The Angel of the Lord

As I mentioned on Wednesday, Patrick Mead was in town giving some lessons over the course of the last week. Unfortunately, I had to miss the first 3 sessions (4 if you count Sunday morning class). Luckily, they are all taped, so I should be able to get some copies and listen to what he had to say at those times. But Wednesday's lesson was really quite interesting to me, as it was focused on something that I hadn't quite heard before. It dealt with the Angel of the Lord (otherwise, this post would be titled something different.

He started in John 1:1 where we learn about the Word being with God, and being the same as God and being there from the beginning. Of course, we know this to be Jesus. He then said that the first time Jesus had been on earth was not when he was born in Bethlehem, but rather from way back in Genesis. If you go to Genesis 16, you see that the Angel of the Lord appeared to Hagar as she was fleeing from Abraham and Sarah. He talks with her, and sends her back to them. The time that I think his point was most apparent to me was in 2 Samuel 24 when David directly disobeys a command and counts the men of Israel. When David realizes his sin, God presents him with 3 options for punishment (vs. 13). David chose to suffer the plague rather than be turned over to his enemies. After 70,000 people had died, it says that the LORD was grieved and told the angel of destruction to stop. It says that the angel of the LORD was at the threshing floor of Araunah (vs. 16).

Of course, I'm not doing the argument any justice, since I'd only heard it one time. His argument was that the translation that we read as "Angel of the LORD", the Word, and Jesus are really all the same thing. The reason for John using the term "the Word" is because of how it was described in the Old Testament when referring to the "Angel of the LORD". He had a fancy word that I can't really remember at the moment for this particular idea, but it made equivalent John's description with those of the Angel of the Lord in the OT. I thought it was a pretty neat concept to think that Jesus had been on earth before he was born in to the world, and that even then he was interceding, and helping those in need of help. I really wish that I could do a better job of explaining it...maybe after I have the tapes and am able to hear it again. I will say that if you're ever in the area where he's speaking, it would be worth your while to go and hear him.

As a side-note, dad made it home fine yesterday after being in the air for about 15 hours, and awake for something closer to 30 probably. But everything is fine on that front. Mom comes home in a little over a week. On the agenda for this weekend is a camping trip with our small group from church up in Cumberland Gap State Park near the Kentucky border. Should be fun times. Who would have thought you could go camping in October and do fine in t-shirts and shorts?