Today we see Jesus calling his first disciples.  Interestingly, we see the story of Simon Peter and his brother Andrew from a different angel than that which we were presented in Matthew and Luke.  With Matthew and Luke’s narratives, we see Jesus encounter Peter and Andrew while they are fishing, and it is a dramatic story that I have always really loved reading.  Now, we don’t know exactly where John’s narrative fits in terms of timeline, but I could easily see something like this - John the Baptist had told Simon and Andrew about Jesus and had brought them along to see Him speak at one point.  They were aware of who Jesus was, and they probably already had some inclinations about who He might be.  That’s basically what John is presenting.  Then John leaves out the next part, which Matthew and Luke recount, which is that they were out fishing one day and Jesus shows up and does a dramatic thing by helping them pull in more fish than they could handle on a morning where they had come up empty, as professional fisherman.  Why would the two of them allow Jesus to talk them into throwing their nets, which they’d just spent probably a couple of hours cleaning, back out into the sea?  Well, because they’d seen Him, they were familiar with Him, they already had inclinations about who He might be.  Then, after catching all of the fish, Simon and Andrew follow Jesus without much of a pause.  Why would a rational person do that?  Well, because as John tells us, they had already encountered Jesus and knew a little and now they REALLY knew that Jesus was something special.  john is probably telling us about their first encounter where as Matthew and Luke are telling us about their moment o conversion from Jesus observers to Jesus followers.

And Jesus then calls Philip and Nathanael.  Philip, being from the same place as Simon and Andrew was now probably fully aware that they had encountered Jesus and were now following Him...we aren’t talking about New York city here.  Galilee had, based on some estimates, probably 13-15k people in it, and I am guessing it is like most towns, that there are clicks within the town, so I am guessing all of these guys were kind of running in similar circles.  So, Philip jumps in and he tells Nathanael about Jesus, and Nathanael was a doubter.  So Jesus does a little mental move on him and tells Nathanael where he had been when Philip came to get him, which he couldn’t have known apart from being omnipresent, and Nathanael is converted into a believer.  And then Jesus drops this statement onto him in verse 51.

“Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.”

And I love that...Jesus knows that the disciples are following Him in the beginning for the same reason I followed at first, and the same reason you followed - there was something in it for me.  There was a clear and present benefit for you.  I mean, who doesn’t want eternal life?  Who doesn’t want healing, forgiveness, and grace?  And those are free?  Sign me up!  But as Jesus told them in Luke, He had something else in mind for them, and He has something else in mind for us...He will make us fishers of men.  Jesus’ mission is to win us over, to get into our lives, and to change us and to shape us and to mold us into what God made us for...and a part of God’s plan for ALL of our lives is that we’d become fishers of men.  These 4 have now been called into service, as have we.