35 The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. 36 When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”
37 When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. 38 Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, “What do you want?”
They said, “Rabbi” (which means “Teacher”), “where are you staying?”
39 “Come,” he replied, “and you will see.”
So they went and saw where he was staying, and they spent that day with him. It was about four in the afternoon.
40 Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of the two who heard what John had said and who had followed Jesus. 41 The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, “We have found the Messiah” (that is, the Christ). 42 And he brought him to Jesus.
Jesus looked at him and said, “You are Simon son of John. You will be called Cephas”(which, when translated, is Peter [Rock]).
The next day, the Baptist again points at Jesus and screams “THAT GUY!” and the two disciples who happened to be with him become the Baptist’s first two success stories. In direct contrast to certain leaders of the modern church who equate success with attendance, the Baptist seems to equate success with exodus (pun intended, if it help drives the point home). While his ministry doesn’t approach fulfillment until 3:25-36, the ball must get rolling sooner or later, and it is these two faithful Jews who take the first step, literally. They start walking behind Jesus, following him, without the courage to actually say anything or to really approach him. As is characteristic of Jesus throughout the gospels he takes the initiative in engaging the interested. He turns and asks them what they want, a question loaded with profundity when posed by the Lord of the universe. But these disciples don’t know Jesus is the Lord of the universe. But they want to know, hence their response: “Rabbi, where do you live?” Here John adds the note that “rabbi” (a Hebrew word) means “teacher” (a Greek word). An initially puzzling response to modern ears, what these disciples mean to imply is that their curiosity demands quality time with Jesus, and can’t be satisfied by a roadside chat. And Jesus obliges their request. “Come and see” was a rabbinic phrase that meant, more or less, “lets go figure this out together”. John notes that they spent the day with Jesus. Coupled with fact that this meeting took place around 4 p.m. (the tenth hour), John implies that these disciples stayed the night at Jesus’ house as well, taking us to verse 40.
The next day begins with one of these disciples, Andrew, completely beyond lit up from his time with Jesus, finding and then bringing his brother Simon to the Messiah who the unnamed disciple and himself have found. It’s the first thing Andrew does. Simon is brought before Jesus who, more obvious in the original Greek, gazes searchingly at Simon. When Jesus does speak he renames him.
A note. John is writing his gospel so that the first-century unbeliever (regardless of ethnicity or religious affiliation) would read his story and subsequently come to faith in Christ (20:31). He goes about this by revealing, up front, just who Jesus of Nazareth is. He is the one through whom all things were created (1:3), the Word of God become flesh (1:14), the fulfillment of the Law given through Moses (1:17), and the only one who can reveal the Father (1:18). Not until this cosmic-eternal understanding of Christ is laid bare does John begin his narrative, and in doing so seems to say to the reader, “this is whom I’m talking about, now watch him walk around and blow everybody’s mind”. The scope of Jewish messianic expectation was totally, insufficiently narrow compared to the Messiah they received in Christ, and so we have a consistent theme running throughout every scene and conversation in John’s gospel: Jesus, at every turn, stretches, expands, transcends, the hopes and dreams of his contemporaries. Back to verse 42.
Jesus renames Simon. Do you know anyone who has been renamed mid-adulthood? I don’t. And though I might know one or two individuals whose self-confidence might lead them to believe in their right to do such a thing, I have yet to hear of their acting in such a way. And there is good reason for that. Today, just as in the first-century, renaming someone, let alone a complete stranger, would be considered an act not only ridiculous but most likely insulting. It implies the possession of a profound authority of the namer over the named. Of course Jesus knows this, but it is neither arrogant nor insulting in verse 42. Jesus is God. Again, the disciples, at this point in the story, don’t know this. They know Jesus is the Messiah, but they’re incapable of thinking in categories beyond those described in the study of 1:19-28.
Re-read that post again, if you must, in the attempt to wrap your ahead around the contrast between the Pharisaic/Jewish messianic expectation and the messiah described in John 1:1-18. Additionally, the quality of Jesus’ renaming of Simon is reminiscent of episodes of renaming in the Old Testament (Genesis 17:5, 32:29). Jesus isn’t just demonstrating his authority over Simon, but is speaking prophetically into Simon’s life. By calling him Rock he is identifying/describing a quality of Peter’s character. Only adding to the beauty of this scene is the fact that Peter will be anything but a rock throughout the entire gospel narrative. Remember, Jesus eventually calls him Satan, and Peter is infamous for his three-fold denial of Jesus in his greatest moment of need. But Jesus does indeed see what truly lies within a person (2:25). Jesus saw the entirety of Peter’s person after one pondering glance, looked deep beneath the dime-a-dozen fisherman, the stupid (Mark 9:5-6), selfish (Mark 8:32-33), and cowardly (Mark 14:66-72) man in front of him to the man who would become the leader of the church in Rome, the man who, when arrested and condemned to crucifixion, felt unworthy to die the same way as his Lord and so was crucified upside down. This is the messiah who was sent to Israel and the world. John 1:1-18, meet Simon, a Jewish fisherman.
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