Come and See
SUMMARY
In this sermon, Carter Shuman uses the calling of Philip and Nathanael from John 1 to challenge us to lay down our snap judgments and our mental calculations, and simply follow Jesus. Like Nathanael, who doubted anything good could come from Nazareth, and Philip, who tried to do the math on what God could do, we often let our assumptions and limitations define what we believe God is capable of. The invitation Jesus extends to both disciples — and to us — is simple and powerful: come and see.
TRANSCRIPTION:
I am from Artesia, New Mexico. The Artesian, New Mexico. Now, most of you Lubbockites, you don't get it. You don't really understand the significance of this statement unless you take the drive to Cloudcroft and you see the water tower displaying for everyone our accolades and achievements since 1956. Our football team has won 33 state championships.
Yeah, and last year, we had one of the greatest comebacks, literally, in sports history. I would go in and tell the story about it, but you don't want to hear me scream that loud. I'm telling you, it was amazing. Artesia is a place for winners, so naturally, I'm a born winner.
But not too far down the road, there lives our rivals, the Carlsbad Cavemen. Can I get a Boo?
Lindsey Joy, It's okay to be from there, I guess.
One thing I can tell you is not much good comes from there. It's a hole in the ground, A place not worth belonging to. And if you ask any Artesian, they will tell you the same. Not much good can come from Carlsbad, New Mexico. Today, one of our disciples will deliver that famous one liner, can anything good come from Nazareth?
And Lindsay might tell you something good might come out of Carlsbad. Maybe a preacher. He's all right.
Maybe a family. Why don't you come and see for yourself what good might come from Nazareth? Nathaniel, this disciple starts off as a skeptic, and I think Philip is almost the opposite. What I love about these two guys is that Jesus calls both of them right where they're at.
So Philip was likely the other disciple that John was with whenever he told Andrew, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. And In John, chapter 1, verses 43, it says, the next day, Jesus decided to leave for Galilee, finding Philip, he said to him, follow me. That's it. That's all he said. And Philip follows.
And I can't help but thank Carl in this moment because he gave me two of the pretty most obscure disciples that you can get.
Because here's what we know about Philip. We know he's not Peter, he's not James, and he's not John. He doesn't have some title behind his name that gives him some clear expectation of who he is. He's not a scholar, he's not royalty. He's not noteworthy whatsoever.
He's not even that guy in Acts, chapter eight who goes and baptizes that Ethiopian fellow like we don't. He's not even that Philip. But Philip does something immediately that Tells us something about him. Philip goes and finds Nathaniel. Immediately we see that Philip has a missionary mindset.
He is already on mission for Jesus. And I think this is really beautiful. Philip doesn't have everything figured out. He doesn't have three years of following Jesus under his belt. Guys, I'm like skipping a few slides here if you want to catch up with me.
He doesn't. He doesn't even know Jesus yet. He doesn't know the power of Jesus. He hasn't seen Jesus feed. He hasn't seen Jesus heal.
He doesn't have all the answers, but he knows enough to say, come and see. Come and see for yourself.
And then Nathaniel says something that I think most of us have probably said at some point in our lives. Can anything good come from there? Now, we need to understand what Nathaniel is doing here. He hasn't met Jesus. He hasn't talked to Jesus, hasn't listened to Jesus, hasn't seen what Jesus can do.
He just knows where Jesus is from. And he makes a snap judgment. Nazareth. And apparently in Nathanael's mind, it's pretty hard to imagine the glory of God coming out of a place like that.
Aren't we all that way? We decide what God can do based on what we already know. We even see people and make snap judgments about what God is able to do in their lives.
Our brains are unfortunately very good at prejudice. 100 milliseconds. 100 milliseconds is all it takes. Princeton University research shows that the brain decides if a face is trustworthy or attractive within a frame fraction of a second, 7 seconds. Most face to face.
Social and business evaluations lock into place. You find your role within seven seconds. Brief moments before speaking. Roughly 69% of people form an opinion about someone prior to any conversation taking place. Before you saw me, before my mouth opened on stage this morning, you probably saw my pit stains because it was hot in here.
All right, you made some snap judgments. I know it. Seriously, it's bad. I'm sorry.
So we decide all kinds of things before we take the time to give it a chance. We decide what kind of church this can become based on what we've already seen. We decide what God can do with our lives based on what we've done in our past. And Nathaniel, he's already decided, can anything good come from Nazareth?
And this is the cool part. Philip doesn't argue with him. He doesn't have some 12 point apologetic defense of Nazareth. He doesn't sit there and say, but, but, but. You haven't seen no no, no.
He just says, come and see.
No argument. Come and see for yourself.
So Nathaniel goes, and this is where the story gets really interesting, because Jesus sees Nathanael coming and he says, here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit. At first glance, when I read this, I was like, whoa, is Jesus just dropping some strong sarcasm right now? Is Jesus just. Did he hear what Nathaniel said about Nazareth? And he's just saying, oh, yeah, you think you've got it all figured out?
No, no. There is some irony there, but also there's. There's a really clear use of Nathaniel's assumptions. And it's the beginning of Jesus revealing not only who he is to Nathaniel, but cluing Nathaniel in on his own identity. Jesus is already reforming and reshaping who Nathaniel is.
It's a theological statement about Nathaniel.
You are the rescued and renamed Jacob, a true Israelite with whom there is no deceit. You're not Jacob the deceiver. You are Israel, the one who wrestles with God and comes out on top. You're the one who's been renamed and God renames you and gives you a new identity. Not a deceiver, but one who grapples with me and lives to tell the tale.
Nathaniel is from Artesia and this Carlsbad, Jesus is ready to wrestle.
Nathanael has his eyes opened and he says, how do you know me? Jesus answers, I saw you while you were still under the fig tree, before Philip came and got you. And all of a sudden, Nathaniel realizes something. Jesus knows him. And we.
Because we're on the other side of the story and we know Jesus, we know something even more that Jesus loves him. Before Nathaniel knows Jesus, Jesus loves Nathaniel. And that changes everything. Nathaniel came into this conversation thinking he knew something about Jesus, but Jesus knew more about Nathanael than he would ever know about himself. And I think that is one of the.
One of the things that we need to remember when we talk about discipleship.
We sometimes think that the Christian life is about figuring Jesus out, and that's certainly part of it. And we need to know Jesus. We need to search the Scriptures diligently. We need to know Jesus, but we need to remember that before Nathaniel figured Jesus out, Jesus already figured him out. Jesus saw him and he knew him.
And Jesus called him anyway.
I have no idea what was going on under that fig tree before Philip showed up, but I can tell you. I can tell you that what happened after is beyond imagination, because this is how Jesus describes it, says, very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven Open up. And the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man. He's saying, you get to play the part of Jacob. You get to see the place where heaven meets earth.
I am that place for Moses. I'm the burning bush and the crag and the rock. I am Jacob's Bethel. I am the ark and the fire by night and the cloud by day. I am the manna.
I am the word become flesh, the stream in the desert. You know me.
Because when we cut this series apart of all these disciples and we really look underneath all of it, none of them are the main character. That's Jesus.
Jesus is the main character of every story of all time. And what he's accomplished cannot be contained in one idea. Atonement, victory, sanctification, propitiation, reconciliation, redemption. All of it, all of it comes under the victory of Jesus Christ. He is the center of it all.
Jacob, come and see. Nathanael, come and see Jesus. The place where heaven meets earth.
And he calls Nathaniel to be his witness right where he's at. I think that's really important because Nathaniel's not exactly the finished product. He starts off this story with a pretty significant prejudice. Can anything good come from Nazareth? But Jesus doesn't say, well, let's get this guy cleaned up before we start using him.
No. Jesus calls him, you will be my witness. And he begins to establish a new identity in him. Because Jesus calls people into process, he's not waiting for you to have it all figured out. And Philip is actually another pretty great example of this, because Philip seems to be a guy who needs to see things make sense.
In John chapter six, a great crowd comes before Jesus. When Jesus looked up, he saw a great crowd coming toward him. He said to Philip, where shall we buy bread for these people to eat? He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do. Philip answered him.
It would take more than half a year's wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite. That's a lot of silver.
Philip starts by doing the math.
Philip's looking at the problem. 5,000 people, not enough food. We don't have enough money. We don't have enough resources. Philip does what a lot of us do.
He calculates well, Jesus, it would take about eight months wages for us to give everyone a single bite here. I don't think we have what it takes. The problem is. The problem is when you're following Jesus, what is possible isn't determined by what you have. And guys, this is the stuff that stretches me, because I'm pretty fluent in Numbers.
I like it when things add up. Mental math is kind of my jam. I love just making sure all the Numbers are in the right spot, making sure everything lines up, that the budget is B balance, that we're not over, that we're in the green, baby, and we're rocking and rolling. I love it. I love it when it all lines up.
So this stretches me because it's not lining up. So I'm like, Philip. And he's right. He's right. They need more.
They need more than what they have. But Jesus is looking at the Father.
And that's a really important difference between us and Jesus, isn't it? Because sometimes our faith gets reduced to what we can calculate. We look at our church, we look at our families, our jobs, our schools, we look at the state of the world, we watch the news, and we start adding it all up together. And all of that sits on one side. And then we look at our resources, our abilities, our finances, our team, our time, our available attention.
We look at these two sides and it doesn't add up.
We're saying it's. There's way too much for anything to cover the gap. There's no way. But Jesus says, come and see. Come and see what the Father can do with what you have.
And he does it, doesn't he? Fast forward to John, chapter 14. Philip is still asking questions. He still has some mental math going on. And Jesus has been talking about the Father.
Jesus answered, I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really know me, you will know my Father as well from now on. You do know him, and you have seen him.
Philip said, lord, show us the Father. That'll be enough for us.
And I actually really appreciate Philip here because Philip's not pretending.
Who here has a tendency to act like they get it even when they don't?
You have that moment where we're asking that question and you're like, yeah, yeah, I've got the answer. But you really don't.
With Philip, we've got a little bit of humility. He's humble. He doesn't understand. So he asks. And Jesus answers him.
Philip, you know me. You've seen me. You've seen me. So you've seen the Father. Recognize the Father because you've seen me.
Philip's questions, they don't disqualify him. His questions become part of the way Jesus forms him. So keep asking questions, because there's a difference between having questions and refusing to follow. Say yes, Lord, please clarify. Show me more.
Tell me more. Help my unbelief. Philip has questions, but he keeps following. Nathaniel has assumptions, but he's still willing to come and see. And that's really the invitation that Jesus gives to both of them.
Follow me and just watch.
So what do we do with these two guys? I think Philip and Nathaniel represent two things that get in our way of following Jesus. Philip's the classic overthinker. Nathaniel prejudges Philip says, I don't know if it's possible. Nathanael says, I don't know if this is worth pursuing.
Philip looks at what he has and he says, I don't know if that's enough. Nathaniel looks at where Jesus is from and says, can anything good come from there? But Jesus calls them both. Because Jesus isn't looking for people who have it all figured out. He's looking for people who will follow him.
And maybe that's where some of us are today. Maybe you're Philip. Maybe you've been following Jesus a long time, but you've started calculating everything.
You know what your family has done, what they're capable of. You know what the Church has done and what it's capable of. You know what you have done and what you're capable of. And you decided what God can and can't do with all of that.
Jesus is saying to you, come and find out. Come and see. And maybe you're Nathaniel. Maybe you've already decided. Maybe you've made up your mind about somebody or some place.
You've made up your mind about what God can do with you. You've made up your mind about what could possibly come from this place. And Jesus is saying, come and see. Because Jesus says the same thing to you as he does to Nathaniel. He says, you will see greater things than this.
That's the promise. Because here's the reality. You haven't seen it all yet.
Many of you have already seen a lot. You've seen the world change. You've seen this church change. You've seen families and lives. And I can assure you, you haven't seen it all yet.
The invitation is simple. Come and see. Come find out. Bring your questions. Bring your assumptions.
Bring your prejudice. Bring your limitations. Bring your finite resources. Bring your five loaves, your two fish. Come and find out.
Bring that part of you that says, I don't think any of this is possible. Bring that part of you that says, nothing good can come out of there. Bring that part of you that's not ready, that's not sure. And come and see.
Come and see. I'm going to ask the praise team to start walking up on Wednesday. I saw a couple of little girls running around the halls, and they came running up to my class that I was about to teach, and they came and asked me, hey, have you seen little Jesus in here?
And I had. I was taken aback. I was like, oh, I sure hope so.
But apparently there's, like, little figurine Jesus's hanging out around the building, and they were looking at, like their mom had sent them off to go get. Get them out of her hair, you know, and they're like, hey, go find this Jesus.
But there's something really true about that search, isn't there? And I thought about it, and in one month of being here, I've already seen what those girls were looking for. And I know that this is true all over the world and in every congregation, every place where people meet to find Jesus, they find him. But I can bear witness, like Nathaniel, right here in this place, this church is filled with people who are in tune with the spirit, who walk with Jesus, who have absorbed Jesus, feasted on Jesus, and the spirit of God lives in you.
This is a very exciting time to be at Broadway Church of Christ because of what God is doing. You want to find Jesus, you need a reminder that Jesus loves you. Well, you can find it right here. You can find him here. And we will be glad to remind you we can't keep it to ourselves.
Go out from here and ask others to come and see.