fully known and fully loved

If you were to sit with every single person that at the very least knows your first name, altogether in one room, how many people would be there? You probably can’t even fathom the number. There’d be people from work, school, church, your family, friends, and maybe that barista from your favorite coffee shop you’re a regular at.

But now if the question were to change ever so slightly to: if you were to sit in a room with every single person that knows you, the real you, how many people would be in the room? Probably significantly less than your answer to the first question.

So what’s the difference between knowing of someone and actually knowing them for who they are?

This question has been on my heart a lot lately because although my team and I are working primarily with college-age students, we’ve also found ourselves talking quite often with a group of local homeless people. Without fail, everytime I look into their eyes, I can’t help but imagine the stories they have to tell, stored up in their hearts with not many people to tell them to. People walk past them as if they’re invisible on a daily basis and yet the Lord knows their name, He knows their favorite color and what makes them laugh so hard their stomach hurts. He knows about the scar on their hand from the bike accident when they were just 6 years old and He knows how they wish they could’ve done things differently in their past. He knows them beyond their name.

There is so much that we are blind to because we willfully choose to cover our eyes. Can you imagine where we’d be if the Lord had chosen to do that to us? But instead, He is El-Roi, “the God who sees me”. The first time this name of God is used in Scripture is in Genesis 16. Hagar, a slave of Abram and Sarai, had just run away due to her mistreatment, into the wilderness. Encountered by the angel of the Lord, Hagar is told she had conceived and would have a son named Ishmael (Hb: ‘God hears’) and that he would be made into a great nation because “the Lord has heard [her] cry of affliction” (v. 11). Hagar says, ‘You are El-roi,’ for she said, ‘In this place, have I actually seen the one who sees me?”. The Lord didn’t just see Hagar in the wilderness from a birds’ eye view. He saw her pain, her sorrow, and the neglect and abuse she received from Sarai. God knew the full extent of her circumstances and cared for her to the full measure of His love.

Another example of the Lord acting as El-Roi is in John 1. Jesus had just decided to make His way to Galilee and had invited Philip to follow Him. Philip finds Nathanael and invites him to follow along as well and as Jesus observes Nathanael approaching, He says that he is “an Israelite in whom there is no deceit” (v. 47). Understandably weirded out by this proclamation of his character from a man he does not yet know, Nathanael asks, “How do you know me?”, to which Jesus replies, “Before Philip called you, when you were under the fig tree, I saw you.” Awestruck in wonder, Nathanael proclaims, “Rabbi, You are the Son of God; you are the King of Israel!” Now we don’t know for certain what Nathanael had been doing or thinking about underneath that fig tree, but clearly the fact that Jesus had somehow seen him despite not physically being there, provoked Nathanael into realizing He is the Messiah. Using my sanctified imagination, I tend to picture Nathanael in one of the lowest points in his life, internally wrestling with something that had been consuming his mind. Maybe it was some form of pain or sorrow, anxiety or depression. Regardless of what it was that was so significant about Nathanael’s time under that fig tree, we can see that because Jesus knew about it, Nathanael felt truly seen.

Are you walking in confidence, knowing that the God of the universe sees you right where you’re at? Are you resting in the fact that you are completely known, deeply cared for, and abundantly loved?

Are you viewing others in the same way, treating them as equally precious in the sight of the Father? Are you walking by people everyday, forgetting that there is more to them than their name- in the same way that there is more to you?

What would the world look like if we took the time to know people past their name and love them past what is convenient to us!!