Philip - the Bean Counter
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Introduction:
Tonight we are continuing our series on the apostles and will look at the fifth name on the list which is Philip. Philip is known as the leader of the second group of the apostles which consisted of four. Philip’s role as a leader is a minor role compared to the four in group one which we have already talked about in previous weeks.
Philip’s name is Greek which means “lover of horses”. He has a Jewish name as well which was not given. Philip came from a family of Hellenistic Jews, this is how we know he had a Hebrew name but for some reason we only know him by the Greek name.
The apostle Philip is from Bethsaida which is also the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip most likely attended the same synogogue as Peter and Andrew.
Philip, Nathaniel (Bartholomew) and Thomas were all fishermen from Galilee. The disciples were all fishermen who were empowered to serve. Jesus chose a diverse yet common group of men with unexceptional talents and average abilities who already knew each other and gave them full power of attorney to speak and act on His behalf.
All Jesus required of them was that they were available. Jesus drew them to Himself, trained them, gifted them, and empowered them to serve Him.
We learn most about Philip from John’s gospel. Matthew, Mark, and Luke give no details at all about him. From John’s gospel we discover that Philip was completely different than Peter, Andrew, James and John. Philip is often paired with Nathaniel (Bartholomew) and we can assume they were close friends. Philip is unique from among all the disciples.
Philip was a facts and figures guy, by the book, practical-minded, non-forward thinking type individual. He was a bit of a kill joy, pessimistic, narrowly focused, and sometimes missed the big picture. He was a cynic rather than a visionary.
Jesus looked around and saw them following. “What do you want?” he asked them. They replied, “Rabbi” (which means “Teacher”), “where are you staying?”
“Come and see,” he said. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon when they went with him to the place where he was staying, and they remained with him the rest of the day.
Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of these men who heard what John said and then followed Jesus.
Andrew went to find his brother, Simon, and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which means “Christ”).
Then Andrew brought Simon to meet Jesus. Looking intently at Simon, Jesus said, “Your name is Simon, son of John—but you will be called Cephas” (which means “Peter”).
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Come, follow me.”
Philip was from Bethsaida, Andrew and Peter’s hometown.
Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.”
Jesus looked around and saw them following. “What do you want?” he asked them. They replied, “Rabbi” (which means “Teacher”), “where are you staying?”
“Come and see,” he said. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon when they went with him to the place where he was staying, and they remained with him the rest of the day.
Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, was one of these men who heard what John said and then followed Jesus.
Andrew went to find his brother, Simon, and told him, “We have found the Messiah” (which means “Christ”).
Then Andrew brought Simon to meet Jesus. Looking intently at Simon, Jesus said, “Your name is Simon, son of John—but you will be called Cephas” (which means “Peter”).
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Come, follow me.”
Philip was from Bethsaida, Andrew and Peter’s hometown.
Philip went to look for Nathanael and told him, “We have found the very person Moses and the prophets wrote about! His name is Jesus, the son of Joseph from Nazareth.”
“Nazareth!” exclaimed Nathanael. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” “Come and see for yourself,” Philip replied.
As they approached, Jesus said, “Now here is a genuine son of Israel—a man of complete integrity.”
“How do you know about me?” Nathanael asked. Jesus replied, “I could see you under the fig tree before Philip found you.”
John 1:38-
The Call
The Call
Philip’s call was different from the other disciples. We meet him in the day after Jesus called Peter, Andrew and John. Jesus called these men in the wilderness, where they were sitting at the feet of John the Baptist. John pointed them to Jesus the Messiah and then they left John to follow Jesus.
Then the following day according to this happened:
The next day Jesus decided to leave for Galilee. Finding Philip, he said to him, “Follow me.”
Philip was in the wilderness with John the baptist and before he went back to Galilee Jesus sought him out and invited him to join the other disciples.
Peter, Andrew and John (and likely James) had more or less found Jesus. So in this instance we see that Jesus actually sought and found one of them. Not saying that he did not seek and call the rest, but the language is quite unique in the call of Philip.
He is the first to be sought out and the first one that Jesus said the words “Follow me”. Philip was the first to hear and obey those words. Jesus actively sought Philip, found him, invited him to follow and He found Philip eager and willing to be His disciple.
Philip had a seeking heart. A seeking heart is always evidence that God is always sovereigly drawing the person.
“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day.
It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me.
“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day.
But as far as Philip was concerned He found the Messiah rather than being found by Him.
The Lord found Philip but Philip felt that he found the Lord.
You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.
But Philip’s search was over and was devoted to the Word of God and believed the OT promise of the Messiah. Philip had a seeker heart and also a heart of personal evangelist. His first response was to immediately go find his friend Nathaniel and tell him about the Messiah. Here is a first example of Friendship Evangelism.
“Nazareth!” exclaimed Nathanael. “Can anything good come from Nazareth?” “Come and see for yourself,” Philip replied.
Nathaniel’s response was cynical asking if anything good could come out of Nazareth? Philip’s response: “Come and See”.
“Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?” Nathanael asked. “Come and see,” said Philip.
The ease that Philip believed was remarkable. He knew the OT promises and was ready and was expectant. His heart was prepared. He received Jesus gladly and without hesitation, no reluctance, no disbelief and mattered not which town he had come from his search was over.
This is out of character for Philip and it reveals to what a great degree the Lord had prepared his heart. His natural skeptical, cynical tendencies would have caused him to hold back, doubt, ask questions and wait and see.
All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.
Feeding the Five Thousand
Feeding the Five Thousand
we see the feeding frenzy. There was a gret crowd assembling. I know we have looked at this with other disciples but this is so important to examine with Philip.
Philip followed Jesus without hesitation, that was his spiritual side. He was a man of faith but he was also man of weak faith.
His personality begins to show through.
The crowd of five thousand was not necessarily the final count there was a multitude.
“Tell everyone to sit down,” Jesus said. So they all sat down on the grassy slopes. (The men alone numbered about 5,000.)
Ten or twenty thousand would not be an exaggeration. In any case it was a huge throng.
As evening approached, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a remote place, and it’s already getting late. Send the crowds away, so they can go to the villages and buy themselves some food.”
The people needed to eat.
When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?”
Why do you think Jesus singled Philip out and asked him?
He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do.
Philip was the administrator of the apostles - the bean counter. He was most likely charged with arranging meals and logistics. We know Judas was in charge of the money, so it makes sense that someone was also charged with coordinating the aquistion and distibution of meals and supplies. It was a task that suited Philip’s personality.
He was concerned with organization and protocol. He was the type of person who in every meeting was the doubter, the pessimist and master of the impossible. Almost everything fit in to that category.
Jesus was testing him with this question. He wasn’t testing him to find out what he was thinking, Jesus knew that already. He wasn’t asking for a plan, John says Jesus already knew what He Himself was going to do. He was testing Philip so that he would reveal to himself what he was like.
That is why Jesus turned to Philip, the classic administrative personality and asked How do you propose to feed all these people?
Can’t you see that he had already counted the heads and started the calculations. When the crowd started moving in he was doing estimates.
Philip answered him, “It would take more than half a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!”
It was late in the day, there was a huge crowd, they were hungry. There was no fast food spot to run to near by.
Philip had been thinking it through the difficulty of the food supply and the size of the crowd was overwhelming to him. He was concentrating on the problem rather than thinking what a glorious occasion! Jesus is going to teach this crowd. What a tremendous opportunity for the Lord! All pessimistic Philip could see was the impossibility of the situation!
Why is it that we tend to look at what we don’t have rather than what God can do?
Why aren’t we quick to jump in on the good that is happening rather than what we are lacking?
All Philip was focused on was the imposibility of the situation despite the countless times Jesus performs miracles and met needs. Impossible should not be a part of his vocabulary.
Philip was there when Jesus turned the water into wine. He had seen numerous times when Jesus healed people, including several other miracles. But he saw that crowd and then became overwhelmed by the impossible. He lapsed into materialistic thinking.
When his faith was tested Philip responded with unbelief, saying it can’t be done, no way no how, discussion over.
But from the human perspective he was absilutely right. His thoughts were pessimistic, analytical and pragmatic - comepletely materialistic and earthbound.
I believe this points to the fact that God wants us to dream big not be caught in the details of the impossibility.
On of the things I believe that we need to gleam as Christians is the sense of vision and the ability to dream big because we serve a God that is limitless, He’s a big God with big possibilities. Don’t limit God!
Philip became obsessed with mundane matters and then became overwhelmed by the impossibility of the immediate problem. He knew too much arithmetic to be adventerous. the raw facts clouded his faith.
His response should have been “Lord if you want to feed them, feed them. I will just stand back and watch how you do it. I know you can do it Lord. You made wine in Cana and fed your children manna in the wilderness. Do it. We will tell everyone to get in line. But instead he was convinced it could not be done.
Philip lost the opportunity to see the reward of faith. Here is a lesson faith family let us not loose the reward of faith.
So tonight I want to remind you of something so valuable.
Matt .17
He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”
Tonight I want to remind you of something. Take a look at this, it is a mustard seed.
See how small it is? Not too big hey. Well this verse is a verse that smacks you in the head and makes you realize all that is required in the size of faith to see miraculous miracles happen? This size!
When you have faith this size, you can say to a moutain, a mountain of all things move from here to there and IT WILL MOVE!
Nothing is impossible for you.
Philip needed to learn this lesson. May we never forget that. May this be our motto here at faith.
Set aside pramatic thinking, realistic pessimism and learn to lay hold of the supernatural potential of faith.
The Visit of the Greeks
The Visit of the Greeks
This is a nother point we get to see in Philip’s character.
shows this. Philip was too concerned about methods and protocols. He lacked boldness and vision. It made him too timid and too apprehensive. Then he is presented with another chance to step out in faith and he misses it again.
This is another lesson to gleam here. May we not get so caught up in policy and protocol to miss out in stepping out in faith and being a person of vision. We need to be persons who live with extreme faith and vision. We ought to be persons of faith and revel in serving a God who does not live in retraint or restrictions so why are we? We have aligned ourselves with Him and our faith is firm then dream big, aim high, no limits and no restrictions.
Now there were some Greeks among those who went up to worship at the festival.
They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, with a request. “Sir,” they said, “we would like to see Jesus.”
Here we seen Jesus at the final Passover of the OT, Jesus was headed into Jerusalem to die for the sins of the world.
Here we see Jesus is facing such a great challenge and his closest disciples have limited faith (Andrew and Peter), wild card unpredictable hot head (Peter), two brothers wanting to rain down fire on those Jesus desired to save, and the whole group arguing over who is the greatest. What a bunch! Not a whole lot of help. If I were in his shoes I would be saying to myself how is this going to turn out when I leave them?
But Jesus worked with the guys patiently and helped them get through these trying times.
These Greeks were interested in Jesus. They sought out Philip in particular, probably because of his Greek name, they thought he was the best contact.
Philip again is seen as the one in charge of operations. So these men approached hi to arrange a meeting with Jesus.
Philip being the typical administrative type probably carried around in his head a full manual of protocols and procedures. Somehow these Greeks knew he was the policy person, so they asked him o arrange a meeting with Jesus.
This was not difficult or complex. And yet Philip seems to have been unsure of what to do with them. There was no protocol in the manual for introducing Greeks to Jesus. And Philip was not prepared to do something so unconventional. But Philip had a good heart and knew his limitations and too the Greeks to Andrew because he knew Andrew’s strength was in introductions and he was not intimidated to point these guys in the right direction.
Philip recognized his limitations and gave it to someone he knew would excel where he coul not.
We should not feel bad when we realize we don’t have a skill but someone else does give it tothem to do that’s what they have been created for. Do not put limits on others due to our own personal insecurities.
Do not be afraid to trust someone else with an important part of the task. Part of being a team player is letting other members of the team play.
Philip went to tell Andrew; Andrew and Philip in turn told Jesus.
Jesus met the Greeks and received them gladly.
All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.
does not record anything about Jesus’meeting with the Greeks except the discourse Jesus gave on that occasion:
Jesus replied, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.
Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.
Anyone who loves their life will lose it, while anyone who hates their life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
Whoever serves me must follow me; and where I am, my servant also will be. My Father will honor the one who serves me.
Jesus Himself welcomes all new comers to freely drink of the water of life.
The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.” Let anyone who hears this say, “Come.” Let anyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who desires drink freely from the water of life.
It would have been wrong to turn them away, Philip knew that in his heart even thought his heart and head was obsessed with protocol and procedure all was not lost on him.
Conclusion:
Our last glimpse of Philip comes in the upper room with the disciples on the occasion of the Last Supper. They are at the eve of Jesus’ crucifixion. The formal training for the disciples had offically ended. The thing we find out is their faith is still pretty weak.
This was the same evening when they sat around the table arguing about who was the greatest rather than taking up the towel and basin and washing Jesus’ feet.
Instead of showing his high honor Jesus opted to show humility.
Many of the important lessons Jesus taught these guys seemed to be unheeded
He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken!
Of all the things said the statement Philip made was more disappointing than Philip’s remark in the Upper Room.
But Jesus took the time to show them yet another lesson.
Jesus’ heart was heavy and He knew way lay ahead for Him the following day. He knew His time with His disciples was at an end, and although they still seemed rather ill prepared from a human perspective. He was going to send the Holy Spirit to empow them as His witnesses. His earthly work was nearly finished. He was sending them out as sheep in the midst of wolves. So He was eager to comfort them and encourage them about the Holy Spirit.
These guys are being introduced to the full Trinity.
John 14:
And you know the way to where I am going.”
Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me.
By now what Jesus meant certainly ought to have been clear to the disciples. Jesus was going to His Father in heaven and the only way there for them was through faith in Christ. Jesus was teaching that no one can go to heaven who does not trust Him and embrace Him alone as Savior. He is the way - the only way - to the Father.
Then Jesus added an explicit claim about His own diety.
If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
Jesus is stating her in the clearest possible way that He is God. Christ and His Father are of the same essence.
To know Christ is to know the Father, because the different Persons of the Trinity are one in their ery essence.
Jesus is God.
To see Him is to see God.
They had both seem Him and known Him, so in effect, they already knew the Father as well.
There is where it happens. Philip spoke up in verse 8 and said this:
Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.”
Show us the Father? How could he say such a thing, especially after what Jesus just told them. This is so so sad.
Where had he been? How could he have missed this?
Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?
What did Philip think had been going on for the past two or three years?
How could the same guy who responded with such enthusiastic faith in the beginning of their relationship be making a request like this at the end? Where was his faith?
Jesus responded Do you not believe? Believe!
He already embraced the Messiah. For three years Philip gazed into the face of God, and it still was not clear to him. His earthbound thinking, his materialistic, skepticism, obsession with the mundane details, all this shut him off from the full apprehension of whose presence he had enjoyed.
Philip was a man of weak faith and a man of imperfect understanding. Facts and figures filled his thoughts. So he was unable to grasp the big picture of Christ’s divine powr, person and grace. He was slow to understand, slow to trust, and slow to see beyond the immediate circumstances. He still wanted more proof.
But instead of thinking about all that Philip didn’t have to offer Jesus said He’s exactly what I’m looking for. My strength is made perfect in weakness.
Jesus saw potential instead of fault or failure. He said I will make him into a preacher. He will be a founder of the church. I will make him a ruler in the kingdom and give him eternal reward. I will write his name on one of the twelve gatesof the New Jerusalem.
THANKFULLY the Lord uses people like Philip - He does not give up on us!
He sees potential in the midst of great limitations.
Philip overcame his limitations and was used to spread the gospel and was among the first to suffer as a martyr. He was put to death by stoning in Asia Minor eight years after the martyrdom of James. But before he died multitudes came to Christ under his preaching.
But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.
God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are,
so that no one may boast before him.
Do not limit yourself with God. God will take you and use you for his power and might to bring glory to his name. Don’t think you are a lost cause. You of great value and needed to work in His kingdom!