Come and See

Two friends were standing by the river when Jesus walked past.

One of them was named Andrew. His teacher, John, looked up and said softly, "Look. There he is. The Lamb of God." And something inside Andrew leaned forward, the way you lean when you hear your own name from far away.

So Andrew followed him.

Jesus turned around. He saw the two friends walking behind, a little shy, not sure what to say. And the very first thing he asked them was, "What are you looking for?"

As if he already knew. As if he could see the ache they had carried a long time, a wondering they had never told a single soul: Is there Someone who sees me? Someone I belong to?

"Where are you staying?" they asked.

And Jesus said, "Come and see."

So they came. And they stayed with him all that day. The Bible doesn't tell us what they talked about. But I think they walked home different than they came. Because when you have been truly seen, you are never quite so lonely again.

Remember, no one had ever seen God's face. And now here was the Word himself, walking by a river, letting two shy friends spend the whole day with him.

Andrew ran to find his brother, Simon. "We found him!" he said, out of breath. "We found the One!" And he brought Simon to Jesus.

Jesus looked at Simon. Really looked. The way you look at someone you have loved for a long time. "You are Simon," he said. "But I am going to call you Peter. The Rock." Already Jesus knew who this man would become. Already he had a name and a place ready for him.

The next day Jesus found Philip. And Philip found his friend Nathanael, sitting under a fig tree.

"We've found him, the One Moses wrote about!" Philip said. "He's from Nazareth."

But Nathanael frowned. "Nazareth? Can anything good come from a little town like that?"

"Come and see," said Philip.

So Nathanael came. And before he got close, before he said one word, Jesus smiled at him and said, "Here is a true son of Israel. A man with no pretending in him."

Nathanael stopped still. "How do you know me?"

And Jesus said, "Before Philip called you, while you were sitting under the fig tree, I saw you."

Think what that meant to Nathanael. He had been all alone under that tree. No one was watching. No one knew his thoughts. And yet Jesus saw him there. Jesus had seen him before they ever met.

You were never a stranger to me, Jesus was saying. I have known you all along.

That was the moment Nathanael believed.

This is how Jesus began: with names. First Andrew, then Simon, then Philip, then Nathanael, each one seen and called and gathered close, the way a shepherd counts his sheep and will not leave a single one out.

He sees you under your fig tree too. In the place where you think no one is watching. He has known you all along.

And the gathering he started that day by the river has not stopped. It has reached all the way to you. He is still counting his own, still calling them close, still saying, gently:

Come and see. I have so much more of myself to give you.