Ben Fourie

“My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you.” Job 42:5 (NIV)

To see God. Unbelievable! To the people of the Old Testament the very idea to see God was a strange concept, fearsome and dangerous. In Exodus 33:20 God said to Moses that nobody is allowed to see his face, because to do so will mean certain death. On Mount Sinai God had to hide Moses in a large crack in the rock and Moses was only allowed to see His back. To see His face was to die. When the people at Sinai saw the lightning and the dark cloud and heard the rumble of thunder they begged Moses to speak to them, ”…  don’t let God speak to us, or we will die”. Even the High Priest was allowed into the inner sanctum only once a year. And in spite of all this Job said: “my eyes have seen you.”

We realize that Job has said it figuratively. His “seeing” God is totally different from what we see with our eyes. What he knew about God until then was nothing but hearsay. His own idea of God, as well as that of his three friends was nothing but a man-made picture of God, and a skewed image for that matter. They actually knew nothing of who God really is and how He operates.

But after his struggle with God and life itself and the hard won knowledge of how different God really is, he for the first time understood the true nature of God. Previously “blind” he was now able to “see” God in all His holiness and splendour.

God also often needs to engage us in discussion or even dispute as we also “hear” about Him through our own and other peoples’ ideas of who He is and what He does. Our spiritual eyes are so clouded by who we think God is rather than who He really is. That is why He sent Jesus so that we can cry out like Job: “my eyes have seen you”.

Prayer: Dear Lord, please open my eyes so that I can see you in all your greatness. Amen