Names of God 5; El Roi: the audience of one.
Genesis 16:1-15, WBC 25/09/05am. Baptism of Kirsty Plant
Intro: Even when I wasn’t a Christian, many of the people I hung around with had Christian families. I remember being in the house of one and seeing a huge sign hanging on the door "thou, Lord, seeest me". I remember it felt a bit disconcerting! Not least as it was the loo!
It can be a bit disconcerted to know you are watched. Ever felt that with CCTV (I can’t resist DOING something!)
- I remember my mate Paul being stuck in the YMCA car park in Watford, trying to get out, and those watching him splitting their sides! Phoning. Watching as he ran to the phone. "hang up… NOW!"
You might feel a bit that way about God. Like some divine Santa
"You’d better watch out… he knows when you’ve been sleeping… awake… bad/good… so be good for goodness sake"
You may not feel like that at all
- you may actually feel nobody is watching. Nobody cares (not in a bad sense):- you’re on your own. "The world works by mechanistic means… so get on with it and make the most of it"
But what if that’s not the whole story?
- what if someone IS watching? The one who made the rules by which all this works. The ultimate cause. Reason
- what if you simply haven’t understood the WAY He acts… is involved… and so have taken this for non-existence
- what if you are hugely missing out… are hugely out of kilter with the universe’s order…. In doing so?
THE GOD WHO SEES
This is a lovely yet sad story. Nobody comes out of it the hero, really. It’s just one of those real life things.
Abram and Sarai can’t conceive. They do the normal thing in those days and try ’surrogacy’ through Sarai’s maidservant, Hagar… who conceives pronto…
… and then the trouble sets in.
Hagar ’despises’ Sarai. Sarai bullies Hagar. Abram goes weak. Sarai kicks Hagar out. Victim or violator, Hagar finds herself out on the desert road near a spring.
And there the ’angel of the Lord’ finds her. He seeks her out… and asks her a question
- now, when God asks someone a Qn, it’s not usually for His benefit!
"Where have you come from, and where are you going?" "I’m running away… from things,,. The past" "well go back. Face it…and I’m going to bless you"
And she gave the name El Roi to God and said ’I have now seen the One who sees me’
The God who sees. God saw her.
You might say: ’fat load of good that did! Why didn’t He stop this?’
- but that’s not the way He works! They made the choices. Free will and all that. Theirs were the consequences
o but God was not detached. He was watching.
I don’t know where you fit in in this story. Heavens knows we’ve all had things happen to us we wish hadn’t. Maybe we felt completely alone in it.
The Times-Reporter of New Philadelphia, Ohio, reported in September 1985 a celebration of a New Orleans municipal pool.
The party around the pool was held to celebrate the first summer in memory without a drowning at the New Orleans city pool. In honour of the occasion, 200 people gathered, including 100 certified lifeguards.
As the party was breaking up and the four lifeguards on duty began to clear the pool, they found a fully dressed body in the deep end. They tried to revive Jerome Moody, 31, but it was too late. He had drowned surrounded by lifeguards celebrating their successful season.
SOURCE: Times-Reporter, September 1985. on www.sermoncentral.com
But God was watching. And He tells Hagar to ’go back and face her abuser’ and deal with it.
- and He doesn’t ’sanitise’ the story, or remove all the consequences (this lad’s gonna be a "rum ’un"!)
- but He shows her victory and huge blessing in it, and lifts her eyes to His cosmic perspective
o just imagine if He hadn’t stepped in, if she hadn’t dealt with it and gone back. Story would have ended pitifully
Maybe you or I fit in as the abusing boss. Well- El Roi. God sees. Watches.
- in fact He is the only one who sees… truly watches. Knows it all.
- Bible describes Him as the one who ’searches hearts and minds’
- Heb 4:13 The One from whom "Nothing in all creation is hidden Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account."
Well- you say. "That’s just my point. If He sees, He sees from a distance, dispassionately"
THE GOD WHO KNOWS
Oh… you’ve misunderstood, then.
Did you notice in here… (and I didn’t fill in the gaps)… that the ’Angel of the Lord’ finds this lass? Yet later she says ’I have seen the Lord who sees me’?
- this is obviously more than a normal Angel
o (angel= ’messenger’)
- the ’angel of the Lord’ was another expression for God Himself
- so, God comes and seeks her out. ’Comes down’
Maybe you don’t realise that. The Bible is filled with ’God coming down’. Walking in the garden. Seeking people out. Asking questions. Appearing to people: hiding in winepresses (Gideon), in danger of fire (S,M&A)… and waiting for the Messiah to come
- God appears on earth and seeks men/women out. Jesus.
In fact- I think this is Jesus, here: He’s the messenger of YHWH
He watches- but not dispassionately. Passively.
He visits in person… and He KNOWS! God knows what it’s like
Illustr: You know the shortest verse in the Bible? Jn 11:35. "Jesus wept". Let me read you the verses before it. It’s in the context of His best friend, Lazarus, dying:
JN 11:33 When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who had come along with her also weeping, he was deeply moved in spirit and troubled. 34 "Where have you laid him?" he asked.
"Come and see, Lord," they replied. JN 11:35 Jesus wept. JN 11:36 Then the Jews said, "See how he loved him!" JN 11:37 But some of them said, "Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?"
What struck me this week was that bit ’deeply moved and troubled’
- literally He is angry. "Enraged in Spirit". And He’s angry with death… and its sting. The pain of life. Listen to the definitive commentary on this (BB Warfield) "It is death that is the object of His wrath, and behind death him who has the power of death, and whom He has come into the world to destroy. Tears of sympathy may fill His eyes, but this is incidental. His soul is held by rage: and He advances to the tomb, in Calvin’s words, "as a champion who prepares for conflict The raising of Lazarus thus becomes not an isolated marvel, but… a decisive instance and open symbol of Jesus’ conquest of death and hell… not in cold unconcern but in flaming wrath against the foe… He has felt for us and with us in our oppression , and under the impulse of these feelings has wrought out our redemption.
No way is this disconnected, dispassionate ’watching’. God KNOWS. Feels. Enters in. Was… is…became MAN
THE GOD WHO WATCHES
So, here’s my final, closing point.
God watches- and so it’s Him we’re trying to please
- not out of fear. "thou, Lord, seeest me!"
o although I guess any motive is better than none
o it does say we will all have to give an account of our lives to Him.
" (whether we think He exists or not, whether we serve Him now or not- every person will stand before Him, bow the knee and answer for their life)
o but that’s an immature motive… fear
- It’s love: for His engagement with us. For Him sending His Son to show us what He’s like… and to die a horrible death to conquer death, pay the price, ransom us from a meaningless life and the power of the devil
- It’s love for how He changes our lives and brings hope and answers into our situations of being Sarai, Abram or Hagar
o His involvement!
2 Cor 5:9 So we make it our goal to please HIM, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. (?For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.)
That’s what Kirsty is doing this morning. It’s for the audience of one. For God (though it’s SO great to have you all sharing it with her)
- but you don’t get baptised for the godparent’s sake, for ’family tradition’s sake’… or any other sake.. though many do.
o not this kind of baptism, anyway. It’ll get you killed in some parts of the world
o you do it for El Roi. You, Lord, see me. This is for you
" because I want to follow you, Jesus
I’m not saying God doesn’t use infant baptism. I believe God uses anything He can…and I do believe many people do that for God
- but my understanding from the Bible is people did this THEMSELVES for God.
- So, for us, we don’t call it ’adult baptism’. It has nothing to do with AGE. It has to do with ’believing and being baptised’
o And that is what Kirsty is doing, herself, for The God who Sees
- It’s for Jesus, and it’s identification with Jesus
o Jesus died, went into tomb, rose to new life
o Old Kirsty dies, goes under the water, rises to new life
o And there, in the water, is the symbolism that God washes away all the past and all our (natural!) rebellion against God
" And the filling of the Holy Spirit
" And identification with the billions of other Christians who have shared this universal sign of standing out for Jesus
Close
-so- let’s close… and spend a mo thinking about who is watching us… and who we do things for. Who are we living/trying to please?
Songs:
Light of the world
Lift up your hearts!
Play: "from a distance " (double click the icon on the desktop. Takes 20 seconds to load)
