can make the most of every moment with Jesus like Nathanael did.
Nathanael ministered in Persia and India and took the gospel as far as Armenia. There is no reliable record of how he died. One account said he was tied up in a sack and cast into the sea. Another account said he was crucified. But all accounts state he was martyred like all the apostles except John.
Nathanael was faithful to the end because he was faithful from the start. May that be our legacy!
Whatever he experienced from the start of his walk made his faith stronger and Nathanael stands as proof that God can take the most common people, from the most insignificant places and use them for his glory.
Are you willing? Are you ready? What a ride? This life with Jesus is something to look forward to and eagerly anticipate every step.
Hold on because it is worth every second.
Have you any room for Jesus?