The God Who Sees: El Roi
“Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said. So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian slave Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. He slept with Hagar, and she conceived. When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress. Then Sarai said to Abram, “You are responsible for the wrong I am suffering. I put my slave in your arms, and now that she knows she is pregnant, she despises me. May the Lord judge between you and me.” “Your slave is in your hands,” Abram said. “Do with her whatever you think best.” Then Sarai mistreated Hagar; so she fled from her. The angel of the Lord found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur. And he said, “Hagar, slave of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?” “I’m running away from my mistress Sarai,” she answered. Then the angel of the Lord told her, “Go back to your mistress and submit to her.” The angel added, “I will increase your descendants so much that they will be too numerous to count.” The angel of the Lord also said to her: “You are now pregnant and you will give birth to a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard of your misery. He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.” 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 the One who sees me.”
Genesis 16:1-13 NIV
What an odd scripture to reflect on for the advent season. But is it? Perhaps you know the feeling of being unseen. Especially during the holiday season, when we are busy making everyone else around us feel special and important, it is easy to slip through the season without creating space for our very souls. We wake on December 26th and we wonder “What happened to the holiday season?” We wonder where another year went. And yet, 365 days later, we have often repeated the same cycle only to ask ourselves the same questions.
Hagar was a slave, someone who had limited options before her. So she did as her masters instructed, which then became the very reason for their loathing and apathy towards her and her well-being. Hagar couldn’t take much more. She hit her limit. So she escaped to the quiet. Here Hagar experienced healing when she went into the wilderness. She had to escape all the noise. She had to get away from the toxicity of Sarai. She needed to remove herself from Abram, who abandoned her. She fled. This is where she met the Lord. El Roi! The God who sees! She was called into obedience first. And even though her son would not be blessed or highly regarded, Hagar felt seen and recognized by God at this moment.
What toxicity surrounds you today that you must let go of? Who will you be around this holiday season that God is calling you into an obedient relationship with? In what ways do you feel abandoned? By a family member? By a friend? By God? Can you see that the God we serve, the God who brought you here today, is the One who sees you?
Fast forward about 1500 years, and we come upon a new scene.
“In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.” Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.” “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?” The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.” “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.”
Luke 1:26-38 NIV
Mary had her life before her. She was ready to be married to Joseph and dreaming of what her life would be like. God interrupted her dreams and her plans. God saw her and that she had found favor in His eyes. She was frightened by the appearance of the angel, perhaps not so much by his physical presence but about what message he was bringing to her. The angel sees her - “Mary, you have nothing to fear.” God has seen her, and she had found favor in His eyes. In all the angel told her, she was met with love. She felt seen, as evidenced by Her response. It is one I can only hope I would have responded with. She simply says, “I am the Lord’s servant. May your word to me be fulfilled.”
My dad began the journey of hospice care this week. It’s a season in my life when it would be easy to feel unseen. I will admit, there are moments I DO feel unseen throughout my life. But it is in these moments when I feel most unseen I must call out El Roi! I must be intentional to carve out these times of escape, flee the disappointment, the sadness, the frustration, the busyness, and even the highs from all the Christmas cheer. In these quiet places, God meets me, shows me the next right steps of obedience, and shows me where he is leading me next. I am grateful for our good God and his graciousness to see me.
How does the name El Roi impact you?
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