At one point or another, most people have spent time considering the existence of God. It comes up in good times and bad, while we’re surrounded by other people in conversation or alone with our own thoughts. This thought, in some shape or form, has probably crossed everyone’s mind: Why can’t I see God? It would be so much easier to believe if He just came down and let me see Him.
I’ve lied awake waiting for that spiritual experience, a sign–anything. But I never saw God. They say that “seeing is believing” but perhaps that phrase needs some revision.
Why We Can’t See God
First, we have to know why no one can see God. God is a Spirit (John 4:24). He doesn’t have a physical form like you and I, so these physical eyes we have just aren’t able to see Him, unless He allows it, of course. When God allowed Moses to see His back, this is what He said:
“But,” He said, “you cannot see my face for no one may see me and live.”
Exodus 33:20
What intention did God have when He said this? Is He like a celebrity that throws a tantrum when someone makes eye contact? Is He letting us know that our relationship with Him can’t be that close?
Of course not. In fact, He actually wants to be among His creation. It’s just that, if He does come to us, the natural consequence is us dying. But why is this the case?
Holiness and Sin Cannot Mix
God is a holy being, meaning He is 100% good, pure, has absolutely nothing to do with sin. That’s why He is compared to everlasting light (Leviticus 19:2). But what about us?
In the beginning, in the Garden of Eden, humankind actually was created in God’s image – holy and pure. But we’ve since departed from that. Now, we are beings who don’t resemble God’s perfection–we’re mixed with good and evil, we are sinful, and therefore the darkness to God’s light.
And I don’t mean this in a “peanut butter to my jelly” kind of way. There are things that cannot coexist together. And that is God’s holiness and our unholiness.
Take the metaphor of God as light for example. When a light is turned on in a dark room, what happens to the darkness? Does it move over to make some space for the light? No, it disappears.
Much like this, us seeing God would kill us. The darkness within us, the sin, would be wiped out by God’s holiness. That’s why we see people trying time and time again to purify themselves throughout the Bible, especially when they’re about to enter into God’s presence.
So now, we can see that God not allowing us to see Him is not an act of anger or spite, but rather, an act of love. What would be the point of coming to meet us if we were going to die the moment we saw Him anyway? Isn’t protecting the children an instinct of any loving parent?
We can’t see God, but that doesn’t mean we have to believe in Him blindly. If “seeing is believing” can’t be our standard, then what is the evidence God gives to prove His existence?
How to Know God Is Out There
Throughout the Old Testament, God showed his power to people through many miraculous events that no human could ever replicate. Things like the plagues in Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, and the food that rained down from the heavens to sustain the Israelites as they wandered the desert for forty years. These were all physical forms of proof of God’s existence for the Israelites.
But is hearing or reading about these events alone enough proof for us today? We weren’t there–we didn’t see these things with our own eyes. For all we know, it could all be hearsay. The reason we can believe in the God that performed these miracles is because He has proven himself to us another way.
Seeing God Through His Promises
The proof for us today is the fact that God makes promises, and then He keeps them. Think about it…if you had a friend that always made promises but never kept them, wouldn’t you eventually lose your faith in them? Once your trust in them is gone, you’ll stop listening to the promises they try to make with you. But God isn’t like this. Every time He makes a promise, He fulfills it.
The LORD Almighty has sworn, “Surely as I have planned, so it will be, and as I have purposed, so it will happen.”
Isaiah 14:24
God has kept every single promise He has made. And we can see it all throughout the Bible. With a 100% track record like that, we can put our trust in Him to continue to keep His promises at our time.
The Promise Made to Abraham
Let’s look at an example of this. In Genesis 12, God promises Abraham, an old man with no children, that he will have descendants as numerous as the stars of the sky, and that they would be enslaved in a foreign land for 400 years. After those 400 years, they would come out with great possessions and take another land promised to them.
It wasn’t until the time of Abraham’s great-grandson, Joseph, that these descendants went to Egypt because of a famine, were enslaved after time because they grew too great in number, and then 400 years after God had promised Abraham, through the leadership of Moses, after being called by God, they came out of Egypt to go to Canaan.
Who else other than God could have made this happen? Who could make all these detailed promises come true, when the one to which it was promised had died long before? Only God can control this fulfillment because He is the one who promised it.
Along with the promises to Abraham, the Bible is full of other examples of God giving a prophecy and later fulfilling it exactly as He said He would. This is how we know God is really there. Not a vague feeling or blind hope, but because God has proven it, and will continue to do so.
How Can I Meet God Today?
However much we may want it, God doesn’t come before us in a way we can see physically. But there still is a way for us to meet Him. He gave us something so that we could have a tangible connection to Him. Do you know what that is?
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1
Seeing God through His Word
He gave us His Word–a letter written to his children whom He was cut off from because of sin. This book is the place where He poured all of His grief, hope, and love so that we could know and understand Him and what He is trying to do. A love that can’t be spoken through an audible voice or a physical gesture–we can find this within the Bible.
If you had children you couldn’t be with in person, wouldn’t you want them to read the letters you write to them? For them to open the form of physical contact you have provided? God also wants us, those who claim to be His children, to go to His word to find Him.
Have I always treated the Bible this way, as a form of God Himself? That’s a no. My Bible used to collect dust on my bookshelf. It seemed more like a supplement to my life of faith rather than the foundation of it.
I spent time waiting and hoping for something, but it was God that was waiting for me. Within the pages of the God-breathed Word, we can meet Him. (2 Timothy 3:16).
So now, let’s make our lives of faith active ones. No more waiting for a sign or a vision that won’t appear before our eyes but strengthen our belief in God by diving into His word. Then we’ll be able to say that we have truly met and seen God.
Written by Samantha
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