"The future enters into us, in order to transform itself in us, long before it happens.” Rainer Maria Rilke
John’s Gospel does not begin with a rule, a commandment, a parable or even a story that unfolds neatly. It begins with a question.
“What do you seek?”
In John 1:35–51, Jesus does not recruit disciples with a speech. He turns, sees them following, and asks them to name their longing. Not Who are you? Not What do you believe? He asks, "What do you seek?" The question assumes faith begins not with certainty, but with desire.
For 2026, there's a new year dawning, and this question feels particularly alive. We are not crossing a threshold into a year we understand. We are entering one that we are seeking our way into. After seasons shaped by ancient voices of the Old Testament, prophets who cried out for justice, poets who named grief, storytellers who remembered covenant in the Narrative Lectionary, we now turn to the Gospel of John. This is not a rejection of those earlier scriptures. This deepens them.
John does not discard the law and the prophets. We move from listening to them and then reaffirming, “And the Word became flesh.”
Where the Old Testament often names God’s movement in thunder, fire, wilderness, and exile, John insists God is found in bodies, relationships, conversations, and risk. In questions asked on dusty roads. In curiosity that refuses to stay still. In people who say, “Come and see,” instead of “Here is the answer.”
John 1:35–51 is a story of movement. John the Baptist points away from himself, “Here is the Lamb of God” and suddenly, disciples are walking. Andrew runs to tell his brother. Philip seeks out Nathanael. Nathanael resists,“Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”, and is not shamed for his skepticism. He is invited anyway.
This is how faith grows in John’s Gospel: not by silencing doubt, but by honoring it enough to keep walking.
This passage sounds like permission. Permission to follow before we fully understand and to be changed by encounter rather than convinced by argument. John’s Jesus does not demand allegiance; he offers relationship. He does not explain himself; he reveals himself over time.
As 2026 dawns, that feels like holy wisdom.
The new year will not arrive with clarity. It will come with complexity, unfinished grief, ongoing injustice, fragile hope, and questions we are still learning how to ask. John reminds us that God is not waiting at the end of certainty. God is already present in the seeking itself.
And when Nathanael finally encounters Jesus, he is seen, “Here is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit.” This is not praise for purity; it is recognition. To be seen fully and loved still is the promise John holds before us. A God who knows us, names us, and calls us into a deeper life, not by erasing who we are, but by drawing us forward.
So as we completely turn our weekly Bible discussions from the long arc of the Old Testament into the luminous poetry of John, and as we cross into the unknown terrain of 2026, we encounter this simple, demanding invitation:
Come and see.
Come and see what happens when faith is lived, not mastered. Come and see what happens when God takes on flesh in real communities, real struggles, and real hope. Come and see what the Word might become among us this year.
And perhaps, as we walk, we will discover that we are not just seeking God.
God has already been seeking us.
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