“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?”
Hagar gives a name to the LORD who spoke to her: 'You are the God who sees me.' She adds: 'I have now seen the One who sees me.' El Roi — 'the God who sees' — is the only name given to God by a human being anywhere in Scripture. The theological insight is Hagar's alone: this God is not the God of the powerful and the established; he is the God who sees the one whom no one else sees. Psalm 139:1–4 celebrates this seeing God who knows the sitting down and rising up, the thoughts before they form. Luke 15:20 describes the father seeing the prodigal while he was still a long way off — the same quality of divine sight that finds Hagar in the wilderness. The application: the name Hagar gives God — the God who sees me — is the name for every person who has ever felt invisible. You are seen. The God who found Hagar in the desert has not changed his fundamental character.
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