Can One See God?

John says "no one has seen God," but other biblical authors talk about seeing God. Is this a contradiction?

Can One See God?

"No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us."

(1 John 4:12)

I began preaching through the book of 1 John on March 8 and completed the study on my birthday, August 16. Two of our teaching pastors at church helped me with some of the preaching. What a blessing it was to take our church through such a wonderful and powerful book. I have written in some of our devotions recently about Scripture passages from 1 John and will do so again today.

Love is one of the predominant themes in John's epistle. He clearly and rather bluntly writes to the believers in the first century and believers in Jesus in every epoch that if we really know Jesus and love God, then we will love our brothers and sisters in the church. This is his social test of love. Loving others sacrificially with agape love is a sure sign that one knows and loves God, whom John describes two times this way: "God is love" (1 John 4:8, 16).

In verse 12, John writes that God's love is perfected or completed in us. But before this, he writes about not seeing God. When I preached on this text in July, a homeless man came and sat on the front pew. As he took out his cigarette, he blurted out that he has seen God! One of our pastors kindly went up to him and said, "So, I heard you have seen God. Let's walk out together so you can tell me more about that."

You may be thinking, why is John changing the subject? He has been talking about love, and now he is talking about not seeing God. How is this statement related to the overall message John is presenting? Follow his line of reasoning. No one has ever seen God. John says this also in John 1:18. Why is this so? John 4:24 tells us that God is Spirit. The human eye cannot see God because He is Spirit. 1 Timothy 1:17 says that God is invisible. Now what about the places in the Bible where it says man saw God, like when Isaiah said, "I saw the Lord," and Moses in Exodus 33:23? These were representations of God. John Stott states, "The Old Testament theophanies were revelations of God in human disguise; they were not visions of God as He is in Himself" (The Epistles of John, p. 163).

How is God seen in this world if people cannot see Him with the eye? God has revealed Himself through His Son. And when you see Jesus, you see God! John 1:18 says, "No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him." The other way God reveals Himself to the world is through the Body of Christ, the church. Look at verse 12 again. When we love one another, people will see God in us. They will be attracted to the God in us who enables us to do the extraordinary, and that is to love others unconditionally and sacrificially.

Are we loving God and others so well and obviously that it presents a strong witness to the world, a world hurting and looking for hope and help?