Nathanael said to him, "How do you know me?" Jesus answered him, "Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you."

 (vii) There is the witness of the disciples and especially of the writer of the gospel himself It was Jesus' commission to his disciples: "You also are witnesses, because you have been with me from the beginning" ( John 15:27). The writer of the gospel is a personal witness and guarantor of the things he relates. Of the crucifixion he writes: "He who saw it has borne witness--his testimony is true" ( John 19:35). "This" he says, "is the disciple who is bearing witness to these things, and who has written these things" ( John 21:24). The story he tells is no carried story, no second-hand tale, but what he had seen and experienced himself. The best kind of witness of all is the one which can say: "This is true, because I know it from my own experience." 