GodReflection: Come and See—God Saved the Best for Now
“Come and see,” said Philip (John 1:46).
“Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now” (John 2: 10).
Life is both tough and complex. One survival tactic is signs.
I need signs to navigate my day. The name of my city is designated with a sign. Signs are also for direction. My city is laid out with street signs, neighborhood signs, traffic signs, numerical signs for homes, businesses, churches and a gazillion other public places. Signs point.
In the Fourth Gospel, John uses sign terminology as a label for miracles. Thus, Jesus first sign of water changed to wine is there for a reason. It points to God’s best saved for now.
John has a second sign. It reads, “Come and See Life.” For us human types there maybe no greater symbol of life than a child. Kids explode with life. They are not only vibrant but their life represents hope and future. So, John takes us to see a father on the verge of the loss of life. It’s his son.
Once more he visited Cana in Galilee, where he had turned the water into wine. And there was a certain royal official whose son lay sick at Capernaum.
When this man heard that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judea, he went to him and begged him to come and heal his son, who was close to death . . . “Sir, come down before my child dies.” “Go,” Jesus replied, “your son will live.”
The man took Jesus at his word and departed . . . When he inquired as to the time when his son got better, they said to him, “Yesterday, at one in the afternoon, the fever left him.”
Then the father realized that this was the exact time at which Jesus had said to him, “Your son will live.” So he and his whole household believed. This was the second sign Jesus performed after coming from Judea to Galilee (John 4:46-54).
To come and see Jesus is to see life. The second sign of John is to teach me this reality: to see Jesus is to see life as God designed me to be.
The fullness of this truth still needs to sink into my soul. Perfect Jesus walked this earth so that I might see how I could have been if Eve and Adam had trusted fully their Creator and refused serpent-Satan’s temptation. Jesus demonstrated life.
Just as a faith encounter with Jesus by the royal official caused his son to live, Jesus calls me to envision restored life through my own trust confrontation so that I might live.
I am reminded of a promise of Jesus on another occasion, “the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live” (John 5:25).
Here is what John invites me to come and see in Jesus’ second recorded sign. To meet Jesus is to see life. It is restorative now. I have one thing in common with the old churchman Martin Luther and the patriot Benjamin Franklin. No matter how hard I might try, I cannot make it through a twenty-four-hour day with perfection intact. That’s solved with the miracle of life found in Jesus.
To see life is to experience every step—even the missteps—covered by the grace of His (now our) Father. Although I’ve never been overly 
comfortable with the word, there is something rather mystical about the experience. The longer I walk with Jesus and observe his perfect walk through earth the missteps lessen in frequency.
That is how I was meant to be. I begin to shadow what I will become in the next reality. I will awaken not only to life eternal, but to life in perfection as God designed me to live. It as if Jesus said to my own dad, “Go, your son will live.”
Can you still hear the echo of the voice of the one who invites to come and see life? I would love to hear your story.
Stay tuned.
Dr. Gary J. Sorrells
A GodReflection: Come and See Life
Gary@Godreflection.org www.GodReflection.org
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