Do you remember your first introduction to Jesus? I don’t remember my first introduction, but I remember the impressions I got from his followers. My grandmother was a great example of a Christian for me. She helped every one who asked, and studied the bible and prayed daily before breakfast. I also had two very bad examples from chaplains in the Navy, and others that I saw proclaim him but lived awful lives. I let the bad I saw as an adult drive me more than the good I saw as a child and I walked away from him.
I remember meeting Jesus for real at 25 years old. I remember being overwhelmed and accepting him as the Lord, leader, and savior of my life. I remember thinking how it could not be true that every bad thing I had done in my life was going to be washed away. I was completely overcome with thankfulness and very aware that the same Jesus knew all that I had done and forgave me anyway.
In the bible John tells us about the first meeting between Jesus and some of his first disciples. Andrew and presumably John himself are disciples of John the Baptist. As Jesus comes by after being baptized himself John the Baptist tells his two disciples who Jesus really is. This is the messiah who Israel had been expecting for 400 years. John calls Jesus, “The Lamb of God,” and the two disciples leave John the Baptist and begin to follow Jesus.
This meeting in a tiny backwater some 60 years earlier changed John the disciples life forever. John knew where he was as a 70 plus year old man. He knew what he had been through and how he had gotten to that point in his life. He also knew where it all began, down by the Jordan river. Most scholars believe that the unnamed disciple is John and as he writes, he knows this point is the key to his life and wants to recount it for those who will read his letter.
John was young, and possibly a teenager. He did not have as much to lose as many of the disciples did, but walking away from family was dishonoring and he could still lose his family. That was a chance he was willing to take. The other disciples mentioned knew the risks of being associated with the newest messiah in town, but they went anyway. They knew Jesus was different from the others claiming to be the messiah before him. John tells of Jesus telling Nathanael what he was doing before he ever met Jesus, through this image Nathanael proclaims Jesus as, “The Son of God; you are the King of Israel.”
Those disciples knew who Jesus was from the beginning and they followed willingly and they changed the world I told you a little of my story, so why not share yours? What was your first impression of Jesus? Was it so powerful that you would want to write about it in 50 years? Did a follower of Jesus give you your first impression? Has your impression changed since the first one?
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