Daily Devotional · Genesis 16:6–13
God Who Sees Me
Reflection
Hagar had no power. She was Egyptian, a slave, an outsider. When Sarah's impatience drove Abraham to take Hagar as a surrogate, Hagar had no say. When she became pregnant and tension rose between the women, Sarai treated her harshly and she fled. She was alone in the desert near a spring — a runaway with nowhere to go, carrying a child she didn't choose. Then the angel of the Lord found her. Not the other way around. God sought out the marginalized, the forgotten, the powerless. God gave her specific instructions and a remarkable promise: her child Ishmael would father a great nation. And she received something else: the knowledge that she had been seen. Not overlooked. Not dismissed. Seen. She gave God a name that appears nowhere else in all of Scripture: El Roi — the God who sees me. Then she asked the most intimate question: "Have I here seen the one who sees me?" Hagar — a slave, a woman, a foreigner — became the only person in the Bible to name God. In your unseen moments, in your desert places, El Roi has not closed His eyes.
Background
The "angel of the Lord" in Genesis narratives often acts and speaks as God Himself, leading many theologians to identify these appearances as Christophanies — pre-incarnate appearances of the Son of God. Whether or not this is the case, the text emphasizes direct divine encounter: God meeting Hagar personally.
Truth
God's concern is not limited to the powerful, the chosen, or the comfortable. He crosses social boundaries to find those the world has overlooked. Your desert is not beyond His sight.
Application
Where have you felt unseen — in your family, your workplace, your pain? Tell God specifically what it feels like to be overlooked there. Then sit quietly with the name El Roi: He who sees me. Let that be enough today.