For the Oneনমুনা

Day 2: Andrew

As we study Christ’s divine encounter with a man named Andrew, we have another opportunity to study the Master, Jesus Himself. As we study Jesus’ life and love for others we are challenged, blessed, and benefited. 

Andrew is one of the original twelve disciples of Jesus Christ. He is mentioned eight times in the New Testament. He is the first disciple of Jesus, and he was initially a disciple of John the Baptist. He was a spiritual man no doubt. Dr. Roy Fish, my evangelism professor in seminary, referred to him as a “religious aspirant.” He had aspirations for religious or spiritual things. 

There are many like Andrew today, who have a bent or proclivity for spiritual matters and are hungry for real spiritual substance. We should welcome people as Jesus did and spend time with them, helping them understand the Answer to their spiritual thirst.

Andrew was a fisherman by trade. Matthew 4:18-20 tells us he was a fisherman along with his brother, Peter. This encounter with Andrew and Peter happened at least a year later than the first encounter in John 1. The name Andrew literally means manly. Like his brother, he was probably a large man, a bold and courageous one as well. 

Andrew and John met Christ and they are changed. Notice what Andrew does after his encounter with Jesus. He goes and tells his brother Simon or Peter. He told him they had found the Messiah, the Christ. So much for the difficulty and hesitancy often exhibited when evangelizing our families! 

Andrew is seen in John 6:8-9, bringing the young boy with the loaves and fish to Jesus, and in John 12:20-22, he is seen bringing the Greeks to Jesus, who requested to see him. Perhaps Andrew thought back to the time when Jesus told him, “Come and see.”

Dr. Fish writes, “I don’t know anybody in the New Testament who seems to be more interested in bringing people to Jesus than Andrew.” 

What a privilege, to be known forever in the New Testament as someone who brought others to Jesus Christ, who introduced others to the Messiah, as Andrew did to Peter. Peter went on to become the great preacher in Acts 2. You never know what will happen and how God will use those whom we have the privilege of introducing to Jesus Christ. 

Edward Kimball was a Sunday school teacher in Boston in the 1850s and he witnessed to a young shoe clerk. The teen had not finished fourth grade. This young man accepted Christ as his Savior and Lord and went on to lead a million people to Jesus through his preaching. His name was Dwight Lyman Moody.

From Andrew’s life and example, I am challenged with this thought—

we will tell people about Jesus as a result of spending time with Jesus. 

Would it not be a wonderful thing if you and I followed Jesus with such passion and intimacy that we never missed an opportunity to brag on our Lord and actually give a verbal witness for Christ? 

I would love to be where James Harper was in his walk with Christ. Perhaps Harper would define evangelism or witnessing as one drowning man telling another how to get to safety. Harper was saved when he was fourteen years old and called to preach when he was seventeen. He served a little church that had twenty people and it grew to five hundred people in thirteen years. His wife passed away, but they had one daughter named Anna. He and his daughter and her cousin were on a ship from England to visit America and Harper was to preach at the Moody Church in Chicago. However, the name of the ship was the Titanic. James Harper, along with most of the men, died in the icy waters of the Atlantic, but Anna and her cousin were rescued. 

Years later a Scotsman who was also on the ship, but who survived, told this story about Harper. This man told how he clung to a piece of wood for survival and a wave brought Harper close to him and Harper asked him “Sir, are you saved?” And the Scotsman said, “No, I am not. 

Later Harper came by again and asked him, “Are you saved now?!” 

The response was the same. So Harper shared Acts 16:31 with the man, “Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.” 

The man believed and was saved, and he, thus, became James Harper’s last convert.

I want to be like James Harper. I want to be so close to Jesus that whether I am experiencing good times or bad, good health or ill, or on the brink of death, to be so closely following Jesus that I tell others about Jesus.

Questions:

1. Why do you think Andrew was so passionate about introducing others to Christ?

2. What did you think about Pastor Harper and his determination to share Christ in a very difficult circumstance?