God Who Sees Me!

Well, good morning.

Wonderful to be here with you.

If we haven't met before, my name is Fred.

I'm a retired Anglican priest, but have been in non-denominational ministry the last 20 years.

My wife, Jill, and I uh retired in 2019, and we've been at his hands ever since.

So she and I just work behind the scenes, encouraging the staff and encouraging anyone we can with classes and with one-on-ones to just kind of live a life that we know is real.

That we know is real with the Lord.

And now let me start with just a brief story to kind of set the stage.

I was very active with the pastors in the county uh back when I was in full-time ministry.

And one time we had a privilege of getting a school of prophets to come to the county and have a discussion with the pastors.

I think they came from Ireland and were well known, and we had the chance of sitting with them for a couple hours.

And they asked a very interesting question as they got started.

They asked us all, when was the last time we heard a prophecy?

And I my first thought was, well, let's see, man, three or four years ago that happened, and then, oh yeah, 10, 12 years ago this happened.

And before anybody answered, they said, We hope you're all thinking about last Sunday when the message was delivered.

And we went, oh yeah.

That's right.

That's right.

You see, but prophecy is one of those things that has a different meaning for believers than as like so many other things, right?

Uh joy is different for a believer, um, love is different, wisdom is different, truth is different.

Uh when you when you get living into the biblical word of God, that words take on new meanings.

Uh prophecy is not just future telling.

Prophecy, you know, a quote, the definition, the spirit-empowered proclamation of a message from God to his people.

That is, the word of God that because we're listening to someone, it becomes the word from God to each of us.

When you think about it, that's exactly what Justin's been doing since January, as he's taking us on this journey with Abram, soon to be Abraham, in the discoveries that the Father of the faith has had, so that we too can enter in, so that we can hear the very word that Abram had to wrestle with in order to affect our lives.

And that's why his challenge to us is would we consider making our most important commitment this year?

Getting to know God better.

So that's the series we're in.

Are we willing to get to know God better?

Are we willing to let the Word of God speak to us of his love and grace?

So, anyways, Justin called me about a week and a half ago and said, Yeah, can you fill in for me on a Sunday?

And I said, Sure.

Uh what do you want me to speak on?

And he said, How about Hagar?

And I got real excited, and I said, You mean chapter 21 when she and Ishmael go out in the desert?

And he said, No, no, the one before that, chapter 16.

So I turned to chapter 16 and I just started laughing.

I really did.

Even though Justin was on the phone, I started laughing out loud.

Because in my daily Bible, I already have this story underlined.

And then I went into my study Bible and I already have it highlighted.

I'm gonna say something you're gonna find hard to believe.

I think this story reveals to us one of the most important messages from God in the entire Bible.

Yeah, yeah, that's a while.

I mean, I you're going, Fred, you've obviously lost it.

No, and I'm not I'm not saying it's up there with he is risen, but it's really, really important.

And so let's consider that which Justin took us through last week.

For just a moment, I'm in Genesis chapter 16, just giving a review of last week.

Genesis 16 · chapter mention

Abram and Sarai have been assured by God that they're gonna have children.

And after years pass, apparently Sarai goes to Abram and said, since I don't seem to be able to have a child, why don't you just have a child with our Egypt my Egyptian servant girl, Hagar?

I don't know how long it took Abram to resist that challenge from his wife, but you know, a wise man does what his wife says.

So he goes and Hagar gets pregnant.

That then causes some significant tension between Sarai and Hagar, you can imagine.

So Sarai goes to Abram and says, She's driving me crazy.

It's all your fault.

Of course, guys have never heard that, but at least it's a unique Bible story.

And so he says, Well, do what you want.

She's your servant, girl.

And so tensions continue, and eventually Hagar can't deal with it anymore.

Sarah treats Hagar so harshly that Hagar finally runs away.

And you may recall that Justin challenges us: whenever we try to force the hand of God and decide what we're gonna do, we're gonna cause some trouble.

We pick up that story now as Hagar goes off into the wilderness.

We're in Genesis chapter 16, verse 7.

Genesis 16:7

The angel of the Lord found Hagar beside a spring of water in the wilderness along the road of Shur.

The angel said to her, Hagar, Sarah's servant, where have you come from?

And where are you going?

I'm running away from my mistress Sarah, she replied.

The angel of the Lord said to her, Return to your mistress and submit to her authority.

Then he added, I will give you more descendants than you can count.

And the angel also said, You are now pregnant and will give birth to a son.

You are to name him Ishmael, which means God hears, for the Lord has heard your cry of distress.

The son of yours will be a wild man as untamed as a wild donkey.

He will raise his fists against everyone, and everyone will be against him.

Yes, he will live in the open hostility against all his relatives.

Therefore Hagar used another name to refer to the Lord who had spoken to her.

She said, You are truly the God who sees me.

She also said, Have I truly seen the one who sees me?

An extraordinary story.

Let's do a deep dive.

We are only in Genesis chapter 16.

Genesis 16 · chapter mention

The story of an intimate God who is the God of God and Lord of Lords who loves us and sends his son to die for us and rise again and grant us the Spirit.

That story is just starting.

It starts in Genesis 12.

In reality, the first 11 chapters of Genesis are like the introduction to the story of God's dealing with us humans.

It gets started with Abram and God entering into and calling him into a relationship the likes of which he could never have imagined.

That God wants to be personal.

That God wants to call him to a new way of relating to one another and to God Himself.

And Abram has a real struggle with this.

He chooses to do that and follow this God and eventually include his wife Sarai at the time.

But we're early on in the story.

They're still trying to figure out what does it mean that he is the God of gods?

He is the supreme one.

And then here in Genesis 16, God reveals himself to a third person.

Let this sink in.

Only the third person to have any connection with the one true God.

And he speaks to Hagar in the wilderness.

The way she probably looked at herself, she was a nobody.

She was an Egyptian slave to this woman, Sarai.

But God now reveals himself not only to Abram, but not only to Sarai, but now even to the servant girl.

And he knows her.

He sees her and knows her.

And he calls her by name.

Hagar.

Sarai's servant.

You understand?

This is crazy wonderful.

She is included now in this covenant walk.

God knows exactly who she is, calls her by name, even understands what she's been doing.

She's Sarai's servant.

And then he asks these amazing questions.

Where have you come from?

And in fact, in most English translations, they put in for us a comma, important comma.

And where are you going?

You see, this encounter causes us to recognize that if we're going to walk on a deeper walk with God, like the challenge that Justin has been giving us for the year, and we will continue in this challenge of studying Father Abraham to understand what it teaches us about walking with God.

Here's this all-important question.

Where have you come from?

Now what's interesting is we we really don't know where she's come from.

How is it that an Egyptian girl, woman, has now become this servant of a couple who are nomads in what we know of as the Holy Land?

How did that happen?

Is it because a couple chapters before Abram and Sarah were down in Egypt?

Did they get a servant girl there?

Did the Pharaoh or some official sell off their daughter or give away their daughter?

Or did she upset her father?

How did that work?

We don't know.

I've often thought about that.

How come we know so little about her life?

All we know is her identity is she's Sarai's servant.

God understands that.

And he wants her to understand that as well.

And the challenge for her, listen to this.

As she looks back, she's realizing she's walking away from only the two people in the world who are growing in a walk with God.

And she's now left them.

Let's pause for a moment.

It's real important to get regular in your church attendance, whether you like it or not.

Get used to being in a place where others are wrestling with their walk with God.

But she's to look back and recognize that he's challenging her to understand the journey she has been on.

And what we have come to realize is, of course, faith is not just a decision.

Decisions are important in this journey.

We've got three making the decisions to be baptized today.

That's an important decision, but that's day one, right?

That's the start.

Faith is that journey of growing and walking with the Lord.

And he wants her to understand that journey.

And what's interesting, now that she's had this encounter, she's got more than just her story to consider.

This becomes her testimony.

Now, there are some of you who are just starting your journey, and that's fine.

And you haven't yet made that commitment to live for Christ.

That's fine.

You're welcome here.

But once you make that decision in whatever causes you to do that, you hear a word from God, you read something in the Bible, you get a challenge in life, something happens, you hear God speak to you, whatever.

Once you have that encounter, you now have a testimony.

And let me pause for a moment and say a testimony is, according to the word of God, the most important gift you have of all things to face Satan.

Revelation makes it very clear there's only two things that drive Satan away the blood of the Lamb, Jesus, and our testimony.

And our testimony always has three parts.

Who were we beforehand?

What happened?

And who are we now?

Hagar's got a got a testimony now, doesn't she?

So significant she couldn't possibly have known that this testimony, because she had to tell the story to Abram.

This testimony is known across the planet 4,000 years later because it's in the Word of God.

This is extraordinary.

It becomes, well, let's let's continue.

Then there's this this comma, there's this pause, there's this and, and she has to sort through what is going on here.

How is it that my entire perspective is now changing about life?

It's not about how I feel, it's not about the rejection of my my mistress.

I'm standing in the presence of God.

That changes everything.

And then the question where are you going?

It's a question that comes to us, isn't it?

Where do you go now?

Now that you know God's real.

God sees us, God knows us.

God loves us.

You can't hide from God.

He knows everything about us the good, the bad, the ugly.

And thanks be to God, He loves us.

We're gonna celebrate that in just two weeks.

She then proclaims a new name for God.

It may not be one that you're familiar with, and it's not one that we sing of very often, but it's El Roy, is the Hebrew.

God sees me.

El Roy.

She is blown away.

I find this extraordinarily interesting because at this point in the unfolding story of the Bible, we know God is the creator.

Genesis chapter one.

That's Elohim, the God who creates.

That's the one we're used to when we hear in the Bible God or the Creator.

That's Elohim.

El Shaddai, you may have heard that in a lot of different songs about that's God Almighty.

We're not there yet.

That's the next chapter.

Maybe we'll hear about that next week or certainly in the weeks to come.

El Shaddai.

No, this is a new revelation.

This is not a God that you carve and put on a mantle and worship.

This is a God who sees and knows me.

And this revelation comes to Hagar.

What's extraordinary is I want to suggest to you this becomes the template for the rest of the God encounters in the Bible.

All of them.

God is real.

And God keeps showing up in the lives of people in the Word of God, as He keeps showing up in our life as well.

He knows exactly who we are, can address us by name, and challenges us with these issues.

Where have you been?

Where have you come from?

What does it mean to your walking with me, says the Lord?

And where are you gonna go?

Let me give you just some of the examples of some of the major people in the Bible.

Jacob, who ends up being Abram's, Abraham's grandson.

He has fled out of fear that his his brother might kill him.

He has fled to work up in the northern region with his uncle Laban.

He's been there for 20 years.

He now has wives.

He has 11 of the 12 sons.

And God shows up.

Go back to the land that I promised to your grandfather.

And his entire life changes.

He has to wrestle with where have I come from?

What's happening right now?

Time for me to leave.

That's a Jacob story.

Consider Moses.

Moses is just a shepherd now.

With his wife, raising his kids, out in the fields.

He sees this bush burning.

He goes over to the bush and goes, I don't understand what's going on here.

Who are you?

And yeah, we get another name for God in that.

We get Yahweh, the I am.

But you know what?

That's 400 years after this story today.

About 400 years before we get the great I am.

And Moses is also told, I'm the God of your father, your your father Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Take off your sandals, you're on holy ground.

Where have you come from, Moses?

He'd say, Well, I'm just a shepherd.

No, you came from Egypt as well.

And now you're gonna go back and do my work.

See how it works, this Hagar encounter?

It's the template for all of us.

How about David?

That's almost a comical one.

The prophet Samuel has a word from God that he's supposed to go to the house of Jesse, have a big festival, and name one of Jesse's sons to be the new king to replace the unfaithful Saul.

Okay?

This is a thousand years after this story.

So Samuel shows up at Jesse's and he's introduced to the seven sons.

And he goes, these aren't the ones.

And he turns to Jesse and says, Don't you have another son?

And he, well, yeah, he's the kid boy.

He's out looking after the sheep.

And Samuel says, We're not gonna eat until you bring him in.

So he sends out for the son that he didn't even think about.

And God says, He's the one.

Anoint him as the king.

So now, David, as far as we know, doesn't have a God encounter at that moment, but he does have a prophet who puts, uh, anoints him and says, You're gonna be the new king.

And what's really interesting is David's got to wrestle with that for a long time, as you probably know the story.

He has to flee for his life frequently, and it probably is a period of about 20 years before he actually becomes king.

What all that time?

Where have you come from, David?

Who are you with me?

Where are you gonna go?

Are you gonna believe that I have a plan and purpose for your life?

God is real.

A comical one I want to just read to you.

Um, it's probably my favorite and one of the funniest verses I think in scripture.

It's refers to an encounter of one of the minor prophets.

They're called minor just because we just have a little bit of writing.

It wasn't that they're insignificant, but it was Amos in the early days when there was a northern kingdom and a southern kingdom.

Okay?

Now, Amos has traveled from the southern kingdom, Judah, up to the northern kingdom of Israel because they're becoming pagans.

And God tells them, go up there and prophesy.

So he goes up to the king's uh worship area and he proclaims the word of God.

The priest who's there doesn't like it.

And Amos sends orders to Amos, get out of here, you prophet.

Go on back to the land of Judah and earn your living by prophesying there.

Don't bother us with your prophecies here in Bethel.

This is the king's sanctuary and the national place of worship.

Do you hear the arrogance?

This visitor has traveled all the way north.

It's like a southerner going up to New York.

I mean, you know what?

Who do you think you are coming up to tell us what to do?

And he's just told off.

And this is Amos' reply.

I'm not a professional prophet.

I was never trained to be.

I'm just a shepherd, and I take care of sycamore trees.

That's his lime to fame.

Hey, I I'm just a shepherd.

I just trim trees.

But he goes on.

But the Lord called me away from my flock and told me, go and prophesy to my people in Israel.

See, Amosis understands.

He knows who he was.

He's looked back and hey, I'm I'm not a trained prophet here, guys.

I'm just a shepherd.

I trim trees.

But I know who God is.

And he's called me to come up here and speak his word to you.

Good job, Amos.

How about Mother Mary?

Angel Gabriel uh shows up and says, You're gonna give birth to the Son of God.

Does she say?

She looks back and says, I can't do that.

I'm just a virgin.

But I'm standing here in the presence of an angel.

He says, So well, God can work it out.

What does she say?

All right.

I'm the handmaid of the Lord.

May it be to me as you have said.

It's the Hagar encounter over and over and over again throughout scripture.

Same with Peter.

When all those fish are in the boat after he's not caught anything, he goes up on the shore, drops to his knees, and says, Depart from me, I'm a sinner.

He looks back and says, I don't, I shouldn't be in your presence.

I can see Jesus just putting his hands.

Come on.

Henceforth, you're going to be fishing for men.

Do you hear what happens when you take God seriously?

And what Peter has to realize is God is real.

Jesus is real.

Same thing with Paul.

Paul's persecuting the Christians.

He's heading on the road to Damascus.

He has this encounter where he falls to the ground, is blinded.

Jesus says to him, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

And Saul says, Who are you?

Paul, we would know him as Saul at that point.

His name was Saul.

Saul has no clue who he is.

And Jesus says to him, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.

Now go.

I'll make you a witness to the Gentiles.

Change life.

He takes God seriously.

Even Timothy.

Paul's successor.

Follows him around, helps him with a lot of ministries, is baptized by Paul.

A Greek father, a Jewish mother.

We believe the encounter for him was he was baptized by Paul.

He took the commitment and decided to serve the Lord.

It's interesting that the prophet Isaiah, he gave us a different name, and why we don't remember the name El Roy very often, the Hebrew, God sees me, because he's given us a different word.

And we know it all very well from the Christmas stories.

Emmanuel, God with us.

But it would be many years after Hagar's story that the prophet gives a different insight to this reality.

God sees us.

God knows us.

He wants us to look at where we've been.

And yeah, if necessary, recognize all the mistakes we've made, trying to make decisions based on our feelings or our figuring it out, or I have a right to do A, B, or C.

He wants us to look at our past, risk believing that He's talking to us.

And then we move forward with a slightly different perspective.

Maybe going back to face realities, maybe facing new realities, maybe just recognizing that God's got a plan and purpose for us.

Let me give you an example of one of my recent Hagar encounters.

Last month, Jill and I had the privilege of being guests of our oldest son, Tim and his and Maureen and the girls, and they asked us to go as their guests to France.

We had a couple days in Paris, then we went up into the French Alps to ski.

Well, we get there the first day to the cabin up in the Alps.

It's gorgeous.

And sure enough, the rental company, who we've already given our sizes to and all the rest, uh they arrive with our equipment.

Now there's seven of us getting gear, so it's a bit chaotic.

You're in a little bitty cabin area with with the stairs, and these these skis are coming in, the boots are coming in, the poles, and the whole thing, you know, the whole thing.

So I'm handed my skis.

I put my head up a little bit, my shoulders go back.

Hmm.

They're different from all the other skis.

Now to understand why I got so significant about these skis that I was being presented to use for the week.

Um, let me give you a little bit about my background.

Um I was a naval flight officer before becoming a priest and pastor.

Uh Jill and I were stationed out in San Diego.

We flew out of North Island and I was a backseater for carrier-based aircraft.

We couldn't afford living in that area, so we lived north of the other base called Mirmar.

That's where they had Top Gun.

So we were aware of Top Gun every single day.

They were always flying over our house.

We're, I mean, we're right there, right down the street.

So when the movie came out, well, that was cool.

The second movie came out that was really cool.

I held back the tears as Jill's looking at me going, what do you think?

And I'm just, that's what that was our lives, like, you know, flying off the carriers and all that excitement and all that danger and all that.

Um, guess what the name of my skis were?

Maverick.

I'm going.

I literally have this thought, only God could know that.

I'm on the other side of the planet, and he knows I'm here to ski.

Only God could make that happen.

And and I'm thinking, yeah, I'm just gonna ski, I'm just gonna fly across the Alps and maybe head on down to Italy where the Olympics are going on.

They probably want to see an old guy, and probably got an American flag strapped in my back and flying along.

And and this song came to mind in the stillness of our family.

God sees me, He knows me.

Oh, the story doesn't end there.

I wish it ended there.

I was so pumped at that point.

I'm thinking, I'm gonna ski my tail off, and my son's gonna be impressed.

Now, guess what?

After they got our boots all fitted to the skis and made sure we're all set, we get our ski poles.

Hey, we're good to go.

Oh, yeah, we need a helmet.

That's right.

Gotta get a helmet.

And on the back of the helmet in Big Brent.

I am not kidding you.

Sinner.

Lord, I'm not laughing now at all.

I don't hear any music.

The encounter.

If it wasn't for that comma, I would have been happy being Maverick for the whole week.

Sinner.

And I actually had this is before I even knew he was gonna that Justin wanted me to share on this passage.

I went, okay, Lord, you know who I am.

And yes, Lord, I'm here to ski.

But Lord, I know who I am.

I'm a man of prayer because I'm a sinner who's been washed in the blood.

And so, yes, Lord, while I'm here, I will pray for my family, and I will pray for his hands, and I will pray for the leadership of his hands, as Jill and I do every day, and I'll pray for those people who've asked for prayers, because Lord, that's who I am.

I'm a redeemed sinner, and it's good enough for me, my brothers and sisters, God knows you, and he invites you, just consider that he wants to speak to you and he wants you to start looking back.

How has it gone?

With him and maybe without him?

How has that gone?

What does it mean that you're really loved by the Lord of the universe?

What does it mean to you that Jesus is real and he has a plan and purpose for your life?

In other words, if you can accept this message today as maybe having a bit of prophetic quality to it, God's word to you, let me just briefly close and give you some tips.

Because if you're gonna accept it well, well, you've got to enter that place of humility.

You really do.

Because you see, I'm not in charge.

You're not in charge.

Only the Lord is in charge, the one who we will come to understand as the journey unfolds, that he is Adonai, our Lord, he is Abba, our Father.

He is the one who is present with us always, as Jesus promised.

But he wants us to stop the foolishness of thinking we're all so much.

Yes, Lord, for a moment, I really felt like I was Maverick.

But there's a greater reality.

I'm a redeemed sinner.

And by the way, I looked it up just to tell you.

I was so curious.

How is it that I that we all got helmets called sinner?

Um, I looked it up.

It's a Dutch company.

They do rental equipment, and they think it's kind of edgy to pick English words.

Edgy.

I don't need edgy anymore.

I'm too old for this.

Edgy.

We're just sinners.

Have some humility.

A second, if we're gonna risk a Hagar encounter, there's gotta be a trust factor.

We've got to believe there's a reason God is speaking to us.

Because maybe something in our life isn't going quite right.

Uh, what was the issue for Hagar?

She was going in the wrong direction.

She needed again to be back with the two people who were wrestling with a walk with the one true God.

And she needed to be there.

And oh yes, she needed to go back and tell them her story so it would become part of our story.

You've got to trust that you are that significant to God.

Let's pause for a moment again on Hagar.

She probably thought she was a nobody.

She probably thought nobody loves her, that she had no plan and purpose.

She just had to run for her life without any plan or purpose.

And in the midst of that, God shows up and says, It's not just about Abraham and Sarai.

It's about you, Hagar.

I see you.

I know you.

I love you.

You gotta trust that.

Stop believing the lies of a culture that doesn't know God.

Then, of course, there's the courage as we go forward.

I know some of you need to hear this today because you've got a tough week ahead.

Don't be afraid.

Fear doesn't have any place in a walk with the Lord.

And reason is simple, no matter what you're facing.

Issues at work, health issues, financial issues, all the stuff that we have to go through, surgeries and loved ones who are suffering and all the rest.

Those are circumstances we have to go through, and in faith they will make us tougher.

And yes, they're hard, and we're not meant to face them alone.

And we don't, because the Lord is with us.

Circumstances can't control us if we're trusting the one who's with us.

Changes everything.

What's the takeaway for I hope all of us?

God sees you.

He knows you.

He loves you.

And he has a plan and purpose for your life.

Look at how, and just listen as I close to, and musicians, you can come out if you want.

We're wrapping things up.

This is how David, a thousand years later, discusses this reality, the the looking back.

And I'm going to quote just a couple verses out of Psalm 32.

Finally, he says, I confessed all my sin to you and stopped trying to hide my guilt.

I said to myself, I will confess my rebellion to the Lord, and you forgave me.

All my guilt is gone.

David writes and looks back and says, Yeah, I screwed up a lot.

But God's forgiven me.

Then he gets to the comma, the pause.

That honesty about taking stock of our life and who God is.

And he writes in verse 7, for you are my hiding place.

You protect me from trouble.

You surround me with songs of victory.

Surround me with songs of victory, and yet we haven't taken the next step.

But if we're trusting the Lord, the battle is his, isn't it?

It isn't ours.

It's a different way of living.

I know who I was.

Repent if I have to.

I know who I'm now with.

Songs of victory.

And finally we go forward whatever we're facing.

And he says this.

The Lord says, I will guide you along the best pathway for your life.

I will advise you and watch over you.

Do not be like a senseless horse or mule that needs a bit and bridle to keep it under control.

Many sorrows come to the wicked, but unfailing love surrounds those who trust the Lord.

So rejoice in the Lord and be glad, all you who obey him.

Shout for joy, all you whose hearts are pure.

My brothers and sisters, Justin has us on a very prophetic journey this year.

Listening to the word of God and saying it's a if it's a word of God to us.

The Lord sees you, El Roy.

He knows you.

He is with you, Emmanuel.

You have nothing to fear.

So have you heard a prophecy from the Lord today?

He's speaking to each one of us.

Be strong and have good courage.

Hold fast that which is good.

Love and serve the Lord with gladness and singleness of heart.

And God bless you.