When God Sees

And the people believed; and when they heard that the Lord had visited the people of Israel and that he had seen their affliction, they bowed their heads and worshiped.     Exodus 4:31 ESV

God sees.  He sees everything. 

In our heads, we know that is true.  For those of us who grew up in Sunday school, bit words like "omnipresent" and "omniscient" may come to mind.  I have been taught from an early age that God is everywhere and that He knows everything.  These are simple facts, so ingrained in my mind that I have no question as to their validity.

My heart, though, is sometimes a different story.  

As I have been reading in Exodus, the stories are familiar.  I've heard them and read them many, many times.  But as is common, I find new nuances in the old stories each time I read them.  I know what's getting ready to happen in Egypt and beyond.  When I think about the years the children of Israel are preparing to spend wandering in the wilderness, I am not prone to think of them as people of great faith.  Which is probably why this verse stood out to me this morning...

For context, if you're not familiar with the story, the descendants of Jacob have been living in Egypt for about 400 years, ever since they came to be nourished through a famine.  God has blessed the children of Jacob (Israel), and they have multiplied in the land of Egypt - so much so that the king (Pharaoh) is worried that they will rebel and overpower his country.  And so, Pharoah has made the children of Israel slaves. 

The slavery thing had been going on for quite a while, and the children of Israel were weary.  They were tired of being slaves, tired of being beaten, tired of having their children murdered, tired of it all, I can imagine.  They had been crying out to the Lord for rescue for years, and they must have wondered if He'd just abandoned them.

He had not.  In Exodus 2:24 we're told that God heard their cries.  He already had a plan for their rescue, but they just didn't know it yet.

So In Exodus 4:31, Moses had just returned to Egypt, having spent the past 40 years away.  He reconnected with his older brother Aaron, and they gathered the leaders of the people for a meeting.  With Moses talking to Aaron, and Aaron relaying the messages to the people, they laid out God's plan for bringing the children of Israel out of the place of their slavery.  They finally had confirmation that God had heard their prayers!

Their response was to worship.

Nothing had actually happened yet.  They were still in Egypt.  They were still slaves.  Circumstances were still pretty bleak.  Nothing had changed for them.  But hope had come!  They knew that God had heard and that deliverance was coming, and that was enough for the moment.  The news that Moses and Aaron brought resulted in humble worship.

As often is the case in life, the rescue was still a ways out.  The children of Israel were not walking out of Egypt that day.  They still had to get up the next morning and go out to work in horrible conditions.  Actually, conditions were about to get a lot worse before they got better...

Still, in the midst of their slavery, before they were rescued, just a simple encouragement that God was listening made a difference in their hearts, and the children of Israel were drawn to worship.

Life is often hard.  We sometimes pray for days, months, years, wondering if God hears or if He cares.  We know in our heads - because we know the nature of God - that He does hear.  But we aren't feeling it, and we're not seeing Him respond.

Occasionally, though, something will happen to remind our hearts of what our heads know.  God is faithful.  God has heard our prayers.  He has seen what is happening, and He has a plan.  Maybe we are encouraged by a song, by a kind word, by the "verse of the day," or by some other means.  In those moments, let us take a page from the Israelite slave playbook and respond in humble worship.

Sure, in chapter 5 the Israelites seem already to have forgotten.  They walked out of the meeting where God spoke, and back into the circumstances of life, where they were quickly discouraged and overwhelmed.

We do that too.  And it's okay.

God still rescued the children of Israel.  He didn't say, "well after you worshiped you grumbled, so I changed My mind."  He did miracles!

So the encouragement today is quite simple: in the midst of the difficulty, go ahead and worship.  God sees what you're going through.  He's heard your cries.  The answer may not come as quickly as you'd hoped, and you may be tempted to doubt.  In those moments, let your head have a little chat with your heart.  You know what is true.  God is good.

So now we wait...

...Just a thought...