For Believers in Christ and His atoning work, we hold the hope for that day when He wipes every tear from our eyes and makes all things new. But until that day comes we bear, at least, the shadow of our sins, and depending on our focus it either propels us in that hope or drives us to despair.
A long time ago there was a household worker, a slave, of a very rich man called Abram and his wife, Sarai (Genesis 16). She must have been a pleasing servant to her owners, because the wife proposed her as a solution to a quandry. The wife was barren, even after an amazing visit from an "angel" Who said Abram would have an heir that came from his own body. Ten years had gone by and no heir.
Sarai was getting up in years and thought something had to be done. So she gave her husband the faithful servant girl in hopes the heir would be produced through her. When the servant girl became pregnant, she became increasingly haughty, even rebellious toward her mistress, to the point where the mistress treated her roughly, and she ran away.
So far we can see the doubt, faithlessness, and manipulation for control of the couple of promise. We can also see the pride, arrogance, and want of pre-imenence of a misused servant girl.
Hagar, the servant girl had no one and no place to go. She was homeless, despondent, and despairing. At a lush watering hole in the wilderness is where she poured out her sorrow to a God she could not see. An "angel" came to her to minister to her seemingly impossibe situation, and told her to go back to her mistress, that it would be well. Not only that, but she would be greatly blessed with nations of descendants.
Hagar was astonished that this angel-like being would visit her, and realized that even in her misery, her caste, her smallness, God saw her. God saw her in her obedience, and her victimization, her plumeting attitude, and in her degradation. He saw it all. He saw the future of the nations she carried in her womb. He saw the evil that would be launched from her descendents generation after generation against the nation of promise yet to be born of her mistress, Sarai. He saw it all. Yet, He cared for her. She called Him the God Who sees.
Thousands of years later, He is still the God Who sees. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Like a good father, God allows us to choose, and does not desert us when we choose poorly. He will not leave us, even long after we have departed from His idea of us. If we are drawing breath we are a candidate for the tender loving care of a God Who sees. He sees our obedience, our disobedience, and the generations they will produce. He sees our best and our despicable worst. He sees what we wish to kill in ourselves. He sees our hopes and our impossible dreams. He sees, and He chooses to love us with an everlasting love. He chooses to make us new again.
When peace like a river attendeth my way
When sorrows like sea billows roll
Whatever my lot thou hast taught me to say
It is well, it is well with my soul
My sin, oh the bliss of this glorious thought
My sin, not in part, but the whole
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul
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