Have you seen God?

What would be a good way to prove God exists?

Being able to see God with our own eyes.

If God would just show up right in front of us, well, there’d be no doubt. God exists. Case closed.

But has that happened to you? Have you seen God with your own eyes?

I haven’t and, as far as my understanding of history goes, no one else has either.

The Bible reports that very fact: “No one has ever seen God.” (John 1:18)

So, um, if God’s word is reporting that no one has ever seen God, that doesn’t inspire much confidence that anyone ever will.

Did you see this?

Tead all of John 1:18, though, and you’ll see something that you might find hard to believe.

“No one has ever seen God. The One and Only Son — the One who is at the Father’s side — He has revealed Him.”

As the rest of John’s gospel goes on to further explain, the One and Only Son is Jesus. According to the start of John’s gospel, this No. 1 son has revealed God.

Who has seen God? Those who saw Jesus, the one who revealed Him to the world.

Whoa.

Believing, not seeing

Now, count down the seconds until you think to yourself: “Okay, sure, but what about us? Jesus is no longer walking the earth. Where’s our sighting of God?”

Fair question.

Flick forward to the other end of John’s gospel and check out what Jesus himself offered about that very situation. Having just proved to one of his disciples that he had physically risen from the dead, Jesus said “Because you have seen Me, you have believed. Those who believe without seeing are blessed.” (John 20:29)

It’s almost as if Jesus was answering our complaints about being unable to see God.

By Jesus’s own admission, it’s possible to believe in Him without seeing Him. By doing so, it stands to reason we also can firmly believe in the one Jesus revealed — God — even if we cannot see Him.

Belief in the One Son surely flows to belief in the One He reveals. Right?

And such belief is the stuff that John’s gospel is all about encouraging in us: “Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of His disciples that are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may believe Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and by believing you may have life in His name.” (John 20:30-31)

Belief without seeing brings quite the blessing.

Ben McEachen

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