Who Sees You?

“And Ahab had called Obadiah who was over the household. (Now Obadiah feared the Lord greatly, for it was so, when Jezebel massacred the prophets of the Lord, that Obadiah had taken one hundred prophets and hidden them, fifty to a cave, and had fed them with bread and water.)”

— 1 Kings 18:3–4

You are getting noticed.

Add me to your network.

See who viewed your profile.

If you spend any time online, you have come across phrases like these. The whole world, it seems, is busy trying to be noticed.

I am not writing this to say anything against the internet, or against wanting to be seen. I am writing this to tell you something the internet will never tell you — something you may have stopped believing a long time ago. You are seen. And you are precious to the One who sees you.

Let me tell you about a cave.

There was a time when a wicked queen named Jezebel was hunting down the prophets of the Lord to destroy them. They had done nothing to deserve it. They were not hunted because they were guilty. They were hunted because someone powerful and cruel decided to harm them. And in the middle of all that danger, a man named Obadiah took one hundred of those prophets, hid them in caves, fifty to a cave, and fed them with bread and water.

Think about where those hundred people were. Hidden in the dark, when the whole world had forgotten them? Hidden in a cave, when no one even knew if they were still alive? Yes. And still, God knew exactly which cave held each one of them. And still, Obadiah climbed to those caves in the dark to bring them bread and water, when food was scarce and there was barely enough to go around.

Maybe you know something about that cave. Maybe you have felt hidden away in the dark, carrying wounds that no one can see, certain that you had simply disappeared.

If that is you, hear me: the cave was not a grave. It was a shelter. And it was a season — not the end of the story.

Those prophets came out of the cave. God kept them alive through the famine for a reason. Their hiding was not the last chapter. It was the place where God protected them until the danger passed and their future came.

We call our ministry Not Guilty. I want you to hear why.

What was done to you was not your fault. Let me say it again, because the enemy has probably told you the opposite a thousand times: it was not your fault. The guilt does not belong to you. It belongs to the one who harmed you. Those prophets were not hunted because they had done something wrong — they were hunted because someone with power chose to do evil. The shame you have been carrying was never yours to carry. It was placed on you by the one who wronged you.

And this is true for you today, no matter what you believe and no matter where you have been. A child who is hurt is never the guilty one. A woman who is abused is never the guilty one. God is not far off and indifferent about it, either. His heart burns for you. Jesus said that anyone who causes one of His little ones to stumble would be better off thrown into the sea with a millstone around his neck (Matthew 18:6). Hear that. God is angry on your behalf. He is for you.

And He wants to give you even more than the truth that the blame was never yours. He wants to lift the shame that has clung to you ever since — the lie that you are dirty, ruined, damaged, too far gone to be loved.

The world measures you by who is watching and how you look. God does not measure you that way at all. He is the One who leaves the ninety-nine to go after the one. He counts your tears. He was not looking away while you were in that cave — He was there with you in the dark, and He has never once thought of you as anything less than precious.

So when I pray for you to be bold, I am not asking you to prove anything, or to risk anything, or to hurry. I am praying that you would be bold enough to believe the truth about yourself: that you are seen, that you are safe in Him, that you are Not Guilty. Healing is a slow walk, and it is alright to take it one small step at a time. You do not have to come out of the cave all at once. God is patient and gentle, and He is not in a hurry with you.

So I pray for you, and I pray for myself, that we would stop believing the lies and start believing the One who made us. I pray that you would lay down the shame that was never yours, and that you would hear heaven say over your life: Not Guilty. Beloved. Mine.

The world is watching profiles. God is watching over you.

You are not hidden from Him. You never were.

Dr. Laila Risgallah Wahba