Genesis 16:13-14 And she called the name of the LORD that spoke to her, You God see me: for she said, Have I also here looked after him that sees me?… 1. The first idea presented to us is one of wonder, admiration, and comfort. It does not so much express her awe as her surprise and delight, that the God of whom she had heard in Abraham's family should have appeared to her in her perplexity. "Have I also here looked after Him that seeth me?" 2. I go on to observe that the omnipresence of God is salutary only when it implies watchful and personal inspection of our conduct, and personal interest in our welfare. We are under a government; we live under an immutable system of law. We ignorantly think to evade it; but the Lawgiver is all eye and all ear. We have no adequate motive for a moral life, except it be the active oversight of a moral Ruler. Every transgressor hopes to escape observation. The great majority need a power out of ourselves, independent of our own strength, resolutions, or sense of duty; yet not superseding, but quickening and aiding these motives to high moral conduct. We do not want to set aside the social esteem which follows good conduct; but this being of most precarious quality, we want to aid it by the sense of Divine approval, manifested to the individual by a personal, all-seeing Judge and Ruler. (B. Kent, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: And she called the name of the LORD that spake unto her, Thou God seest me: for she said, Have I also here looked after him that seeth me? |
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