¹⁸ Jesus was walking by Lake Galilee. He saw two brothers, Simon (called Peter) and Simon’s brother Andrew. The brothers were fishermen, and they were fishing in the lake with a net. ¹⁹ Jesus said, “Come follow me. I will make you fishermen for men.” ²⁰ At once Simon and Andrew left their nets and followed him.

²¹ Jesus continued walking by Lake Galilee. He saw two other brothers, James and John, the sons of Zebedee. They were in a boat with their father Zebedee, preparing their nets to catch fish. Jesus told them to come with him. ²² At once they left the boat and their father, and they followed Jesus.

Jesus Chooses Matthew

⁹ When Jesus was leaving, he saw a man named Matthew. Matthew was sitting in the tax office. Jesus said to him, “Follow me.” And Matthew stood up and followed Jesus.

The First Followers of Jesus

³⁵ The next day John^[a] was there again with two of his followers. ³⁶ He saw Jesus walking by and said, “Look, the Lamb of God!”^[b]

³⁷ The two followers heard John say this. So they followed Jesus. ³⁸ Jesus turned and saw them following him. He asked, “What do you want?”

They said, “Rabbi, where are you staying?” (“Rabbi” means “Teacher.”)

³⁹ Jesus answered, “Come with me and you will see.” So the two men went with Jesus. They saw the place where Jesus was staying and stayed there with him that day. It was then about four o’clock.

⁴⁰ These two men followed Jesus after they heard about him from John. One of the men was Andrew. He was Simon Peter’s brother. ⁴¹ The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother, Simon. He said to Simon, “We have found the Messiah.” (“Messiah” means “Christ.”)

⁴² Then Andrew took Simon to Jesus. Jesus looked at Simon and said, “You are Simon son of John. You will be called Cephas.” (“Cephas” means “Peter.”^[c])

⁴³ The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Follow me.” ⁴⁴ Philip was from the town of Bethsaida, where Andrew and Peter lived. ⁴⁵ Philip found Nathanael and told him, “Remember that Moses wrote in the law about a man who was coming, and the prophets also wrote about him. We have found him. He is Jesus, the son of Joseph. He is from Nazareth.”

⁴⁶ But Nathanael said to Philip, “Nazareth! Can anything good come from Nazareth?”

Philip answered, “Come and see.”

⁴⁷ Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him. He said, “Here is truly a person of Israel. There is nothing false in him.”

⁴⁸ Nathanael asked, “How do you know me?”

Jesus answered, “I saw you when you were under the fig tree. That was before Philip told you about me.”

⁴⁹ Then Nathanael said to Jesus, “Teacher, you are the Son of God. You are the King of Israel.”

⁵⁰ Jesus said to Nathanael, “You believe in me because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. But you will see greater things than that!”

Jesus Sends Out His Apostles

10 Jesus called his 12 followers together. He gave them power to drive out evil spirits and to heal every kind of disease and sickness. ² These are the names of the 12 apostles: Simon (also called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; ³ Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew, the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; ⁴ Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot. Judas is the one who turned against Jesus.