By Mike Caton

John 1:18 – No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.

God is not a physical being, so how can we expect to see him with our physical eyes? God existed before anything else, he is eternal and he created this world, in fact, everything, from nothing. But we can see the effects, the power, the evidences of God all around us. How is it possible for us to think that this complex world we live in just happened? When we see anything that was made, from a chair to a watch to a computer to a car, we know there was intelligent design behind it. A wooden chair, for example, didn’t result when a storm blew a tree down. Someone took that wood, processed it, shaped it, worked with it until that chair was made. So how can we possibly think the tree itself just came into being? Or the sun, the moon, the stars and so forth? We’ve not seen God, but we have seen his handiwork, we can know there is a God behind what we see.

But Jesus, the Son, has seen God and he knows God. This is because he is God himself. We have trouble wrapping our minds around the concept if the Trinity. How can one God be three persons? (But even at that, God is not a person.) There are some things that we just have to admit are beyond our physical understandings, things we have to accept by faith. But Jesus has come to make these things known. Jesus is in the closest relation with the Father and he has come to reveal the Father to us. Does this mean we will understand everything, that every mystery will be revealed, every question we have will be answered? Of course not. But it does mean Jesus has come to bring us the truth as the last verse stated, and that we will have all the truth, all the understanding that we need. (Not necessarily all that we want, but all we need.)

So, where does that put us? It puts us in a position of faith. Of having to reach out to live, to trust, to learn, to grow, to mature in our relationship with the Son and the Father. No one will ever know all there is to know in this life. But we need to realize our spiritual life is a journey, each and every day we need to be getting closer to the Lord, more committed to him. We will never be able to say in this life, we have arrived. But we ought to be able to say, I am getting closer every day.

Father, help me learn more. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Mike Caton is the preacher at Mount Olive Church of Christ in Belhaven. He volunteers at the Ponzer Fire Department and works part time with Hyde County EMS. If you would like to receive daily devotions in your inbox, email mikecaton@centurylink.net.

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