El Roi (The God Who Sees)
I don't know how you may feel about a God who sees everything or a God who sees us for who we really are? I'm not sure what thoughts may come to your mind as you dwell on this truth.
Some years ago, I remember seeing signs on the highway posted on billboards of little "Statements" from God. I still see them now and again, but not as often as I used to. Some of them had some things to say about how God sees us. The billboards were to serve as a way he might communicate with us now if he were to rent out a piece of advertisement. Take a look at these: |
I Saw That! - God!
When I was growing up, I used to be scared of God! I imagined him as the great all powerful being that was waiting to squash me at any sign of rebellion or disobedience. How many of you remember thinking that way at some point in your life? I was SCARED of God. And furthermore, I was taught to be so. Perhaps not so much by my parents, but there was enough sermons and lessons that pointed to this end. We still have bible tracts and literature that utilizes these scare tactics to get people to repent and turn to him. I SAW THAT! - |
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Here is one such tract.
YOU SAY NO ONE CAN SEE YOU! WELL GOD CAN SEE YOU! GEN 16:13 TELLS US THAT GOD SEEST ME! AND PROVERBS 15:3 TELLS US THEY EYES OF THE LORD ARE IN EVERY PLACE BEHOLDING THE GOOD AND THE EVIL!
There is our All Seeing Eye watching you!
And I was afraid to "interrupt" the service in anyway when I was growing up. Of course my dad was a preacher and one of the worst moments in my life was when he stopped preaching his sermon, looked directly at me and said, "I will deal with you when I get home!". I am surprised God didn't zap me for all the times I went to the restroom during the services. Or the times that I talked or passed notes. Or how about the times I may have fallen asleep during the sermon, or made fun of others who did the same. What about all the times I heard a point in the sermon and thought to myself, "Boy I am glad brother or sister so an so is here to get that special message designed by God just for her!" God didn't zap me for my judgmental attitude. perhaps he should have, but my point is there were times when I worried that I was just one mess up away from termination.
(perhaps move the following down after the next picture)
Now it is true that God sees us! And Fear should be one of the responses if we are not walking in the light as He is in the light. If we are living for ourselves and not God almighty, we should show concern and have some fear. But when we think about God Seeing us, if our only emotion is FEAR , then either we need to do some repenting, or we need to do some more studying, and I am not sure where you may be on this right now, but if Fear is what comes to you when thinking about an all seeing god, I believe it would do yourself a service to try to figure that out this morning as we continue. Because this sermon will not end on the side of fear. But if you have it, you can give it up today. (perhaps say a short prayer on behalf of those who are feeling Fear at this time. Fear of their relationship with God)
YOU SAY NO ONE CAN SEE YOU! WELL GOD CAN SEE YOU! GEN 16:13 TELLS US THAT GOD SEEST ME! AND PROVERBS 15:3 TELLS US THEY EYES OF THE LORD ARE IN EVERY PLACE BEHOLDING THE GOOD AND THE EVIL!
There is our All Seeing Eye watching you!
And I was afraid to "interrupt" the service in anyway when I was growing up. Of course my dad was a preacher and one of the worst moments in my life was when he stopped preaching his sermon, looked directly at me and said, "I will deal with you when I get home!". I am surprised God didn't zap me for all the times I went to the restroom during the services. Or the times that I talked or passed notes. Or how about the times I may have fallen asleep during the sermon, or made fun of others who did the same. What about all the times I heard a point in the sermon and thought to myself, "Boy I am glad brother or sister so an so is here to get that special message designed by God just for her!" God didn't zap me for my judgmental attitude. perhaps he should have, but my point is there were times when I worried that I was just one mess up away from termination.
(perhaps move the following down after the next picture)
Now it is true that God sees us! And Fear should be one of the responses if we are not walking in the light as He is in the light. If we are living for ourselves and not God almighty, we should show concern and have some fear. But when we think about God Seeing us, if our only emotion is FEAR , then either we need to do some repenting, or we need to do some more studying, and I am not sure where you may be on this right now, but if Fear is what comes to you when thinking about an all seeing god, I believe it would do yourself a service to try to figure that out this morning as we continue. Because this sermon will not end on the side of fear. But if you have it, you can give it up today. (perhaps say a short prayer on behalf of those who are feeling Fear at this time. Fear of their relationship with God)
![Picture](/uploads/1/8/1/0/18104947/7081386.png?449)
Here is another image for you.
This one doesn't seem quite as scary as the previous one. So I read the passage it listed! I had to read it twice, because the first time I read it, I read it with the same colored glasses portraying him as the cosmic cop waiting to take us in for injustices caused. I'll start at verse 5.
5 Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you. 2 Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. 3 Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. 4 Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty. 5 You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourselves in the day of slaughter.[a] 6 You have condemned and murdered the innocent one, who was not opposing you.
So on one side, we see a god who is telling those who have messed up, that they are in for it. It is the Father looking down at his children and saying, "I will deal with you when I get home!" But on the other hand it is the congregation saying, "I'm glad he said something, cause his child was being a distraction to me!" Read this again as if you are the abused, the downtrodden, the mistreated. Take heart in a God who sees the injustices and not only has an opinion about it, but a plan to deal with it! Our God is a Just and Fair God! HE SEES!
May want to use the following later in the sermon
This one doesn't seem quite as scary as the previous one. So I read the passage it listed! I had to read it twice, because the first time I read it, I read it with the same colored glasses portraying him as the cosmic cop waiting to take us in for injustices caused. I'll start at verse 5.
5 Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you. 2 Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. 3 Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. 4 Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty. 5 You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourselves in the day of slaughter.[a] 6 You have condemned and murdered the innocent one, who was not opposing you.
So on one side, we see a god who is telling those who have messed up, that they are in for it. It is the Father looking down at his children and saying, "I will deal with you when I get home!" But on the other hand it is the congregation saying, "I'm glad he said something, cause his child was being a distraction to me!" Read this again as if you are the abused, the downtrodden, the mistreated. Take heart in a God who sees the injustices and not only has an opinion about it, but a plan to deal with it! Our God is a Just and Fair God! HE SEES!
May want to use the following later in the sermon
- Patience in Suffering
- 7 Be patient, then, brothers and sisters, until the Lord’s coming. See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop, patiently waiting for the autumn and spring rains. 8 You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord’s coming is near. 9 Don’t grumble against one another, brothers and sisters, or you will be judged. The Judge is standing at the door!
- 10 Brothers and sisters, as an example of patience in the face of suffering, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. 11 As you know, we count as blessed those who have persevered. You have heard of Job’s perseverance and have seen what the Lord finally brought about. The Lord is full of compassion and mercy.
- 12 Above all, my brothers and sisters, do not swear—not by heaven or by earth or by anything else. All you need to say is a simple “Yes” or “No.” Otherwise you will be condemned.
I'm glad I ran across this passage, because I do believe this scripture gives us hope because Our God is a God who sees the injustices and will hear our cries. He sees how mankind has done harm and has a plan for his people to rise above it. It may not look like we think it's supposed to, but His ultimate plan of freedom has already been set in place.
(this will be a great lead in to the story of Hagar)
(this will be a great lead in to the story of Hagar)
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We go to Genesis 16 which will take us back to the days of Abram and Sarai! Abram is about to learn a great deal of how God Sees. But he is not the only one in this story that will have this experience. He won't even be the first. In Abram, we are about to see a man who is the perfect example of what we read about in James 5.
Abram has been promised that through his seed all the nations of the earth are to be blessed. He is 75 years old when this promise is first spoken. Imagine such a promise. God comes to you and says!
"There will be one from your offspring that will change the world forever! This would will never be the same again after his birth. It can't! He will be that important! Not just people from your community will reap the blessings, not even people from your country, but people from all over the world from now until it ends, will be greatly impacted by this man's life!"
That alone is a promise that would make me weep and humble me. Why should I be worthy of such a thing. Now put that promise of God in the context that you haven't had kids yet, and you are still unable to have kids. Your wife isn't getting pregnant. It's not from a lack of trying to fulfill God's promise, but nothing is happening. Years and years and years go by and still nothing! So God makes the promise again! More years go by! Still nothing! More years! Nothing! More years! Empty!
This is the time when we start trying to find ways to make God's promise come true. Maybe we misunderstood the plan. Maybe the plan wasn't to be through Sarai. And that's where we pick up in Chapter 16
Abram has been promised that through his seed all the nations of the earth are to be blessed. He is 75 years old when this promise is first spoken. Imagine such a promise. God comes to you and says!
"There will be one from your offspring that will change the world forever! This would will never be the same again after his birth. It can't! He will be that important! Not just people from your community will reap the blessings, not even people from your country, but people from all over the world from now until it ends, will be greatly impacted by this man's life!"
That alone is a promise that would make me weep and humble me. Why should I be worthy of such a thing. Now put that promise of God in the context that you haven't had kids yet, and you are still unable to have kids. Your wife isn't getting pregnant. It's not from a lack of trying to fulfill God's promise, but nothing is happening. Years and years and years go by and still nothing! So God makes the promise again! More years go by! Still nothing! More years! Nothing! More years! Empty!
This is the time when we start trying to find ways to make God's promise come true. Maybe we misunderstood the plan. Maybe the plan wasn't to be through Sarai. And that's where we pick up in Chapter 16
God saw the mistreatment of Hagar. Mistreatment caused by Abram and Sarai! But that still didn't change the role that Hagar was to have. God tells Hagar to go back and submit to Sarai! That couldn't have been easy! I don't think the dirty looks, or the rough treatment stopped. I am pretty sure that they likely continued. But notice Hagar's predicament. She didn't ask to be Abram's wife. She is a maid servant. You do what you are told to do. If your master says to marry someone, you do that! And then for Hagar to be mistreated because of the jealousy, this has all the makings of an ABC prime time drama series. (REVENGE). Hagar is lost and heart broken and mistreated, and abused. and GOD SEES!
I don't think God told her what she wanted to hear. Going back to Sarai couldn't have been part of HER plan. But she was struck by an actual face to face with one of God's angels that she had no doubt that God Saw here situation and intervened. She did not question God as to why she needed to go back. God said it, so she was going to do it. She took this encounter and treasured it as a point where she saw God Seeing Her. God promised she would also have offspring too numerous to count. Not all of the news was "Good" but she saw GOD SEEING HER!
Situations in our lives may not always be what we want, but you can rest assure that God sees and hears, and he cares for you. We see things in the here and now, but God's sight is much bigger than ours. We may feel that God isn't acting quickly enough, but perhaps our faith in God's timing isn't what it ought to be. No where in this story are you going to see a God who responds the way we think he should, but make no mistake, he sees, and he cares! To further show evidence of a God who acts on his time, not ours, let's follow Abram's journey a little farther.
I don't think God told her what she wanted to hear. Going back to Sarai couldn't have been part of HER plan. But she was struck by an actual face to face with one of God's angels that she had no doubt that God Saw here situation and intervened. She did not question God as to why she needed to go back. God said it, so she was going to do it. She took this encounter and treasured it as a point where she saw God Seeing Her. God promised she would also have offspring too numerous to count. Not all of the news was "Good" but she saw GOD SEEING HER!
Situations in our lives may not always be what we want, but you can rest assure that God sees and hears, and he cares for you. We see things in the here and now, but God's sight is much bigger than ours. We may feel that God isn't acting quickly enough, but perhaps our faith in God's timing isn't what it ought to be. No where in this story are you going to see a God who responds the way we think he should, but make no mistake, he sees, and he cares! To further show evidence of a God who acts on his time, not ours, let's follow Abram's journey a little farther.
In the very next chapter, (17) God approaches Abram and tells him by this time next year, his wife will have a son. God goes further and changes their names to Abraham and Sarah! Abraham laughs. I think I would too! He was 75 years old when the promise was first made. He is 99 now! It's been a quarter of a century and we haven't seen any sign of Sarai producing a boy. And now she is OLD! Even for this time in Bible history, she is OLD! I think I might have laughed also!
Chapter 18, the Lord appears to him again as 3 men! Abraham goes out to greet them and to serve them, wishing to pay kindness by refreshing their bodies from the long travel. The three men oblige him and so Sarah begins making things ready for them. As they ate the provisions, the men ask where Abraham's wife is. He said, "She is in the tent!" They then told Abraham that she would have a son by this time next year. This time, Sarah laughs as she over heard this conversation. You see, she was in the tent that was right behind them as they were talking. Then the Lord said, Why did Sarah laugh at this! Is anything to hard for the Lord? I don't know what Sarah was thinking at this point. I wonder if she thought the men were just men, and then when they knew she laughed, she knew they were of the Lord! I don't know what she thought, but the last part of the dialogue show us once again about the God who sees. She defends herself and says, "I DIDN'T LAUGH!
But he said, "YES YOU DID LAUGH!"
I SAW THAT! But what I want us to see in the bigger picture is that God doesn't bring this up to trick Sarah into lying! He speaks a truth that she laughed! She said she didn't and God wanted her to know that He saw that! He heard that! Not in order to make her feel guilty, but rather the bigger picture that he has been there all along, seeing and hearing, and he knows the burdens of her heart, and he cares for her deeply, and now his time has come to reveal himself in power. HIS time, not Our time! and the promise comes true, and Isaac is born! and this is the promised seed! Sarah is now a mother, in her old AGE! But the God who sees is still not done!
When Isaac grew older, Ishmael would mock him. Sarah did not like this and bid Abraham to send Hagar and Ishmael away! Abraham didn't want to do this. This was his son after all. But he did so for the peace, and sent them on their way with his blessings.
Hagar and Ishmael were soon in need of water and once again! God sees and hears. (Gen 21:15-20)
Time went on and God sees fit to test Abraham's faith. God seems to do this to those he loves and chooses. We may not understand it, but think of it like putting iron in the fire to make in pliable, moldable, shapeable. Hammers used to beat it into the shape it should be to be the best tool it can be for his purposes. That's what God does here. He tests Abraham. Genesis 22 is the story of Abraham and Isaac. The story where God asks Abraham to offer his boy as a Sacrifice! Never before has God ever asked for a human sacrifice. But it won't be his last. He doesn't ask Abraham do do anything he himself is not willing to do. God SEES! His test is for Abrahams benefit.