(Text Only)
Title: How to See God
Often when discussing faith, not just my faith, but the very concept of faith itself, I have met several people who don’t subscribe to any faith, to any confession of God at all. For them, most often the issue is a lack of proof.
Essentially they say, “You can’t prove to me that God is real.” And all of you know that I whole-heartedly agree with that statement. Faith is not about empirical proof. Faith, by its very definition is the belief in something that can’t be definitively proven.
But I would also suggest that there is a definitive difference between proof and evidence. I cannot prove God to anyone. I can only share what I believe God is. I only believe it because of my faith.
But I also readily confess that when I look at the world, when I looked at the evidence in creation, when I look at the radical transformation in my life, when I look at the radical transformation that I’ve witness in the lives of others, I see evidence everywhere, not just for the mere existence of God, but for the active ruling of a sovereign Lord upon His creation.
There is a beautiful scene in the second Lord of the Rings movie, “The Two Towers” where Aragorn is talking with Gandalf and feeling dejected and says, ‘Why do we continue to struggle, we don’t even know if Frodo is still alive.’ And Gandalf takes a moment, and looks at Aragorn and simply asks, ‘what does your heart tell you?’ There is a moment of internal investigation from Aragorn and then he replies, ‘He’s still alive.’
There was no empirical proof. There was only faith and belief.
Likewise, for me, It is only my faith in God that turns this evidence into proof of God. Others will look at the same evidence (in creation, in the changing lives of believers) and they choose not to attribute it to God, but to something else, most usually they attribute it to chance, to randomness.
Today John is going to talk to us about how to see God. He’s going to point us to three pieces of evidence, but we will only see that evidence as proof if we believe.
- Exhibit A: “seen”
The first thing that John points to in the passage is the issue of visual evidence. John states very clearly in verse 12 that no one has seen God the Father. In fact, there are other scripture references that go into more detail to explain why, on the rare occasions when God the Father makes an appearance in Scripture visually, He is always veiled or manifest in a way that we can’t look upon his face.
Exodus 33:20
“You are not able to see my face, because no man may see me and yet live.”
We read of God placing Moses in the cleft of a rock and covering him with His hand as he passed by. Why? Because the holiness and righteousness of God is so magnificent, that for us to witness it in this sinful state would kill us.
Can you imagine that? Something so righteous, so amazing, so Holy, so perfectly beautiful that it would literally kill you if you laid eyes upon it? That’s incredible.
So John says that no one has seen God, but he does offer visual evidence. He says in verse 14 “We and have seen and testify that the Father sent the son as Savior of the world.”
Well, what’s the correlation? It can be found in the Gospel of John 14:9 “He that has seen me has seen the Father…”
Point: Though we have not “seen” God, we have seen the physical, human manifestation of Christ whom he sent. And God sent him precisely to be seen!
- Exhibit B: Witness
If you will forgive the ongoing courtroom analogies, John acting as the defense lawyer in the “Case of the angry Nay-sayer” then does something quite unorthodox, he calls himself as a star witness.
He says, “I’ve seen, and testify that I’ve seen, the Son, Jesus Christ in the flesh. I walked with him, I touched his flesh, I witness firsthand his miracles.”
And why is this important?
Because John is writing to refute Docetism, which specifically denies the manifestation of Jesus in the flesh.
But John doesn’t stop there. He goes on to then draw a parallel between the evidence he’s personally witnessed and the belief of the Church. As far as we know, no one John is writing to in this letter saw or talked to Jesus Christ like John did. The next thing that John says then is extremely important.
In verse 15 John says, “Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in that person.”
What is John really asking here? He’s saying “I’ve seen him. Do you believe me?” In other words, John is asking, “What does your heart tell you?”
Remember our nasty little annoying question from a few months ago? Which would you betray first: everything you have ever come to know and love, or your heart?
Here is John’s entire argument.
1. No one has ever seen God.
2 Whoever has seen the Son has seen the Father.
- I’ve seen the Son.
- Do you believe me?
- Do you confess Him?
So John’s entire message this chapter is this: “We believe the love God has for us. The evidence of that Love is that He sent Christ. Christ told us to love. If we truly love, God is in us.”
It’s not complicated. It never was meant to be. It’s a simple presentation, it’s a simple argument. It’s not about “proving” the existence of God. God doesn’t’ NEED to be proven. He IS, whether you believe in HIM or not.
Do you?
Then do what John says.
Those who love Him keep his commandments.
All of them. All the time. Every day. Twice on Sunday.