{"id":12547,"date":"2024-07-26T00:00:07","date_gmt":"2024-07-25T16:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/?p=12547"},"modified":"2024-07-28T21:53:01","modified_gmt":"2024-07-28T13:53:01","slug":"deep-insights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/2024\/07\/26\/deep-insights\/","title":{"rendered":"Deep Insights"},"content":{"rendered":"

John 1:47-49 47<\/sup>Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said about him, \u201cBehold, truly an Israelite, in whom there is no deceit!\u201d 48<\/sup>Nathanael said to him, \u201cHow do you know me?\u201d Jesus answered and said to him, \u201cBefore Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.\u201d 49<\/sup>Nathanael answered him, \u201cRabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The omniscience of Jesus is on display in the next part of the story. He shows more than human intuition and was able to look deeply into Nathanael’s character and see a person of great integrity. Nathanael was a genuine seeker of the truth. Not much is known about Nathanael’s background or life before meeting Jesus. Minimally, he was from the area of Bethsaida and knew Philip, Andrew, and Peter. What Jesus says about him implies that he had lived an exemplary life as an Israelite.\u00a0Deceit <\/em>(dolos<\/em>) has the sense of intentional cunning, treachery, or action that if full of lies. The opposite would be honest, forthright, and with clear motives.<\/p>\n

Nathanael must have tried to live his life this way because his responding question to Jesus in verse 48 gives a sense of surprise. How could Jesus perceive this about him? His deep motives were right as he sought for truth. Jesus saw his inner drive and how it influenced how he lived, but there was something deeper he needed: to find the Messiah. Another indicator of Jesus’ omniscience was his knowledge of where Nathanael was before Philip went to look for him. Nathanael’s response of surprise and exclamation implies that he was far away from Jesus, even beyond eyesight. Only someone of divine enablement could see that far and know what was going on in his heart.<\/p>\n

Nathanael’s answer shows a key confession that the readers of this Gospel should also have. He gives three significant descriptions of Jesus.\u00a0Rabbi<\/em> was the Aramaic word for “teacher.” It was a polite address to someone who had religious influence. In his ministry, Jesus would become the greatest teacher of all time. Nathanael would hear, learn, and believe in Jesus’ words. Second, Nathanael was the first to acknowledge and confess Jesus to be the Son of God<\/em>. Third, he also believed Jesus to be the\u00a0King of Israel<\/em>, which would be another way of calling him the Messiah. Readers of this Gospel have been alerted to three key descriptions and will find evidence throughout the book to backup Nathanael’s assertions.<\/p>\n

For older posts, click\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

John 1:47-49 47Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said about him, \u201cBehold, truly an Israelite, in whom there is no deceit!\u201d 48Nathanael said to him, \u201cHow do you know me?\u201d Jesus answered and said to him, \u201cBefore Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.\u201d 49Nathanael answered him, \u201cRabbi, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devotions","post-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12547"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12547\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12565,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12547\/revisions\/12565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/acky4.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}