About twenty years ago, at the annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society, I heard a speaker present a message about the Angel of the Lord (Malak Yahweh). The speaker suggested that the Scriptures show that the Angel of the Lord is never the preincarnate Lord Jesus Christ.
After the talk, I asked Dr. Arnold Fructenbaum, who had been in the audience, what he thought of the talk. He said, “I know my Messiah appeared many times to believers as the Angel of the Lord.” I agree with him.
We know that the expression the angel of the Lord often refers to God in the flesh because the text tells us so. Since Scripture also tells us that no one has ever seen God the Father (John 1:18), the Angel of the Lord, in these instances, must be God the Son. There are several OT examples of such appearances.
After the Angel of the Lord met with Gideon, he said, “Alas, O Lord GOD! For I have seen the Angel of the LORD face to face” (Judg 6:22). The Lord then told Gideon not to fear, for “you shall not die” because of having seen the Lord (Judg 6:23).
Before Samson was conceived, the Angel of the Lord met with Manoah and his wife. Afterward, Manoah said to his wife, “We shall surely die because we have seen God!” (Judg 13:22).
Moses met with the Angel of the Lord at the burning bush (Exod 3:2). We then read: “God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, ‘Moses, Moses!’” (Exod 3:4). The Angel of the Lord is identified as God. Moses was told to take off his sandals “for the place where you stand is holy ground” (Exod 3:5).
The Angel of the Lord met face-to-face with Hagar, the mother of Ishmael (Gen 16:7-11). Moses reports: “Then she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees; for she said, ‘Have I also here seen Him who sees me?’” (Gen 16:13). She knew she had met with the Lord God.
Abraham also met the Angel of the Lord. When he was about to take Isaac’s life on Mount Moriah, the Angel said, “Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me” (Gen 22:12). The Angel of the Lord identified Himself as God.
In his commentary on Zechariah 12:8, Eiselen writes:
Any angel might be called “angel of Jehovah” (1 Kings 19:7; 2 Sam. 24:16), but there are passages in the Old Testament in which the phrase has a peculiar meaning (Gen. 31:11–13; Exod. 23:20, 21, etc.). To the latter class belongs this verse [Zech 12:8]. In these passages the “angel of Jehovah” is “not a created angel; he is Jehovah himself,” manifesting himself without men, that is, in the external affairs of men, just as in the Old Testament “spirit of Jehovah” is Jehovah manifesting himself within men (The Minor Prophets, Vol. IX, pp. 610-11).
The expression the angel of the Lord occurs only once in the NT. An angel met with Joseph and told him not to divorce Mary because she was with child by the Holy Spirit, in keeping with the prophecy of Isa 7:14 (Matt 1:20-25). However, since that angel is first called “an angel of the Lord” (Matt 1:20), the definite article in Matthew 1:24 merely refers to the specific angel who had met with Joseph.i
Gotquestions.org (see here) says:
It is possible that the appearances of the angel of the Lord were manifestations of Jesus before His incarnation. Jesus declared Himself to be existent “before Abraham” (John 8:58), so it is logical that He would be active and manifest in the world. Whatever the case, whether the angel of the Lord was a pre-incarnate appearance of Christ (Christophany) or an appearance of God the Father (theophany), it is highly likely that the phrase “the angel of the Lord” usually identifies a physical appearance of God.ii
I agree with Dr. Fructenbaum. I am encouraged by my Messiah’s appearing many times to believers before His Incarnation. His appearances demonstrate His love for us.
Keep grace in focus.
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i Mary was already pregnant, so this would not be a preincarnate appearance. Were the messenger the Angel of the Lord, that would mean the seemingly impossible: Jesus was present in two places at once in His physical body.
ii As previously mentioned, John 1:18 says that no one has seen God the Father. That would suggest that all Theophanies were Christophanies.
