It was his eyes. Something about those eyes.
As if nobody had really "seen" him lately.
Oh people had looked at him. All day they looked at him. Customers, co-workers, parents maybe, his wife perhaps. But had they SEEN him? Had the stopped long enough to pay attention to what was really going on?
Because I felt it.
In the brief encounter I had with a man I didn't even know... I felt it.
The pain, the longing for something more. The ache.
It was undeniable... this look in his eyes.
As if they were begging someone to notice. Someone to care. Someone to ask, "Are you okay?"
Because here is what I know....
We all carry pain with us.
Everywhere we go, we carry pain and hurt and sadness.
We have regrets.
We've been bruised.
We ask ourselves if we're the only ones and then...
we do our best to hide it.
And it works. Most of the time.
It works when others are too busy with their own lives to notice.
To see.
And how many times have we passed right by... him, or her?
How many times have we been him, or her?
And in our rush and in our self-centeredness, we miss an opportunity to see the way God sees.
Genesis 16 tells the story of Hagar.
A woman.
A servant.
A foreigner.
A loner.
A mother.
A daughter.
And loved by God.
Hagar was the Egyptian servant to Sarai (Sarah), the wife of Abram (Abraham), who would later become pregnant with Abrams son, Ishmael. Because of Sarai's barrenness, she contrived a plan. A plan to have children through a lonely servant girl.
God had promised to make a great nation of the childless Abram, and assured him that his son would be his heir, but Ishmael was an attempt to fulfill God's promise by human means. And so this plan... it pretty much backfired.
Alone and frightened of what the future held for her son, Hagar cried out to God, and in verse 13 declares, "You are the God who sees me."
In all of my brokenness. You see me.
In all of my sin. You see me.
In all of my disbelief. You see me.
You. See. Me.
And He sees you.
He doesn't choose to turn from the ugliness.
He doesn't abandon the lonely.
He doesn't ignore the hurt.
He sees.
He looks directly at the hurt and the pain and the bitterness and He whispers, "Child... I see you!"
I see what you have been trying so hard to hide.
I see the burden you have been carrying around.
I see the tears you've cried.
I see the scars you've desperately attempted to cover.
I see you.
And I want to see others like that.
I don't want to miss an opportunity to really see the person and not the mask they hide behind.
I want to touch the tears and say, "I get it. I've been there too."
Because I have.
And I have pain too.
But we need each other.
We need someone to see past the rough exterior. To see into the soul.
Because within us... within them... is a need to be seen.
Will you choose to see today? With eyes wide open, will we look and SEE what the eyes are really saying? And will we offer hope if nothing more than with eyes that see?
You are the God who sees me.
And so I choose to see with Your eyes, Father.
I choose to see.
