How the Angel of the Lord is Revealed

When we encounter the angel of the Lord in Scripture, he reveals himself primarily in four ways:

The angel of the Lord speaks

In his first recorded appearance, the angel of the Lord speaks to Hagar after she has been sent away from Sarai. The text strongly suggests a physical manifestation, for the angel finds Hagar by a spring in the wilderness. Later, Hagar names him El-roi, which means “God sees me,” and she asks, “In this place, have I actually seen the one who sees me?” (Gen. 16:13). 

At the same time, the angel converses with Hagar. He asks where she has come from and where she is going. He tells Hagar to return to Sarai, and he promises to greatly multiply her offspring, although Ishmael is going to be a wild donkey of a man who battles with everyone around him (Gen. 16:8-12). Later, after Abraham has sent Hagar and her son away, the angel calls to Hagar from heaven and comforts her (Gen. 21:17-18).

When Abraham takes Isaac up Mount Moriah and is about to thrust his knife into the son of promise, the angel of the Lord calls from heaven to Abraham to spare the young man. Then, the angel calls a second time, promising to bless Abraham and his offspring (Gen. 22:11-18). 

As one other example, the angel of the Lord sends Elijah to the messengers of King Ahaziah and later instructs the prophet to go with a captain of fifty soldiers to meet with the king (2 Kings 1:3, 15).

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ARTICLE II of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000: God

There is one living and true God who reveals himself to us in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with distinct personal attributes, but without division of nature, essence, or being.

The first paragraph of Article II of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000 reads:

There is one and only one living and true God. He is an intelligent, spiritual, and personal Being, the Creator, Redeemer, Preserver, and Ruler of the universe. God is infinite in holiness and all other perfections. God is all powerful and all knowing; and His perfect knowledge extends to all things, past, present, and future, including the future decisions of His free creatures. To Him we owe the highest love, reverence, and obedience. The eternal triune God reveals Himself to us as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with distinct personal attributes, but without division of nature, essence, or being. 

One living and true God

The Bible consistently declares there is one living and true God, the self-revealed creator who alone must be loved and worshiped. All other gods are false. The physical depictions of these gods, as carved images or naturally occurring phenomena such as stars and trees, in fact represent demons (see Deut. 32:16-17; 1 Cor. 10:19-20).

Perhaps nowhere is the exclusivity of God stated more clearly than in the Shema, an affirmation of Judaism and a declaration of faith in one God. It is the oldest fixed daily prayer in Judaism, recited morning and evening since ancient times. It consists of three biblical passages (Deut. 6:4-9; 11:13-21; Num. 15:37-41), two of which instruct the Israelites to speak of these things “when you lie down and when you get up” (Deut. 6:7; 11:19).

The best-known part of the Shema is from the first biblical passage: “Listen, Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength” (Deut. 6:4-5). 

The prophet Isaiah echoes this cry as he calls the Israelites to return to the Lord. Isaiah 44:6 – 45:25 is a powerful reminder from Yahweh that he alone is God. Consider just a small portion of this passage: 

“This is what the LORD, the King of Israel and its Redeemer, the LORD of Armies, says: I am the first and I am the last. There is no God but me” (44:6).

“I am the LORD, and there is no other; there is no God but me” (45:5).

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Walking in the Garden

There is intimacy between God and humans from the moment God forms Adam from the dust of the ground and breathes life into his body (Gen. 2:7). The Lord blesses Adam and Eve, speaks with them, commands them, and offers them dominion over the created order. All is well until the serpent enters the scene. He deceives Eve, who successfully beckons Adam to disobey God. At the point of sin, everything changes.

Even so, there is an interesting encounter between God and his fallen human creatures beginning in Genesis 3:8. Adam and his wife hear the sound of the Lord walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and they hide from him. This is the earliest theophany in Scripture after the Fall, and it indicates a physical manifestation of the Lord.

Could this also be the first recorded Christophany – the first appearance of the preincarnate Christ? We can’t say with certainty. He is not depicted as the angel of the Lord in this passage. But God does appear physically and speaks personally with Adam and Eve. He asks them questions in which they confess their sin, although they also make excuses for it.

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ARTICLE I of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000: The Scriptures

The Bible is God’s revelation of himself to man and is a perfect treasure of divine instruction.

Article I of The Baptist Faith & Message 2000 reads:

The Holy Bible was written by men divinely inspired and is God’s revelation of Himself to man. It is a perfect treasure of divine instruction. It has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any mixture of error, for its matter. Therefore, all Scripture is totally true and trustworthy. It reveals the principles by which God judges us, and therefore is, and will remain to the end of the world, the true center of Christian union, and the supreme standard by which all human conduct, creeds, and religious opinions should be tried. All Scripture is a testimony to Christ, who is Himself the focus of divine revelation. 

Four key truths

We know the Bible as the word of God. That means God is the source of Scripture, revealing truths we are incapable of knowing without divine help. The Bible is special revelation in that it is a record of God’s work before time, in time, and beyond time, with a particular emphasis on creation, sin, redemption, and restoration.

As such, Scripture complements God’s general revelation, which all people witness in creation and conscience (Rom. 1:18-32; 2:14-16).

Let’s break down Article I of the BF&M by briefly exploring four key truths Southern Baptists embrace with respect to the Scriptures.

First, the Bible is inspired. The apostle Paul writes, “All Scripture is inspired by God” (2 Tim. 3:16). The phrase “inspired by God” comes from the Greek word theopneustos. It means “God-breathed” and conveys the idea that Scripture is the product of a holy exhalation.

God did not breathe into the Scriptures, thus inspiring them; he breathed out his word. The Bible’s origin is God himself.

Theologian Charles Ryrie defines inspiration this way: “God superintended the human authors of the Bible so that they composed and recorded without error His message to mankind in the words of their original writings.”

By superintendence, we do not mean that God dictated his word to human stenographers, as Muhammad claimed of the Qur’an (via the angel Gabriel). Rather, God breathed out his word, enabling the human authors to use their own writing styles, backgrounds, experiences, and ideas to put in written form the very thoughts of God, thus ensuring their accuracy.

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Jacob meets the angel of the LORD

Previously, we explored Abraham and Sarah’s encounters with the angel of the LORD. Now, we learn about three visits Jacob has with the angel, including Jacob’s classic wrestling match with the pre-incarnate Christ.

The angel appears to Jacob

Genesis 28:10-22

Isaac has blessed Jacob and sent him to find a wife from the family of Jacob’s uncle, Laban. While on his journey, Jacob stops for the night and, having fallen asleep, experiences a most remarkable dream. He sees a ladder extending from earth into heaven. Angels are moving up and down the ladder. Above it all (or perhaps beside Jacob; English translations differ) stands Yahweh, who identifies himself as “the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac” (Gen. 28:13). 

The LORD promises Jacob and his offspring the land on which he sleeps. He also assures Jacob of descendants as numerous as the dust of the earth. And he promises that all the peoples of the earth will be blessed through Jacob and his descendants. Finally, the LORD tells Jacob, “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go. I will bring you back to this land, for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you” (v. 15).  The description of the LORD as standing evokes images of a human-like figure, so it’s possible we are witnessing a Christophany.

Lending credence to this view is Jesus’ conversation with Philip and Nathanael in John 1:51. Jesus says to these disciples, “Truly I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.” Perhaps Jesus is urging his new followers to see him as the one who appeared to Jacob in the vision, especially as he connects the heavenly ladder with the Son of Man. 

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