Thursday Evening Adult Bible Study

The priests and Temple assistants (also called Levites) were respected religious leaders in Jerusalem. Priests served in the Temple, and Temple assistants helped them. The Pharisees (1:24) were a group that both John the Baptist and Jesus often denounced. Many of them outwardly obeyed God’s laws to look pious, while inwardly their hearts were filled with pride and greed. The Pharisees believed that their own oral traditions were just as important as God’s inspired Word. One of the two disciples was Andrew (1:40). The other was probably John, the writer of this book. Why did these disciples leave John the Baptist? Because that’s what John wanted them to do—he was pointing the way to Jesus, the one John had prepared them to follow. These were Jesus’ first disciples, along with Simon Peter (1:42) and Nathanael (1:45).