“Behold, the Lamb of God.” With those words a torch is passed. John the Baptist sends his disciples to the one who is greater than he. John does not even consider himself worthy to be the slave of Jesus. So he sends Andrew and another disciple to Jesus and Jesus accepts them with the invitation, “Come and you will see.”
The dialogue between the disciples and Jesus sounds odd to us today. Imagine walking along a street and sensing that you are being followed. You turn and ask “what do you want?” and the strangers reply by asking, “where do you live?” It is unlikely many of us would invite them to follow us home and see.
But something else is going on here. The disciples have been sent to follow Jesus without knowing anything more about Him. But before long Jesus confronts them and asks, “what are you looking for? What do you seek?” They don’t really know how to respond. They want to know more about Him, where is He at home, how can they get to know Him better?
And Jesus responds with an invitation for them to accompany Him, to learn more about Him.
Jesus always invites us to learn more about Him. Blind faith does not serve Him. Blind faith cannot defend itself or convince others to follow. Andrew, the first disciple, sat with Jesus and learned from Him before he left to bring his brother Simon, with the words, “We have found the Messiah.”
Pax Vobiscum
Second Sunday in Ordinary Time