El Roi

I am struggling to put my racing thoughts into words today. I have deleted time and again what I want to say. Hopefully this time I will convey my thoughts in a way that will express the awe and wonder I have discovered this morning.

I was reading in John 4 today about the woman at the well. If you are not familiar with it, it tells of a woman that goes to the well to collect water for the day. She doesn't go when the other women go as she is not "one of their kind". She must go and collect by herself to avoid the ridicule and biting remarks of others. She meets Jesus, who is tired, hungry and thirsty. They have a conversation and she is amazed by him that first he sees her and then speaks to her. The most amazing part is that when he asks her to go and call her husband and come back she is brought back to earth as she is living with a man who is not her husband and has had 5 husbands already. The shame and embarrassment arises. Jesus tells her she he knows of the 5 and the one she is living with and she only had said she didn't have a husband. Jesus met her right where she was. She is so excited she runs and tells the whole town, "come and see the one who told me everything I have ever done"! Jesus knew all that had taken place in this woman's life, yet offered her life.

Then I remembered Hagar Genesis 16 as she fled from Sarai to the desert to die. She encountered an angel that asked her where she was going. She told him and the angel and he said that God had seen her pain. She called God El Roi the God who sees.

In both cases God saw the pain that others refused to acknowledge or want to be around. He offered life and release from that pain. Are you feeling dejected, or the pain of loneliness, or some other pain? There is a God who sees you and has wonders to offer you. All you need do is seek Him.