Second Sunday after the Epiphany
(B)
January 14, 2024
Text:
John 1:43-51
When the Lord calls a person, He
calls that person by name. The Lord
called you by name in Holy Baptism.
When you were baptized, it was not some other person the Lord
addressed. The pastor asked you,
“How are you named?” And you, or
your parents and sponsors on your behalf, responded with your proper name. And when the pastor took you up in his arms,
or bid you hold your head over the font, as God’s spokesman, he addressed you
by that proper name, pouring the water upon you and saying, “I baptized you in
the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” Your name now united to God’s Name,
the Christian Family Name, given you as a gift, and written upon you,
because you are precious to God, and holy.
Born anew in the blest baptismal waters, God’s own child, I gladly say
it.
He still calls you by
name. And He knows you. As your loving heavenly Father, He knows
His child. He knows your sins, your
faults, and weaknesses. He covers them
with the blood and righteousness of His Son, Jesus. He forgives your sins for Jesus’ sake. He knows your sorrows and your wounds. He consoles you by His Spirit in the
Gospel. He feeds you. He clothes you. He cares for you and provides for all your
needs of body and soul. He knows what
you need even better than you do. He
never forsakes you, for you belong to Him, in His House, and at His Table. You are His own.
The boy, Samuel, in our Old
Testament reading (1 Sam. 3:1-20), did not yet know the LORD. That is to say, the Word of the LORD had not
yet been revealed to him as a prophet (v. 7).
But the LORD knew him.
And when the LORD called him, He called him by name: “Samuel! Samuel!” (v. 10; ESV). Three times the LORD called to him
(vv. 4, 6, 8), before Eli the priest realized what was happening. And now, by Eli’s preaching and instruction,
the thrice-called Samuel was given ears to hear. “Samuel!
Samuel!” the LORD called again.
And Samuel responded, “Speak, for your servant hears” (v.
10). What do we learn from this? The LORD must call us before we can hear
Him. The LORD must speak His Word if we
are to know Him.
“How do you know me?”
Nathanael asks Jesus (John 1:48). It is
a reasonable question. Now, Nathanael…
you may also know him as Bartholomew… knew the God of Israel by His Word, by
the Torah, by faith. But he did not yet
know that the LORD was standing before him in the flesh. But Jesus knew Nathanael. “Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom
there is no deceit!” (v. 47). See, “Before
Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you” (v.
48). Now, it’s not as though the fig
tree was over there, ten yards from Jesus, and Jesus happened to notice
Nathanael sitting there against the trunk in the moments before He also saw
Philip walk up and call Nathanael to join them.
No, the point is, this is a miracle. Jesus was nowhere near the vicinity when
Philip bid Nathanael “Come and see” (v. 46). Philip brought Nathanael along, in
spite of Nathanael’s objections… “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Nathanael, though assuredly awaiting the
consolation of Israel, was not one to be taken in by messianic delusions. But now, not only did Jesus rightly identify
Nathanael as an Israelite’s Israelite, guileless, faithful, but He also
identified where Nathanael was, and what he was doing, when Philip called him, thus
revealing… manifesting (Epiphany!)… His divine omniscience. Jesus knew Nathanael. And He called him through Philip’s faithful
confession: “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the
prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth” (v. 46).
And in this way, Nathanael was given to know the Lord Jesus, and
to confess: “Rabbi, you are the Son of God!
You are the King of Israel!” (v. 49).
No one comes to know the LORD… no
one comes to faith in Christ… apart from His call. To Philip, He simply says, “Follow me”
(v. 43). Just prior to our text, hearing
John’s preaching of Jesus (“Behold, the Lamb of God!” [v. 36]), two of
John’s disciples asked Jesus where he was staying. “Come and you will see,” Jesus
responds (v. 39). Note how Philip simply
echoes these words of Jesus when he witnesses to Nathanael. In any case, the rest is history. The two disciples do come and
see. And one of these is Andrew, who
finds his own brother Simon, and brings him to Jesus. And once again, the Lord knows him,
and names him. He simply looks
at him, before any introductions are made, it would seem, and says, “So
you are Simon the Son of John? You shall
be called Cephas,” which, as we know, means “Peter” (v. 42).
Again, what do we learn from all of
this? Before we know the Lord, the Lord
knows us. When he calls us, He calls us
by name. And it is His call that gives
us ears to hear Him, to know Him, to confess Him, to follow Him. So also, we learn that often His call is mediated
through the faithful confession of those who already know Him. “Come and see,” they say. Andrew brings Simon Peter. Philip brings Nathanael. They bring them into the presence of Jesus. And it is Jesus, the Lord, who speaks,
imparting His Spirit, through His Word, bringing new disciples to faith in
Him.
How is that for an evangelism
program? We worry an awful lot about
witnessing. It makes us nervous. What will we say? And we’re pretty good in the Church about
taking that anxiety out on others, accusing everyone else of “not loving the
lost,” because obviously “you all are not evangelizing,” because “if you were,
the Church would be growing.” See, “it’s
all your fault!” (I’ve just summarized
90% of the professional conferences I’ve attended over the years… and they
wonder why I don’t like attending!) It’s
absurd. We make it too complicated. First of all, the apostolic method is pretty
straightforward: “Come and see.”
“Hey, if you ever want to come to Church with me, I’d love to bring
you. I’ll introduce you to the pastor
and the other people, and show you how to use the hymnal. I’ll talk you through it, and be with you the
whole time.” You just bring the person
into the presence of Jesus. Or, at
least, you offer. And the rest is up to
Jesus, who speaks His Word. And the
Spirit, who calls. And the Father who
draws (John 6:44). You can’t
bring anybody to faith, anymore than you can bring yourself to
faith. What are the words we all
remember so well from Catechism? “I believe
that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or
come to Him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel.”[1]
So, you bring them for an encounter
with Jesus and His Word. And you already
do this. Parents do this when they bring
their children to Baptism (where God, who knows the child, calls the child by
name, to be His own)… when they bring their children to Church, and Sunday
School, and Catechism class. You do this
when you invite family and friends who don’t have a Church to come and
see. You do it for one another when you
encourage each other, by your words, and simply by your own faithful example
and presence, to come to Church and Bible Study, and be in God’s Word,
receiving His gifts in the Sacrament.
That’s all it is. Enough with the
guilting. Enough with the worrying and
fretting. We are simply given to
confess: “Jesus is the Lamb of God, the One about whom Moses and the Prophets
wrote, the Son of God, the King of Israel.”
And invite, “Come and see.”
But none of it depends on us.
It’s all up to God. In the
immortal words of Eli the Priest: “It is the LORD. Let him do what seems good to him” (1
Sam. 3:18).
The Lord calls, “Follow me!” That is His call to you, today, and every
day, as He who knows you continues to call you by name. What does it mean to follow Him? Walk with Him. Walk in His steps. Listen to His voice (not the voice in your
head or the feeling in your heart. No,
no… Scripture, preaching, the confession of His disciples). Go the way He goes. Obedience in life. Faithfulness under cross and suffering. Yes, death.
The grave. The valley of the
shadow. But on through into resurrection
and eternal life. Beloved, heaven is
open to you. And Jesus is the Ladder
that connects heaven to earth, upon whom the angels ascend and descend. To follow Jesus is to live all of life in His
saving presence, your whole life and being redeemed by His atoning sacrifice,
now enlivened by the life of the risen Lord, one with Him. It’s all given to you in Baptism, where God
first called you by name, and named you with His Name.
When my grandmother died (21 years
ago, now!), the pastor pointed out to a packed Church building full of Krenzes
and others, that every last one of us was there hearing the Gospel,
confessing the Creed, singing hymns, and rejoicing through the tears, because
Erna née Fuerstenau Krenz was baptized into Christ (well over a century ago,
now!), called by name, known intimately by her Lord. Five boys she and Grandpa raised in the
Christian faith, who raised their children in the faith, who raised their
children in the faith, and so on, and so forth, all of whom bid others to come
and see. And what was the funeral
service, but one big invitation to come and see? And how many generations before Grandma
brought their children to come and see, into the presence of Jesus, so
that down the line she would be baptized, and bring her children
into the presence of Jesus? And how many
pastors, and how many other faithful Christians, made an impact on someone, who
made an impact on her to keep her in the faith?
I’m in the pulpit this afternoon, and you are hearing this sermon, in
part because the Lord Jesus called Erna Feurstenau to follow Him. And here are my children, who never met her,
in the pew, in part, because of her and the Lord’s grace to her. If we could follow all the mystic cords that
bind together the Communion of Saints, we would see that we are all here
because Jesus said to Philip: “Follow me!” And Philip said to Nathanael: “Come and
see.” And through them, and through
the web of a countless host of others (each one known and named by God), here
we are right now. How many in
generations to come will be known and named by God because of you? The Lord knows us. The Lord calls us. He calls us by name to be His own. In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X,
and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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