4 Ways to See God: Seeing God Like You’ve Never Seen Him Before

Would you like to see God like you’ve never seen Him before?

It has been three years since I had the surgery that gave me better vision than ever before and I am still discovering new things I have never noticed.

I saw a bird trapped beneath an overhang. While I felt compassion for the trapped bird, I found myself fascinated by the furious flapping of his wings. I had never seen outstretched wings or the motion of a bird’s short choppy propulsion in a tight space. Instead of seeing nothing more than a dark silhouette, I could actually make out the variegated colors of the inner wing.

Several times, I’ve mistaken objects for being closer than they are. My husband and I were returning home on our street one day when I almost commented out loud, “Whose car is in our driveway?” I realized the car I saw was in the parking lot of the church beyond our house. I’m not used to seeing objects beyond a certain distance.

No, my vision is not continuing to improve.

The physical structure of my eyes has not changed after the initial healing period of six months. The surgeon gave me better vision the day of my surgery. I am seeing new things because I’m learning to use what I have and I’m discovering what I’ve missed for over 50 years. I’m learning to use and strengthen what I already have.

The same is true when we accept Christ and receive His gift of salvation.

At the time of our baptism, Christ transforms us. He heals us of the sin that has blinded us to His truth and broken our purity and righteousness. In God’s eyes, at the moment we die to our old self, we are made whole. We are healed. We are now holy and righteous in the sight of God.

God has already given us new sight. It is up to us to discover the changes.

From that point on, we witness the glories of our transformation. Each day, we discover something new about God. We learn about His character, and have a greater understanding of the new life He longs for us to live, As we immerse ourselves in His Word, we unearth aspects of this new life He’s called us to live. And, as we associate with other believers, we find out how life can be so very different and how different can be so very good.

It’s ours to have if we look for it.

Like me with my new vision, we’ll get more out of our new life in Christ if we go into full discovery mode. If you want to discover what God is like and how we relate to Him, you have to be intentional about it. You have to do the looking.

How do we see God with our new spiritual eyesight?

Look Up

My former way of walking was to look down at the barely visible ground at my feet, one step at a time. Now, with better eyesight see, I can lift my head and look at the birds in the air, the flowerpots on porches, and the waving arms of neighbors inside cars that pass me. Wow! All that I’ve missed! Yet, all too often, habit takes over and my head lowers.

Do you want to know what God is like? Then look up at Him! Make it more than a cursory glance. Study Him long and hard. Look and wonder at His creation. Immerse yourself in looking intently at His Word. Examine the lives and character of godly men and women. What makes them tick? How have they been able to live this Christian life in spite and through the adversities?

Look Out

For years, I lived in a six-foot bubble of existence. If something was beyond the boundaries of my bubble, it might as well not be there. I became comfortable in not caring what was beyond my visual reach. After my surgery, however, I had to train myself to think beyond six feet.

Before we took Christ seriously, we were used to living in the temporal finite world of the everyday and the here and now. It takes practice to look beyond ourselves, our family, and our house perimeters to the world beyond. If you want to see the world as God sees it, you’ll need to train yourself to look beyond the length of your arm, beyond the face of your loved one to the world that is out there. Just as I need to go searching for what I can now see, we need to stretch ourselves in service projects, short term mission trips, and acts of hospitality and generosity.

Look Within

You are now a different person. After you took hold of Christ, He is now in the process of redesigning your spiritual DNA. Look at what His word says about how you are different – holy, forgiven, made for an eternal existence – then make choices based on that new person image..

Look Away

Imagine what is beyond what you can see and move toward it. I keep mentioning the idea of being intentional. It’s more than that. I knew from a lifetime of experience that there was a lot of stuff out there I’d never seen before, so I moved toward an exploration of those things. I have a bucket list that I’ve shared on this site before of what I’ve wanted to see! (Click here for that list!) One of my most satisfying experiences was when I went back to my hometown of Tucson and rediscovered the beautiful Sonora Desert.

In our spiritual lives, we need to look beyond this world to the parallel universe of the spiritual domain. This life is not all there is, folks. Before you became a Christian, this world was the best of all possible worlds. Now that you are a Christian, this temporal life is the worst of all possible worlds, for you have Heaven waiting for you.

One of my very favorite verses is found in Isaiah 42:16. Here’s what it says:

“I will lead the blind by ways they have not known, along unfamiliar paths I will guide them; I will turn the darkness into light before them and make the rough places smooth. These are the things I will do; I will not forsake them.”

Isn’t that wonderful? God has promised He will turn your darkness into light. And He will help you see in that new light. His light will shine upon all the wonders of His spiritual realm that He has waiting just for you.

• Look up.
• Look out.
• Look within.
• Look away.

Let me know what you saw today with your new spiritual eyes.

Happy discovery!