ANNOUNCER: We are continuing our journey this week, looking at the prehistoric Christophanies or Theophanies in the Old Testament. Focusing on the ones to Abraham this episode, glad you are with us, friend. This is Grace in Focus Radio, a ministry of the Grace Evangelical Society. Our website is faithalone.org and I want to let you know and encourage you to find out more about our online seminary. It offers an MDiv degree, and scholarships are available for those who maintain high academic performance. Application and registration for our fall semester is now, get the information you need at faithalone.org. 

Now with our discussion of the day, here are Bob Wilkin and David Renfro. 

BOB: Okay, David, we’re talking about appearances of the preincarnate Lord Jesus Christ in the Old Testament. And because last time we just barely scratched the surface, I thought we’d have a part two. And we were talking about Abraham and how the Lord met with Abraham in Genesis 18. But there are probably many different times when the Lord met with Abraham, for example, in Genesis 12, when He talks to him and says he’s going to be a blessing to him and he was going to have a great number of descendants in Genesis 12:1-3. That’s probably, he’s seeing the Lord Jesus Christ face to face. And again, in Genesis 15, when He gives him the promise of justification by faith alone through his descendants, he says, no, no, Eliezer is not going to be your descendant. It’s going to be through you and Sarah, which was going to be a miraculous birth. That’s another example. 

But I thought we’d also talk about Genesis 22 because something amazing happens in Genesis 22. You have the promised child in Genesis 15 and that child is born and he grows up and we’re not sure how old that Isaac is at the time at which God tells him to offer up his son on Mount Moriah and he’s called by the way, his only son. Even though he had Ishmael through Hagar, that wasn’t his legitimate child. That wasn’t the one that was going to be in line of Messiah. And he later had other sons through Katurah. But again, none of those are his son in the line of Messiah. He had only, 

DAVID: In the kingly line. 

BOB: In the kingly line, he had one son. And that one son was Isaac. But in Genesis 22, he’s told to offer him up. Now we’re told in the book of Hebrews that he believed God would raise Isaac from the dead because he knew God had promised that his descendants would come through Isaac. 

And by the way, a lot of people scoff at that. I remember talking to a New Testament scholar at the Evangelical Theological Society. And he had said that there’s no Old Testament belief in bodily resurrection. I’m thinking, what about Job 19? Where Job says, I know I’m going to walk with my redeemer in my flesh. Or what about, I asked him specifically about Hebrews 11 saying that Abraham believed God would raise Isaac from the dead. And his response is, no, no, that’s what his actions imply. That’s not what he believed. I’m like, I don’t know if you read Hebrews 11, it says that’s what he believed. 

And part of the problem is many scholars today have an anti-supernatural bias. And they don’t think that Old Testament people believed in bodily resurrection, that we had to wait till we get to the New Testament to have teaching on bodily resurrection. Daniel, of course, talks about bodily resurrection in Daniel chapter 12. There are lots of examples in the Old Testament. And of course, David believed he was going to be with the Lord forever. And he was going to enjoy fellowship with the Lord forever. And all of the Old Testament believers did. 

But in any regard, how do we know or do we think that the preincarnate Lord Jesus Christ met with Abraham on Mount Moriah? 

DAVID: Well, it says in the text here that, 

BOB: And what is this Genesis 22? 

DAVID: Genesis 22. And he’s talking about taking his son Isaac up to the mountain. In other words, he was obeying the word of the Lord to do this, to sacrifice his only son.

BOB: And by the way, it wasn’t it a three day journey?  And that’s interesting because Jesus rose on the third day. And if he believed that God could have raised Isaac from the dead, this might be not only a type of the death of God’s only son, where Abraham’s offering his only son, but it could also be a type of the resurrection of his only son. Because figuratively speaking, God spared his life and raised him. And it was a three day journey. So what hint is there that this might be actually Yahweh in the presence of Abraham? 

DAVID: Well, it says here that when they got to the place where the sacrifice was to take place, that all of a sudden, it says Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked and there was a ram. And that was divinely provided. Before that he stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. And then in verse 11 of Genesis 22, it says, but the angel of Yahweh, the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham.

And by the way, just a little Bible study. You know, whenever you see something repeated like that, it’s intense. It stresses the intense. When our Lord says, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me, when He was on the cross, that’s intense emotion. And so that’s kind of a Bible study. I threw that in for for free. 

But he calls out to Abraham and says, do not lay your hand on the lad. In other words, don’t kill your son. 

BOB: And the one speaking to him is the angel of the Lord. 

DAVID: The angel of Yahweh, yeah. 

BOB: Now, at least sometimes in the Old Testament, the angel of the Lord appears to be Yahweh in the flesh. This one in the New King James, do they capitalize the angel or not? 

DAVID: Yes, they do. 

BOB: So when the New King James capitalizes the A in angel, that means that Art Farstad and the translators of the New King James, they believe this is the preincarnate Lord Jesus Christ and I would agree. 

DAVID: I agree. 

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BOB: Now, where are they? They’re on Mount Moriah. Are they not? By the way, is it true that Mount Mariah is essentially the same place as Golgotha, the same place as where Jesus was crucified? 

DAVID: There’s a little good chance that they are the same. 

BOB: And so here you have the One who dies on the cross for Abraham, for Isaac, and for us. And he’s meeting with Abraham, knowing that Abraham offering up his son is a type of His own death. And He knows that 2000 years later, He’s going to be dying for the people and that the Father is not going to stop that death, that He really is going to die. And yet Jesus in His grace is stopping Abraham from taking his only begotten son.

DAVID: It’s an amazing thing. 

BOB: Isn’t it? And by the way, in James chapter two, James cites this incident to say this was a fulfillment of the faith that Abraham had in in Genesis 15:6, meaning that it was the maturation of his faith. In other words, when he believed God about the coming Messiah that was coming through him, that was tested at Genesis 22.  And he passed the test. Didn’t mean that this proved he really believed it proved that his faith had matured to the point where he was ready to offer up his son, knowing that God would raise him from the dead. 

DAVID: Yeah, it’s a fascinating passage to me too, because put yourself in Abraham’s place and you hear, go to Mount Moriah and kill your son. After you’ve heard that he is through him, through this son, the same son that you’re supposed to kill, that the promises are going to come through. And so can you imagine what was going through his mind? How is the Lord going to put all that together? And I think one of the major statements of faith there is I don’t understand this, but the Lord can do whatever He wants. 

BOB: But you know, a lot of people when they look at Abraham, they think of somebody that was spiritually ignorant. Somebody who didn’t have a clue about who Jesus is, they didn’t have a clue about the coming kingdom, they didn’t have a clue about the resurrection from the dead. And yet Jesus said in John 8:56, Abraham rejoiced to see My day. And “My day” refers to His kingdom. So Abraham rejoiced looking at the coming kingdom. 

DAVID: He knew that was going to happen. And he rejoiced. 

BOB: And we’re told in Hebrews 11 that Abraham was looking to the new Jerusalem. He knew that there was going to be a city that would be a new city that would be the world capital, the new Jerusalem. And he was going to be in that kingdom. And the idea that Abraham was some kind of spiritual nincompoop is contrary to both the Old and the New Testament. 

DAVID: If he was an nincompoop, then what can you say about us? 

BOB: Yeah. I mean, don’t a lot of people in the church age think we know so much more about Jesus than Abraham did. But he saw him face to face. I never have, have you? 

DAVID: I have yet to see that. 

BOB: I have yet to see the Lord face to face. And I really don’t think that the Damascus experience has happened too many times in church history. I mean, I know people have said, people have seen Jesus in visions. People say that Jesus appeared in their cell or whatever when they were being imprisoned for Christ. Maybe. I mean, that certainly could happen again. But it’s not a common experience. But before Jesus was born in Bethlehem, it was not uncommon for Jesus to meet with people, many times. 

In fact, I have a theory that most likely he appeared in every generation, at least to somebody in every generation from Adam and Eve, at least until the 400 silent years, at least up until the Italian prophet, you know, Malachi. What does Malachi mean by the way? 

DAVID: My messenger. 

BOB: It means my messenger. 

DAVID: Actually, Malach is it’s two words. Like Malach means angel, but the word angel is literally messenger. 

BOB: And Melek is king, But Malach is related is angel or messenger. And so Malachi is my messenger. 

DAVID: Yeah. Malach-i, my messenger. 

BOB: Malach-i, my messenger. Very good. All right. Well, we’ve just again touched the surface on the preincarnate Lord Jesus Christ. We just looked at one incident from the life of Abraham. But we’d like to go on and let’s talk a little bit about Moses because Moses met the preincarnate Lord Jesus Christ on multiple occasions.

So let’s talk about that in the next one. In the meantime, we’re going to keep the grace in focus. 

ANNOUNCER: Would you be interested in some free ebooks on topics you hear on this program? Well, if you are, you need to come visit us at faithalone.org. That’s faithalone.org. We would love to hear from you. Maybe you’ve got a question, comment, or some feedback. If you do, please don’t hesitate to send us a message. Here’s our email address. It’s radio at faithalone.org. That’s radio at faithalone.org. And when you do very important, please let us know your radio station call letters and the city of your location.

On our next episode: more Old Testament appearances of Christ to Moses. Be sure to join us. And in the meantime, let’s keep grace in focus.