Jehovah El Roi: The God who sees

Fully Seen and Known by Jehovah el Roi-the God who sees

You are fully seen. You are without a doubt heard. You are intimately known. You are 100% without a doubt loved.

I’ve been studying Hagar in Genesis when she was fleeing with her unborn son into the desert. There is a WHOLE lot to learn from her life and the mess of a situation she found herself in.  But what really spoke to me was how God saw her. In Genesis 16:13, what she said when God intervened in her life resonated with me.  Like a loud reverberating promise, it seeped into the deepest crevasses in my heart and mind.  “For the Lord has heard of your misery.” she was told as she was fleeing the situation she was in.   The revelation that she received that she was seen, heard and known by God changed everything.  

God was seeking her out.  Not only did He know where she was, He KNEW her and her situation.  He heard her and was well aware of the difficult predicament she was in. What God revealed to her was there was never a moment in her days that He wasn’t aware of her and her situation.  He heard her cries and went to her.   

In the Hebrew, the word qashab (kaw-shab’) means “to prick up the ears, i.e. hearken, give heed, incline.  His ears hearken to my cries, just like they did for Hagar. The image that came to mind when I was studying this particular word was a mother and her newborn baby.  When a mother hears her baby’s cry, her ears perk up and she goes to her baby.  When our daughter was a baby, we put a baby monitor in her room so we could hear her should she wake in the middle of the night and cry.  When we’d hear her, we’d go to her, change her diaper, feed her, sometimes play with her and then put her back to sleep.  God’s heart for us is the same way. He hears our prayers and His ears perk up and he tends to us. He truly is mindful of us. 

She goes on to say, “You are the God who sees me. I have now seen the One who sees me.” (Jehovah el Roi: the God who sees) You can hear over and over that God is the One who sees but when you get a revelation for yourself of His omnipresence and omnipotence, it changes everything. You are not forgotten or overlooked.  In this world where there are approximately 7.8 billion people, you are seen and intimately known by God. He knows when you get up, when you go to sleep, when you leave and when you return home. (Psalm 139:1-18)  His word even says He knows the very number of hairs you each have on your head. You are known and seen by Him. He is attentive to you and your prayers. There is never a moment in your life that He isn’t aware of you. He watches over you. You are His beloved. You are seen by Him. He is for you and not against you.  

There are so many words that describe God as the caring Father/Abba He is.  To study his characteristics in the Hebrew language is so descriptive and beautiful.  As I’ve been studying being known, heard, and seen by Him, Jehovah El Roi, these past two weeks, His word has been melting through the doubt, the noise and busyness of my days.  He’s been weaving together the most beautiful imagery, words and meaning for me, revealing His beautiful heart. 

He is the lifter of my head and He gets my attention with His words and speaks directly into my heart, revealing His love for me and for you. Getting a deeper revelation and understanding of His love, attentiveness, and care changes everything.  It changed everything for me. You are the longing of His heart.

 I’ll end here with His word.

Psalm 139: 1-18

1. You have searched me, Lord, and you know me. 2.You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. 3.You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. 4. Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely. 5. You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me. 6. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. 7. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? 8. If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. 9. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, 10. even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. 11. If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” 12. even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. 13. For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. 15. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. 16. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. 17. How precious to me are your thoughts, God! How vast is the sum of them! 18. Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand—when I awake, I am still with you.