“Jesus responded to him, ‘Do you believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than this.’ Then he said, ‘I tell you the truth, you will all see heaven open and the angels of God going up and down on the Son of Man, the one who is the stairway between heaven and earth.’ ” (John 1:50-51, NLT).

Many if not most of the words spoken by Jesus and recorded in the Gospels either reference Old Testament scriptures or allude to Old Testament events. That is the case in this story of the calling of Nathanael to become one of Jesus’ twelve disciples.