Devotional by Amanda Kepple:

Since this week’s sermon is entitled El Roi, or the God who sees, I decided to go with the song, “When Love Sees You”. What I found amazing about the song was the fact that the song took on the perspective of Christ; both before and while He was a man walking on earth.

I love how the verses tell about the people who are dismayed, broken, poor, doubtful, sick, and enslaved by their shame and fear, looking to Christ for Mercy and Grace by when He in there presence-which I think all do can relate to at some point in our lives-; I think Psalm 56:8 described the verses well when it said:

Record my misery; list my tears on your scroll, are they not in your record?

And then the Chorus suddenly flips the scene and shows how marvelous, caring, sovereign, and loving He truly is  when it says “Tell me your story, show me your wounds, and I will show you what love sees when love looks at you, hand me the pieces broken and bruised, and I’ll show you what love sees when love sees you”; as it says it Proverbs 15:3:

The eyes of the Lord are everywhere, keeping watch on the wicked and the good.

The chorus is made even better when we think about when it said when love looks at you, and seeing it as saying when Jesus looks at you. We all go through times of pain, agony, struggle, shame, and even doubt if God is with us in all of it, but in Matthew 6:26, it says:

Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?

Here we are given assurance and hope by God that, despite what it is we may be going or will be going through, just as He cares for the birds, so long as we believe in Him and who He says He is and remember His promises to us, He will take care of us.

I want to leave you guys with the bridge of the song and if any of you are struggling with hardships or sin and shame or doubt or fear or anything, just remember that God can and will take your story, good or bad, and He will take care of you and use it in the way that only He can.

I see what I made in your mother’s womb
I see the day I fell in love with you
I see your tomorrow’s nothing left to chance
I see my Father’s fingerprints
I see a story, I see my name
Written on every beautiful page
You see the struggle, you see the shame
I see the reason I came