God Sees and God Knows
I heard a story on the radio one day of a man who was flying over Ellis Island in a helicopter when he looked down in wonder upon the Statue of Liberty. His interest was sparked when he noticed the great detail in the very top of the head of Lady Liberty. It appeared that the sculptor took great care in detailing every single wave of hair. My interest in this story led me to search out a picture of the top of the Statue of Liberty and I found some beautiful pictures of the very site mentioned in the story that the man in the helicopter had seen. And he was right. The workmanship is beautiful.
But why did the sculptor expend so much time and energy to this particular part of the statue? He certainly couldn’t have conceived that human eyes would ever see it. The sculptor, Frederic Auguste Bartholdi, was commissioned to design the sculpture with the year 1876 in mind for its completion and began construction in 1875. Yet, due to financial obstacles in both the United States and France, he was unable to complete the great monument till June of 1884. Once delivered and erected upon the foundation and base the top of the head stands nearly 270 feet in the air. It was not until December 1903, on the sands of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, that the Wright brothers achieved the milestone of manned, controlled, powered flight.
So why did Bartholdi go to such great lengths certainly never contemplating that it would be looked down upon my human eyes? Possibly an honorable sense of pride in his workmanship. Who knows? But this one thought struck me, whether men see the work we do or not, whether or not our labors here are ever appreciated or scrutinized, God sees and knows everything!
“The eyes of the LORD are on the righteous, and His ears are open to their cry” (Psalm 34:15). “For the ways of man are before the eyes of the LORD, and He ponders all his paths” (Proverbs 5:21). “The eyes of the LORD are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good” (Proverbs 15:3). “For who has despised the day of small things? For these seven rejoice to see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel. They are the eyes of the LORD, which scan to and fro throughout the whole earth” (Zechariah 4:10). “For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers: but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil” (1 Peter 3:12).
So be careful what you do, say, see and think. Because, whether your neighbor, spouse, elders, or friends know, God knows and will “bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil” (Ecclesiastes 12:14). Because God sees and God knows. He even knows that “Lady Liberty” wears a size 879 shoe. And you thought you had big feet.