GodSprings - February 01, 2016

Be Happy God is Watching

She gave this name to the Lord who spoke to her: “You are the God who sees me,” for she said, “I have now seen[c] the One who sees me.” Genesis 16:13 (NIV)

Oscar Hammerstein had seen a picture, a photograph of the top of the Statue of Liberty from a helicopter. And he said, "This picture reveals the intricate detail that has been sculpted on Lady Liberty's head, her hair and her crown and all of those things at that angle which no one could ever see," And he said, "I got to thinking that sculptor must have realized that never will anyone see the top of the Statue of Liberty's head, since there were no airplanes or helicopters when the statue was set in place. But he spent the same kind of detail and care and painstaking craftsmanship on the top of Lady Liberty's head as he did down at the feet and everywhere else that would be seen by everyone." Little did he know that someone could see it from above, someday!

That's the way it is with our lives. Someone is looking down from above carefully noting the progress and quality of our existence.

Abraham washed his hands of the conflict between Sarah and Hagar, and it escalated to the point of Hagar fearing for her life. She did what any person, and soon-to-be mother, would do – she ran away to protect her child and herself.

This is where something incredible happens. Hagar is alone in the desert, forgotten and abandoned. But God planned otherwise. He entered simply and beautifully. He saw her when no one else did, and cared for her when no one else would.

Of all the names God is given in Genesis, this one is my favorite: El Roi – the God who sees me. When we pray it often feels like we’re talking to nothing, like our prayers are bouncing off the walls, and our struggles are invisible to the One who could help. They’re not. We’re not invisible. We are never stuck, forgotten, and left hopeless for as Charles H Spurgeon in one of his sermons said God is the ultimate Good Samaritan: what He sees He must take action on, and He sees me and He sees you.