This has been a long time coming! Seen and Heard by God Part 1 is here and was written in January 2025. In that post, I reflected on the story of Hagar who calls God by the name El Roi– the God who sees. In her distress, she also acknowledges that God heard her cries for help. Nowhere else do we hear of anyone calling God by the name El Roi, though the validity of this name weaves its way through the entirety of Scripture.
As I’ve been reading through the Bible this year, this name of God has continually whispered its way into my heart through His word and into my circumstances. I noticed this trio is often linked together: God sees, God hears, God knows.
In the Old Testament, we see many instances of God seeing, hearing, and knowing His people in their distress, whether that be the collective group of His people (for example, Exodus 2:24-25) or a narrowing-in on one person individually suffering, such as in Hagar’s story (Genesis 16).
These accounts bring deep comfort when it seems that injustice is prevailing in our world. They allow us to rest and trust God sees, God hears, God knows. And they remind us that God will act — in His time and in His way — to deliver from the hands of evil and oppression.
These truths have anchored my heart — but as I read further, I began to notice another beautiful layer of what it means to be seen and heard by God.
As I shifted into the New Testament, a different sort of “seen and heard by God” jumped out at me. It’s one that encourages delight and reward in remaining unseen.
In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gives us three examples of practices that God sees in secret and promises reward for it: in giving, in prayer, and in fasting.
“When you give to the poor, don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matt. 6:3-4)
“When you pray, go into your private room, shut your door, and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matt. 6:6)
“When you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, so that your fasting isn’t obvious to others but to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.” (Matt. 6:17-18)
The truth that God sees in secret frees us from a different sort of oppression we can put ourselves under. It’s freedom from self-glory — freedom from the fleeting praise of others becoming our reward.
Calling on the God who sees, hears, and knows brings freedom from oppression at the hands of evil and freedom from the oppression we can put ourselves into as we slave away for the approval of others rather than living only to be seen by God.
We can be assured that in every circumstance, God sees the big picture when others miss what should be seen. He hears both the shouts and the whispers of our hearts, and He knows the depths of what’s visible and what’s hidden — it’s all seen by Him. What a God we can trust!
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