The First Disciples

Today's Reflections

The First Disciples 

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Jn 1:35-42

³⁵The next day John was there again with two of his disciples, ³⁶and as he watched Jesus walk by, he said, “Behold, the Lamb of God.” ³⁷The two disciples heard what he said and followed Jesus. ³⁸Jesus turned and saw them following him and said to them, “What are you looking for?” They said to him, “Rabbi” (which translated means Teacher), “where are you staying?” ³⁹He said to them, “Come, and you will see.” So they went and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day. It was about four in the afternoon. ⁴⁰Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, was one of the two who heard John and followed Jesus. ⁴¹He first found his own brother Simon and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated Anointed). ⁴²Then he brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, “You are Simon the son of John; you will be called Cephas” (which is translated Peter).

Reflection:

Behold, the Lamb of God. John the Baptist declares this again as he points to Jesus. Two of his disciples leave John and follow Jesus. Andrew, one of the two, later invites his brother Simon to Jesus. Jesus welcomes Simon and gives him the name “Cephas” or Peter.

John the Baptist’s selfless gesture of pointing others to Christ starts a whole chain of events leading to the formation of the first group of Jesus’ disciples. That is the way God’s providence works. Just think, if a Christian man and woman marry each other in a non-Christian country, conscious that God wants them to be married, and responding to their God-given vocation to give themselves to each other in marriage, they will then produce children who will be baptized and become Christians, and these in turn will have children who will also be Christians, and so on. What a chain of graces is opened up by their faithfulness to their vocation!

Fulfill your mission: you never know

how it may bring an avalanche of grace!