While driving through town the other day, I came across this sign: “GOD SAW YOU DO THAT” 

Ah, Christians can be so interesting sometimes, can’t they?

God saw you do that.

It’s a proclamation of judgement, something that says you better watch your back, isn’t it?

How many of us have church experiences like that? We interact with “God’s people” and all we get is a picture of the God who smites, who is watching your every move like a hungry predator, just waiting to pounce on your every mistake.

We read about grace in the Bible, but we have images of angry preachers hurling messages of judgement from the pulpit.

We picture Jesus, and see his followers holding signs on street corners damning entire populations.

God saw you do that…

But what if that sign, that message of judgement is really intended for Christians? Jesus, after all, was more harsh with the religious people of his day than he was with the sinners. At least the sinners knew they were messed up and in dire need of grace. It was the pious ones looking down their righteous noses at the sinners who Jesus had the issue with.

God saw you do that.

Then again, what if that sign is for the sinners? You know, the ones who refuse to admit that they have any problems that would require the grace Jesus so freely offers? Regardless of how these people may feel, we all mess up and need to own it. When we don’t we are just as pious as the religious folks Jesus speaks so harshly against; we’re just pious in a religion of our own making. And that’s not a good long-term solution, and so the God who loves his people fiercely pursues our false thinking for our own benefit.

God saw you do that.

Or – what if the sign isn’t spewing judgment at all? What if that sign is affirming the good things we’ve done? The times we’ve sacrificed for the benefit of others; for the times we’ve given of our own resources for those less fortunate than us; for when our hearts turned toward something life-giving rather than destructive; or when we’ve used our life stories to point others away from destructive choices?

God saw you do that.

I don’t know about you, but I’m far from perfect.

I have my issues, my fears and my anxieties, and I need God.

I actually need a God who does see the bad things I do, because if he doesn’t see those, then I can’t receive grace. And if I can’t receive grace and forgiveness, then my whole faith is for naught. 

I also need a God who sees the “sinners” who don’t know they’re doing anything wrong. I need a God who loves them enough to pursue them with an invitation to meaningful relationship with the God who created us all. I need that type of God to love everyone, even though everyone may not love him back. Because a God like that can accept me, faults and all.

I need a God who sees the good I do, too. The times when I get it right, when I choose the right path even when my internal faculties pull me in the opposite direction. The times when I courageously offer what I have, and God supernaturally takes my little and multiplies it for his purposes.

I actually feel safer with a God who sees us do that.

Because a God who sees is a God who is near. That same God who sees is the same God who sent. And because of his sending, I can experience the grace, the freedom, and the joy of knowing the creator of Love itself.

And for those reasons, I say, God, keep seeing. Keep pursuing. Keep loving.

Because life wasn’t meant to live alone, and thank God we don’t have to.