To Be Known and To Know

“Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, and saith of him, Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!” ~ John 1:47 KJV

Growing up in a day when fewer choices were at our fingertips, with only a handful of Bible translations available, I came to only know King James’ Version and grew to love its graceful dialect.

I read words we’d never speak in our everyday language, and would only and always associate as His holy language. Such regal words like “saith”, and such rare words like “guile”.

So when Jesus “saith” that Nathanael was “… an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile” (as recorded in King James’), I always wondered what that word “guile” meant and, going a step further, what Jesus meant when He used that rare word. Was it a salute? Was it a warning? Was it merely a statement of fact?

Never knowing for sure and wanting to presume a praise from the Master, often would I naively say to myself, “Wish I were a man in whom is no guile.” And while modern day translators have since brought so much clarity to words like “guile”, I was both illumined and surprised to read their substituted (and perhaps more fitting) word is simply “deceit”. That’s because the Greeks often used a similar word for “bait”, as if to be cunning, much like the Israelite Jacob who baited his father for his older brother’s birthright. [Genesis 27:35] Thus, perhaps, Jesus’ connection between an Israelite and guile. All the more reason for me to desire guilelessness, never really admiring Jacob’s low-blow to Esau. But this all seemed rather academic, until it dawned on me that I might be missing the forest through the trees.

Why, just before Jesus the Nazarene [Matthew 2:23] audibly exposed his future disciple to His listeners, Nathanael somewhat prejudiced Jesus (without ever meeting Him) as a “good-for-nothing”; “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” [John 1:46a ESV] That’s easy to say, until you come face-to-face with your arrogance and then all of the sudden things look different. “Come and see” [John 1:46b ESV] for yourself, said Nathanael’s friend, Phillip.

Why argue a presumptuous spirit when you can dispel with the real deal? To his dismay, Nathanael had been had. He was known. He was found out. “… an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile.” A more guileful man might have responded to Jesus’ piercing insight with a bit more modesty, but not Nathanael. No, he bluntly jumped right to the point, “How do you know me?” [John 1:48a ESV] So as if Jesus’ soulful knowledge of Nathanael wasn’t enough, He drives home His all-seeing wisdom with even more penetration, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.” [John 1:48b ESV] To which Nathanael, O’ guileless Nathanael, who might have thought he was the only one who could have possibly known of that secretive moment, can only reply, “… You are the Son of God!” [John 1:49 ESV]

So in my original nobility to be guileless, as Nathanael simply was, never truly knowing what I really wanted, I’ve become known instead, also just like Nathanael. Known. Not only every physical fiber of my being, to which I have no say, but every aspect of who I am. And that… can be terrifying.

An irony of Nathanael’s U-turn belief that Jesus was now the Son of God, only after realizing he was seen under the anonymous fig tree, is that his greater known-ness (if you will) is that he had no guile. And not only was that, but everything about Nathanael, deep within his soul, was also known by the Son of God.

There are some things about me that only I could know, that only I would dare to know and wish I didn’t. But no, turns out they’re all known, every single one of them.

“O LORD, you have searched me and known me!
You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
you discern my thoughts from afar.
You search out my path and my lying down
and are acquainted with all my ways.
Even before a word is on my tongue,
behold, O LORD, you know it altogether.”
[Psalm 139:1-4 ESV]

Nathanael’s no special case, nor am I. We’re all known, every single one of us. Truth is, His knowledge knows no depth [Romans 11:33]; even the abyss of the Marianas Trench and the vastness of the Galaxy Andromeda are known to Him. And such dark, hidden places, in the depths as well as the expanse of our being, are also all known. And knowing that we’re known can either bring us to a place of fear and defensiveness or to a place of honor and laud. Perhaps such knowledge brings us to both, the first leading to the second.

But here’s the crowning moment for Nathanael, and for us as well: He’s known, he believes, he worships, but now he can also… know. Know greater things than the here and now, the things of this earth, but now also things not of this earth, things heavenly beings “long to look into…” [I Peter 1:12c NIV] “… you will see heaven opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man” [John 1:51b ESV], were Jesus’ finishing remarks to Nathanael. To us, “it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven.” [Matthew 13:11b NASB]

And one of the greatest mysteries of all is that even in being known, fully known for who we really are, we’ve been given the right [John 1:12] to fully know the unfettered love of God available in the Son of God.

Since we’re fully known, shall we (like Nathanael) also believe, worship and know? Perhaps this Advent Season we need ask for nothing else, for nothing could possibly surpass the gift of being known and, yet, to know the Son of God.

Thomas Kruggel is a non-vocational Elder at Grace Bible Church and works in the City of San Francisco.