Appearances of Christ in the Old Testament

Video/audio transcript

00:0000:00 - so in this last lesson of this study of Bible basics part one theology we are going to be talking about the specific
00:0800:08 - passages going over appearances of Christ in the Old Testament so just to situate ourselves we just finished uh
00:1600:16 - recently talking about an overview of appearances of Christ in the Old Testament we talked about uh the
00:2300:23 - difference between theophanies and christophanies and the father’s invisibility his inaccessibility and his
00:2900:29 - dignity conted with the sun’s visibility accessibility and humility and that’s introducing the concept but here’s where
00:3500:35 - we are now in the study very bottom going over the actual cases of christophany in the Old Testament so if
00:4100:41 - we scroll down a bit this is what we’re going to be talking about in this lesson here this part of the study and so it’s
00:4600:46 - sort of organized into uh two different kind of groupings here we have uh the just another overview talking about sort
00:5500:55 - of the Angel of the Lord and what that means as a concept you know sort of what the words for Angel are in Greek and
01:0201:02 - Hebrew and how their kind of generic usage as Messengers is different from Jesus Christ as the angel definite
01:0901:09 - article of the Lord and then we’re going to talk about the angel of Exodus of the book of uh Exodus or at least the first
01:1701:17 - few books of the Bible where um the angel of the Lord leads the Israelites God’s people out of Egypt so we have
01:2401:24 - this um burning bush um you know the uh appearance of God to Moses calling him telling him to go to Egypt
01:3201:32 - and rescue his people the column of cloud and fire that went before the people of Israel as they wand the
01:3801:38 - Wilderness um the Angels sent before the Israelites to guard them on the way we have this passage in uh Exodus I think
01:4501:45 - it’s like chapter 21 we’ll see the verses in the slides um talking about how he sent before them and then we have
01:5201:52 - all these uh encounters with you know one member of the Trinity said to be God but someone who they speak to face to
02:0002:00 - face so Moses for example was said to be a friend of God who spoke to him face to face that’s actually the words that the
02:0602:06 - Bible itself uses and you know we’ve already talked before about how this means that uh these appearances of God
02:1202:12 - in the Old Testament have to be the sun because we have it on good authority also in the Bible that no one can see
02:1902:19 - the father and live um so there’s one way in which we know that all of these things have to be christophanies and
02:2502:25 - then finally I’m just talking about how in the Book of Judges we get this mention of
02:3002:30 - how the people were said to be led out of Egypt by the Angel um who we know to be the angel of the Lord definite
02:3702:37 - article because we know that God himself was in that pillar or the pillar of cloud and fire um so all of these things
02:4402:44 - we’ll tie them together with the specific passages and we’ll get this idea this powerful representation of God
02:5002:50 - personally leading his people out of Slavery to Egypt um that is highly symbolic um you know Egypt that place we
02:5702:57 - turn back to in our hearts that’s us in sin man that is US turning to the Wicked Ways of the world um now we’re not going
03:0503:05 - to make too much more out of the metaphor than it is but you know this parallel we see as well is also going to
03:1103:11 - be in play when we get to the end times in human history we are going to be you know Watching God judge the wickedness
03:2003:20 - of the world just how he judged uh the Egyptians with the plagues we’re going to see the the trumpet and bold
03:2603:26 - judgments of Revelation as God preserves his people throughout that most trying time in
03:3203:32 - human history and we will see the promised land at the end of it all we will have the peace and restoration of
03:3803:38 - the Millennium just how the Israelites were led into the promised land of Canaan so in any case um the angel of
03:4603:46 - Exodus um the uh rep uh the appearances of God as the definite artical Angel of the Lord in his direct shepherding of
03:5503:55 - his people out of Egypt uh is one of the more um I I suppose like one of the the places
04:0304:03 - in the Old Testament where we more frequently see God appear um as as opposed to being in Visions or talking
04:0904:09 - to prophets or something we actually have what we would call physical manifestations of God in this particular
04:1604:16 - account of uh the people of Israel being led out of Egypt and then we’re also going to go over uh where the angel of
04:2304:23 - the Lord is mentioned elsewhere in the Bible or where we we understand it to be him by implication um so we’re going to
04:3004:30 - get this this nice wide understanding look at all these passages together that show these appearances of God in the Old
04:3704:37 - Testament and just as we’ve been arguing all along we’re going to conclude that all of these are in fact christophanies
04:4304:43 - that it’s the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ who manifests as the angel of the Lord in these Old Testament appearances of
04:5004:50 - God um and then notably um after Jesus Christ takes on a human nature in the Incarnation we stop hearing about the
04:5704:57 - angel of the Lord there is no the Angel of the Lord in the New Testament there’s just Jesus Christ and so that is the
05:0305:03 - evidence here that there is continuity that the second member of the Trinity is and has always been the one who is
05:1005:10 - visible to us so we’re just going to be tying up this study kind of going over this last loose end in uh the Trinity
05:1905:19 - talking about how the Trinity was manifested in the Old Testament with Jesus Christ sent on behalf of God the
05:2605:26 - Father so the first thing that we’re going to be talking about here uh is sort of
05:3405:34 - going in a little bit more depth about this idea of the definite article Angel of the Lord and what that means and how
05:4105:41 - we kind of contrast that with uh Messengers or Representatives sent on God’s behalf who were not you know Jesus
05:4905:49 - Christ because we have actual literal angels we also have human beings who can be sent as messengers of God like the
05:5505:55 - prophets for example so uh we have been in the process here of demon rating that the appearances of God to Believers in
06:0206:02 - the Old Testament are really pre-incarnate appearances of the father’s representative that is Jesus
06:0706:07 - Christ acting for the father and speaking in his stead that was sort of the point of the last lesson we went
06:1306:13 - over kind of uh outlining exactly what theophanes and christophanies are as Concepts and arguing that in fact Jesus
06:2106:21 - Christ pre-incarnate Jesus Christ was the member of the Trinity who appeared to folks in the Old Testament and so in
06:3006:30 - the majority of these cases the Old Testament identifies such appearances using this particular phrase here is the
06:3806:38 - Angel of the Lord and the importance of the wordthe is important there or sorry the the wordthe is important there
06:4606:46 - because it is a so-called definite article it means that we’re talking about a specific Angel of the Lord this
06:5206:52 - one as opposed to just any old messenger of the Lord because that is actually what angel means so skipping ahead a bit
07:0107:01 - here um the Greek word for Angel is angas um so you may actually see this transliterated sometimes with two G’s
07:0807:08 - because in Greek a gamma that comes before another Gamma or another V Act V consonant is pronounced as sort of the
07:1807:18 - the same sound as in the word sing at the end of the word v nasal sound so angas here and then Malak in Hebrew it
07:2707:27 - also has that same meaning here of messenger uh someone who is sent as a representative um and so we have some
07:3607:36 - confusion here because angels have all this baggage from centuries and centuries of people talking about and
07:4307:43 - teaching on these things that maybe sometimes we muddy the waters a bit here and we do have appearances of angels in
07:5007:50 - the Bible we’ll get to that just a sec but uh who we are talking about here with the angel of the Lord is not an
07:5707:57 - angel as in that c ategory of created being we are talking about a member of the Trinity um so when God Appears in
08:0808:08 - his interrogation of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden in the middle part of Genesis chapter 3 so when it says
08:1408:14 - Genesis 38 says that they heard the sound of the Lord God Walking In The Garden in the cool of the day and then
08:2108:21 - they hid themselves we have no mention of Angels In this passage you know it wasn’t an Angelic being walking around
08:2908:29 - in the garden it was the Lord God and so there is a physical manifestation of deity present in this account in Genesis
08:3808:38 - chapter 3 but we don’t have any mention of angels whatsoever and we also just know from all these passages that we’re
08:4508:45 - going to be going through that angel here is variously described as the Lord and the angel of the Lord so basically
08:5408:54 - we know that all of these appearances have to be God manifesting himself to mankind as in physically something that
09:0209:02 - people can see with their eyes it’s not like I don’t know a spectre in their minds or something like that it is
09:0709:07 - actually God manifesting himself to humanity and so as we kind of skipped ahead we’re talking about how angels are
09:1509:15 - different than this right we said there were no Angels present in this passage in Genesis chapter 3 this is just the
09:2109:21 - Lord God talking to Adam and Eve directly face to face um angels as a class of created creature are different
09:3009:30 - than humans um Angels were created first ichus talks in great detail about some of angelic prehistory in the satanic
09:3709:37 - Rebellion series um on the site um so all of that happens before the creation of mankind and in fact we are sort of in
09:4509:45 - the midst of this Cosmic battle between Satan and the rebelling Angels uh and God of course God could win in an
09:5309:53 - instant but he’s letting this play out because these created creatures have dained to raise their hand against their
09:5909:59 - creator but they are not God they are not they don’t have the essence of divinity one of those properties being
10:0610:06 - you know Infinity omniscience omnipotence externality to SpaceTime angels are just creatures they are you
10:1510:15 - know smarter and wiser and and much more powerful than we are but they’re still just created beings um so those are
10:2210:22 - Angelic messengers of the actual quote unquote Angel variety but we do not refer to them when we talk about the
10:3310:33 - angel of the Lord and so uh importantly actually these words that I mentioned so angas in Greek and Malak in Hebrew
10:4210:42 - actually don’t necessarily even mean a supernatural being as in we have the angel of the Lord who is pre-incarnate
10:4910:49 - Jesus Christ we have Angels like Gabriel for example who are you know Angelic beings beings other than humans but it
10:5810:58 - can actually just apply to normal regular human Messengers as well this is just the word in Greek and Hebrew for
11:0511:05 - saying someone sent on behalf of another someone who is a messenger um Messengers from God you know who aren’t inherently
11:1311:13 - human you know except for the prophets who hear things from God well they would of necessity have to be Supernatural and
11:2011:20 - a lot of the time so for example when uh the birth of the Messiah is communicated to Mary that is done through an Angel um
11:2911:29 - uh Supernatural messenger from God who is not Jesus because you know the angel is communicating to Mary that Jesus will
11:3711:37 - be born this is an actual angel in the literal sense of the word you know how we use that word in English but the
11:4411:44 - point is is that the word doesn’t necessarily have to mean that it can mean messenger and then you have to do
11:5011:50 - some interpretation you know exercise that principle of hermeneutics that pulling things from Context you have to
11:5811:58 - read things in the context in which they were written figure out what is the meaning what is the sense here well when
12:0312:03 - you do all of that background work you will pretty clearly see that we have this pattern here that sometimes
12:1112:11 - messenger refers to human being sometimes it refers to Angels that’s pretty commonly who it refers to uh kind
12:1712:17 - of if God is communicating with humanity and it’s not otherwise clear that the one doing the communicating as God
12:2312:23 - himself then often times God did speak through Angels um so it wasn’t just in the new test you know Daniel several
12:3112:31 - times had Angels communicate things to him for example um but some of the time it is also the angel of the Lord this
12:4112:41 - this reincarnate appearance of Jesus Christ as the one and only representative of the father in a way
12:4812:48 - that angels as created beings simply aren’t um and so this isn’t to say that they’re not true messengers of God they
12:5512:55 - are acting in their capacity but they aren’t the messenger of God um and so that’s sort of the point that
13:0113:01 - we’re introducing here the angel of the Lord is an entirely different story for scripture uses this phrase to designate
13:0813:08 - an appearance of God himself taking on messenger form to deliver a message personally and so as we’ve already
13:1513:15 - talked about it’s best to take these appearances of the Angel of the Lord to be appearances of the messenger and
13:2213:22 - minister of the father and that is Jesus Christ he is sent as the agent or the representative of our salvation of our
13:2913:29 - Redemption and so for example when we read of Isaiah’s vision of the Lord and this comes in chapter six of the book of
13:3613:36 - Isaiah we have this accounting of a person sitting on the throne someone who’s highly exalted and this is where
13:4413:44 - we hear that Holy Holy Holy and Isaiah says woe is me I am ruined because I’m a man of unclean lips um and so king of uh
13:5213:52 - the king the Lord of hosts here well who is Isaiah seeing here is he seeing the father or is he seeing the son well in
13:5913:59 - John 12: 41 we get this mention of Isaiah saying that he said these things because he saw his glory and he spoke of
14:0814:08 - him uh it’s not quite an airtight deductive argument there this a little bit inferential but we have this this
14:1514:15 - inkling then that Isaiah is actually talking about seeing Christ’s glory and this uh to go back to the uh concept we
14:2214:22 - talked about in our last lesson is kind of getting that idea of the monarchy of Jesus Christ ruling as a regent on the
14:2914:29 - father’s behalf Jesus not only the father but Jesus is called the king of king and the Lord of lords um so we have
14:3614:36 - this hold on I know it comes up somewhere in the future here uh here uh in Revelation sorry I just have memory
14:4514:45 - because I was going through the slides earlier here uh Jesus has a name written on his thigh king of King and Lord of
14:5114:51 - lords this is right there in Revelation this is when he’s returning in Revelation chapter 19 so Jesus has that
14:5714:57 - he has that monarchy has that Authority delegated from the father here um and so where I’m going with all this is that
15:0515:05 - that when we see Visions or not when we when prophets saw Visions were they seeing the father were they seeing
15:1315:13 - Christ sometimes they were actually seeing Christ too it’s not just appearing before people it depends on
15:1915:19 - context of course as we said it’s important for us to not try to make rules where there aren’t any we always
15:2515:25 - have to figure out you know who is in view by reading the round in context of the passages but the point is this is
15:3215:32 - Jesus in his capacity as the King of Kings and the Lord of lords the glorified ruler of the earth who has
15:3815:38 - accepted the mantle of rulership from the Father and Jesus will reign until he has placed all enemies under his feet in
15:4615:46 - which point um the world is turned over to the father you know we have the heavens and the Earth remade so that’s a
15:5215:52 - quote from 1 Corinthians chapter 15 says he must Reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet
16:0016:00 - so all of this is talking about Jesus serving as that representative just how we’ve been talking about from the
16:0616:06 - beginning the distinction in terminology we’re making here is that we are talking about the definite article Angel of the
16:1316:13 - Lord we’re putting sort of a title to it when Jesus appears in the Old Testament very often this language is used of him
16:2016:20 - and even when it’s not we can infer in other places that this is the being who is who has been sent by the father um
16:2916:29 - so the appearance of uh the Lord to Moses in giving the Mosaic law uh presents a pretty similar Vision to that
16:3716:37 - of Isaiah here at first glance we may assume that Moses is actually viewing the father or his likeness somehow but
16:4416:44 - the New Testament is actually quite explicit in stating that the law was given through angels and so in Greek
16:5116:51 - that is dongon here so this is a preposition uh that can mean like through um that’s typic how it’s
16:5916:59 - translated so through Angel the angelan here um we see that in all these passages which I’ll read a little bit
17:0517:05 - later when we get to them but you can well no maybe I’ll go through them now so you can see verse 19 it says that
17:1217:12 - transgressions having been ordained through Angels by the agency of immediate right so the law coming
17:1817:18 - through Angels Galatians chapter 3: 19-20 Hebrews chapter 2:2 says for if the words spoken through Angels proved
17:2717:27 - unalterable that his again talking about the law being given acts 7:38 um this is the one who was in the
17:3617:36 - congregation in the wilderness together with the angel who was speaking to him on Mount Si the angel speaking to him
17:4317:43 - although we know from Exodus chapter 32 through 34 you know that account of Moses receiving the law that it was the
17:5017:50 - Lord as in that tetragrammaton is used of him in the Hebrew the Lord was speaking to Moses so if he’s called an
17:5717:57 - angel or the Angel rather but he’s also called God that’s where we get the angel of the Lord from um and then acts 7: 53
18:0718:07 - uh again said to have the laws ordained by Angels received through Angels um so all of this means that the laws were
18:1618:16 - given to humanity by a messenger or a representative and the problem with this translation as we just went through is
18:2418:24 - that a lot of the times people think that we have like I don’t know Michael or Gabriel floating around as in Angelic
18:3018:30 - creatures of the class of beings that we call Angels rather than it being these things were given through a messenger is
18:3918:39 - the sense here and that messenger was Jesus Christ um so these Angelic appearances are represented in the Old
18:4618:46 - Testaments as appearances of God here’s that passage from Exodus chapter 34 I was mentioning you can’t take this as
18:5418:54 - anything other than the Lord the Lord descended in the cloud and stood there with him as he called upon the name of
18:5918:59 - the Lord the Lord passed in front of him the Lord the Lord God you know this is God talking to Moses god appearing
19:0619:06 - before Moses it is not like Gabriel or one of the other messenger Angels this is God himself except that passage in
19:1519:15 - Acts chapter 7 here just said that Moses was talking to an angel so you see how people might get
19:2219:22 - confused by this if they try to equate these with Angelic beings well if Exodus 34 says that you know it was God talking
19:3019:30 - to Moses but Acts chapter 7 says it was an angel talking to Moses and you think Angel equals creature you know not Angel
19:3719:37 - as the angel of the Lord then people run into problems because of this but this is actually exactly why it must be the
19:4419:44 - case that the New Testament passages which ascribe the giving of the law to angels are actually indicating that the
19:5119:51 - father spoke the law to Moses through an appearance of the Angel of the Lord a manifestation of our pre-incarnate Lord
20:0020:00 - Jesus Christ that is through christophany the law was given to us through a messenger through a
20:0720:07 - representative not by God the Father directly because that’s what the New Testament says and the only way to make
20:1420:14 - this not have contradictions is if we understand that the person who was sent as a messenger the person who is called
20:2120:21 - an angel here you know angalo in uh the Greek which we should probably better translate less confusing in our Modern
20:2920:29 - English versions as messenger rather than Angel so that people don’t get as confused well the one sent as a
20:3420:34 - messenger in this giving of the law was in fact Jesus Christ not you know an Angelic being like
20:4220:42 - Gabriel so I I know that was a lot of information this is sort of the Whirlwind overview to the specific
20:4820:48 - concept that we’re going over here is that Jesus is the definite article Angel of the Lord he serves as we’ve already
20:5420:54 - talked about as a messenger or a representative of the father but we’re talking here about how that makes him
21:0121:01 - distinct from both human Messengers and messengers of an Angelic variety as in the class of faded beings called angels
21:1021:10 - He is different from both of them because he is actually God so lot to go through there aie do you
21:1821:18 - have anything to add to this kind of upfront overview of how we’re talking about Jesus in
21:2521:25 - his want say christop appearances when he’s appearing in christophanies I think you covered the
21:3421:34 - the whole ground really the fact that uh Angel is not um it’s really not the shall we say
21:4221:42 - technical name of the class of creatures that God created before human beings were created we we we only have this uh
21:5221:52 - we do have other terms the sons of God and uh um gods and what not yes we we have that but um we we frequently call
22:0322:03 - them angels and that has given many especially in our times the notion that when you see the word angel in the
22:1222:12 - Scriptures it would necessarily be addressing itself to a class of creatures but you’ve made it clear that
22:2122:21 - in fact it’s just a word that means messenger and the messenger of the Lord Lord is um a very definite person that
22:3322:33 - we’re talking about it’s not just any one of the many messengers of the Lord but this one is a very he’s a unique one
22:4222:42 - he stands out yeah um there isn’t uh there isn’t much more that I think uh I have to see yeah add we see this
22:5322:53 - distinctness that AI mentioned more clearly when we actually go through all the passages here this is just sort of
22:5922:59 - the upfront or just priming us to be ready for when we talk about Jesus in this way but we’re going to see all the
23:0523:05 - passages as we go through the next slides here I me you know like we said this word that we translate as messenger
23:1323:13 - the fact that a lot of versions actually translated as Angel is actually somewhat what is confusing because in
23:2023:20 - English in English when we use the word Angel we don’t think messenger we think subass of creature right but the problem
23:2923:29 - is that in Greek they’re one and the same thing but we have specialized the meaning of that word such that I
23:3523:35 - actually think that this particular translation here in nasby 95 is a mistranslation I don’t think you should
23:4123:41 - use that word in English here I think you need to say together with the messenger or the representative of the
23:4623:46 - father if you want who was speaking with him on sin because when you translate as Angel people think that it’s like
23:5223:52 - Gabriel because that’s how we use the word um so uh it’s not any one translation that
23:5923:59 - does this I mean I bet if we were to go look up this verse in a bunch of different Bible versions it’s not like
24:0324:03 - this is the only one that actually translates that word as Angel but it just tends to be misleading for us in
24:0924:09 - English uh because of how people use it yeah all right well I think that’s where we’ll stop this overview we will pick up
24:1824:18 - talking about all of these appearances of the Angel of the Lord throughout the Old Testament um so that’s what we will
24:2624:26 - kind of spend the rest of this lesson going about we’re going to talk first about specifically the appearances of
24:3124:31 - this Angel of the Lord in The Exodus account so that Narrative of God leading his people out of Egypt but we’ll also
24:3824:38 - see that there’s some other there’s some other appearances of of the Angel of the Lord the definite artical Angel of the
24:4524:45 - Lord in the Old Testament too quite a few in fact and so um that’s kind of what we’ll be spending the rest of our
24:5024:50 - time in this lesson talking about so now we’re going to be talking about this concept of the Angel of the
25:0025:00 - Lord that we have been going over this pre-incarnate Jesus Christ appearing to people in the Old Testament as the agent
25:0825:08 - or representative of the father well now we’re going to spend some time specifically focusing on uh certain
25:1425:14 - things related to The Exodus the uh Escape of the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt and their Journey to
25:2225:22 - the promised land so um of all the places in scripture this is some of where we see most directly uh the
25:3025:30 - activity of the definite article Angel of the Lord you know he comes up in these places uh in this narrative so the
25:3825:38 - giving of the law on Mount Si the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire we’ll go through some other ones as you see as we
25:4425:44 - go here but this gives us a sense of God’s relationship with his people and the one cent who we have talked about
25:5425:54 - being a messenger but not just any old messenger like human being beings or angels as creatures but the messenger of
26:0226:02 - God the person who actually speaks for the father who has the authority to do that and that is of course the
26:0926:09 - pre-incarnate Jesus Christ and so um the angel of The Exodus demonstrates both the Divinity of the Angel of the Lord
26:2026:20 - and his identification as a pre-incarnate manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ and how we can kind of make
26:2626:26 - such a strong assertion I think we’ll become a little bit clearer as we go through the first couple examples here
26:3226:32 - um but basically we know that this isn’t just any old run-of-the-mill messenger because there are overtones of divinity
26:4126:41 - in the passages we’re going to look at it it is clear that we are talking about God as in Yahweh Jehovah however you
26:5026:50 - want to transliterate the tetragramaton um you know the god of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob the god of your forefathers
26:5726:57 - that God is who we are talking about here and yet uh the being represented in many of these cases is also called an
27:0627:06 - Angel um and so the only way that you reconcile these things as we’ve kind of already been over is that well it has to
27:1227:12 - be a messenger who is also god um and that makes perfect sense we understand that that is the role that the son has
27:1927:19 - chosen to adopt in the Trinity he speaks as the father’s agent uh carrying the authority of the father to be clear but
27:2727:27 - on his behalf he represents the plan of the Trinity to humanity as the one who we see the one who is visible to us uh
27:3627:36 - to whom we have access and so uh you’ll kind of see exactly what I mean by quote unquote the angel of The Exodus as we go
27:4527:45 - here on that is I I I suppose I haven’t read all the systematic theologies in the world I this is sort of something
27:5127:51 - that we’re coining here as just a shorthand way to represent uh the being who is very much guiding Israel
27:5927:59 - throughout this period And so just as way of shorthand we’re going to call this being the angel of The Exodus you
28:0528:05 - know you just compare the angel of the lord it’s the same it’s the same person uh it is the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ
28:1228:12 - but uh we are arguing that this person we’re talking about here is the Angel of the Lord as in christophany as in the
28:2028:20 - pre-incarnate Jesus Christ that’s kind of the argument we’re making um but you’ll see exactly what we mean by this
28:2528:25 - as we go through the following passages uh because it will kind of situate Us in context of of all the times that God
28:3228:32 - Appears to the Israelites during this period in the Old Testament so the specific Focus here is going to be on
28:3928:39 - passages from the first few books of the Bible so it’s not strictly going to be Exodus although a lot of passages will
28:4528:45 - come from that book specifically you know we’ll get some from numbers and Deuteronomy and things like that too um
28:5028:50 - so things like from the calling of Moses with the burning bush to Israel’s flight from Egypt and pharaoh to their settle
28:5828:58 - in the promised land in every step of the way during this journey they were Guided by a pre-incarnate Jesus Christ
29:0629:06 - on behalf of the father so it’s not like Jesus of his own will decided that this was the path that the Israelites were
29:1229:12 - going to take he was there as a representative of the father as God worked out his Redemptive plan for
29:1929:19 - Israel which by the way is a symbol of his Redemption of us right um and so we’ve talked a little bit about
29:2729:27 - symbolism and typology already but once you start looking for it you will see it everywhere um and this is one such
29:3329:33 - instance here with God’s Deliverance of his people out of the clutches of pharaoh into the promised land we talked
29:4029:40 - about this uh eschatologically already a bit you know is going to mirror us going through the tribulation and being
29:4729:47 - delivered to the Millennium but it also is true of us on a personal spiritual level as well um and so uh it’s not like
29:5429:54 - we’re allegorizing this overly it’s just typology can have multiple fulfillments that’s the sort of idea here but not to
30:0030:00 - belabor that point too much as we go through these just keep in your mind that this person who is very physically
30:0930:09 - present with the Israelites in this time of their need this is the god whom we serve today as well and he is just as
30:1730:17 - present for us if only we would turn to him um and I think sometimes we forget that I don’t want to go off on a tangent
30:2430:24 - here but just I think it’s a point worth making that we think well you know back in the old days when people were more uh
30:3130:31 - superstitious and we didn’t have smartphone cameras maybe God does things in the world you know maybe there’s a
30:3730:37 - pillar of Fire in the Sky but you know we live in the the boring modern times where Miracles don’t happen or whatever
30:4530:45 - and part of this is that we get fixated on physical Supernatural events as in Pillars of Fire And The Parting of the
30:5330:53 - Red Sea but we fail to understand God’s spiritual deliverance and the spiritual import behind things because honestly
31:0031:00 - that’s the important part right God takes us out of position of spiritual death to life eternal that’s way more
31:0931:09 - impactful than just moving some water right um and I think that’s the attitude we need to have when we think about
31:1531:15 - these things carrying it forward to ourselves is we’re not just studying this because G whiz all these things
31:2131:21 - happened in the past well that’s nice we’re studying it because it helps us understand God who he is what he does
31:2831:28 - for his people and we are his people not just Israel we have been grafted onto the vine of Israel As Romans chapter 11
31:3631:36 - tells us so um before we kick off here Audi is there anything else you want to say just on uh kind of The Exodus story
31:4531:45 - itself and why that’s a good way for us to frame talking about christophany specifically I think what you’ve said is
31:5431:54 - pretty much enough I don’t think uh I’m going to be able to say anything right now that won’t preempt a lot of stuff we
32:0132:01 - will’ll be getting into and that’s pretty normal for us right you know we have lots to go through so we’ll get to
32:0732:07 - it in the individual ones then but just trying to frame us basically just be thinking about some of the stuff we’ve
32:1432:14 - talked about here as we go through all the examples moving forward we’re talking about all of these specific
32:1932:19 - passages to give us that sense of ah this person who guided the Israelites that is the God we serve that is the pre
32:2732:27 - carnate Jesus Christ appearing to us in the Old Testament it is christophany so just bear that thought in mind as we go
32:3432:34 - forward with all of the specific passages kind of what we’re trying to frame everything
32:3932:39 - with yeah so the first appearance that we’re going to look at quite a famous one I
32:4832:48 - might add here is the burning bush in Exodus chapter three so I’m going to go ahead and read some of this it’s
32:5532:55 - probably a familiar passage to many people uh it’s a powerful physical symbol of the Judgment Christ endured
33:0233:02 - for us the bush which is not consumed by the fire right um and Dr lugan Bill explains how we get there a little bit
33:0933:09 - more with some of the verses that we’ll go over in a second here but this is the story of when Moses encounters the
33:1633:16 - burning bush in the first part of Exodus chapter 3 so Exodus chapter 3 picking up at verse two says the angel of the Lord
33:2433:24 - appeared to him that is Moses in a blazing fire from the midst of a bush and he looked and behold the Bush was
33:3133:31 - burning with fire yet the Bush was not consumed so Moses said I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight why
33:3833:38 - this bush is not burned up when the Lord saw that he turned aside to look God Called to him from the midst of the Bush
33:4533:45 - and said Moses Moses and he said here I am then he he being God saido not come near here remove your sandals from your
33:5633:56 - feet for the place on which you are standing is Holy Ground he also said I am the god of your father the god of
34:0334:03 - Abraham the god of Isaac and the god of Jacob then Moses hid his face for he was afraid to look at God the Lord said I
34:1134:11 - have surely seen the Affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have given heed to their cry because of their task
34:1634:16 - Masters for I am aware of their sufferings and so then God goes on to tell Moses that you know he is going to
34:2434:24 - bring his people out of the clutches of Egypt um because he has not turned his face away from their oppression but the
34:3134:31 - point here is that you can see in verse two that it opens with the angel of the lord it’s what verse two says right but
34:4134:41 - then in verse six the the the being who is speaking says I am the god of your father the god of Abraham the god of
34:4934:49 - Isaac and the god of Jacob now to the monotheistic uh Jewish Folks at the time they would have said well this has to be
34:5634:56 - the father right because they didn’t understand that there were multiple people within the Trinity they didn’t
35:0335:03 - understand the Trinity um so to them well I don’t know exactly what they thought I I am not in their mind in
35:1035:10 - their culture in their temporal context but some of that might have been a little bit confused because when we hear
35:1735:17 - things about the the Holiness of the father how do you reconcile that with the fact that well people were talking
35:2435:24 - to him right now to be fair some of the references for that we’ll get back to these we’ve talked about these already
35:2935:29 - um it’s somewhat only in the New Testament that that this distinction of no one can see the father we’ve talked
35:3535:35 - about this in 1 Timothy 6:16 that the father uh lives in unapproachable light whom no one has seen or can see and then
35:4335:43 - John 1:18 says that no one has ever seen God but only the one and only son right well that’s New Testament um but
35:5035:50 - regardless we see in this passage here that the angel of the Lord is God you know if you compare verse two and verse
35:5735:57 - six that’s immediately what you have to take like that’s the context that’s what the passage says all right so if the
36:0436:04 - angel of the Lord is God here well you know it’s a bit more of a generalization to say that every time the angel of the
36:1236:12 - Lord if when we use that definite article in the phrasing shows up that that’s you know God well that is the
36:1836:18 - argument we’re going to make but you know you can kind of see how maybe we need a little bit more evidence than a
36:2236:22 - single passage to go on and and we’ll get there you know we have multiple passages but let’s talk a little bit
36:2736:27 - more about some of the specifics of this passage like what some of the symbolism here means so it is the Angel of the
36:3436:34 - Lord as verse two tells us who appeared to Moses in the fiery Flames but shortly thereafter the angel represents himself
36:4236:42 - as God the father or I think we should say here in the same way that we hear of God reporting himself elsewhere saying I
36:5036:50 - am the god of your father the god of Abraham the god of Isaac and the god of Jacob that’s verse six like we just
36:5536:55 - talked about and then he also says later on in verse 14 which I gu I didn’t really get to skimmed over some stuff
37:0237:02 - but uh this should look familiar to us here this I am who I am uh you know God tells Moses I am has sent has sent me to
37:1237:12 - you right this is Exodus chapter 3 vers I want to say 15 or so Exodus chapter 3 at any way um well this is that passage
37:2137:21 - here this is God saying who he is but this is the angel of the Lord right in context
37:3037:30 - here um you so I said have it right in front of me here it is verse 14 right um and so when we think of this In this
37:3937:39 - passage which we started out this study talking about we talked about how God’s very nature is existing that’s who God
37:4737:47 - is he is existence uh the Alpha and the Omega he who is and was and is to come and so that is the fundamental
37:5637:56 - characteristic of divinity we would say of the unchanging existence of God um and so even here in this rather famous
38:0738:07 - passage where God tells us who he is he uses the tetr Graton you know that four letters in Hebrew that represent that
38:1538:15 - are tied up in this idea of existence uh well when he’s saying this the angel of the Lord is present in this context
38:2338:23 - right um the angel of the Lord is the one who says I am who I am um so that is something right and so we also know that
38:3538:35 - you know he’s identified as the Lord you know verse seven this is you see the small caps Lord here that is the that is
38:4338:43 - the tetragramaton um in the Hebrew you know it was transliterated different ways you may see this sometimes as
38:4938:49 - Yahweh or Jehovah uh depends how people transliterate it you know but uh these are the four Hebrew letters together
38:5938:59 - that represent the Divine name of God and so not going to overly belor the point the point is the Angel of the Lord
39:0639:06 - is most definitely God proper that’s what this passage tells us but to move into some of the symbolism here a little
39:1439:14 - bit the symbolism of the fire and the bush is important so uh there are other places where the angel of the Lord kind
39:2239:22 - of just walks up to people like he talks to Abraham in I want to say Genesis chap 18 I think we’ll get there it’s in the
39:3039:30 - later section but where you know he manifests and talks to people like physically so why did God appear to uh
39:3839:38 - Moses in the burning bush like what’s the point of that why not just appear to him and talk to him normally you know
39:4439:44 - why why burning bush um so the symbolism of the fire and the bush is actually quite important um it is foreshadowing
39:5239:52 - we would say if this were a literary work which the Bible is in some respects but it’s prophetic for us it is prophecy
39:5939:59 - of what was to come on the cross um so the bush calls attention to Christ the Messiah as the branch or the root um and
40:0840:08 - so there’s a lot of passages that we’re just going to look at real briefly here the concept of Christ as the branch you
40:1540:15 - know we have the I am the vine you are the branches sort of thing in John chapter 15 but Jesus as uh you know
40:2240:22 - using this analogy of plants and the growth of plants to represent um kind of Jesus’s mission and his identity so just
40:3140:31 - going to go through some passages here this is just a driveby really honestly I’m just showing you this idea of this
40:3840:38 - this idea of like being the root or being the branch shows up actually it’s very well attested in scripture so the
40:4540:45 - idea of the Bush here is kind of what we’re getting at you know it’s this this plant that is being consumed by fire
40:5240:52 - well if Jesus is the plant that’s what we’re going to establish the fire represents judgment so Isaiah 4:2 says
41:0041:00 - in that day the branch of the Lord will be beautiful and glorious and so on and so forth um Isaiah 11 verse1 then a
41:0941:09 - chute will spring from the stem of Jesse and a branch from his roots will bear fruit right so stem of Jess that’s David
41:1841:18 - right um and so a descendant of David it’s called this branch that will bear fruit that’s Jesus Christ Isaiah chter
41:2541:25 - 53:2 um this is part of the suffering servant passage in Isaiah chapter 534 he grew up
41:3341:33 - before him like a tender Chute and like a root out of parched ground and so on and so forth right but same idea
41:4141:41 - continuing this idea of the plant metaphor the plant analogy in Jeremiah 23:5 behold the days are coming declares
41:5141:51 - the Lord when I will raise up for David A righteous branch and he will reign as king and act wisely and do justice and
41:5841:58 - righteousness in the land so again we have this idea of the branch Jeremiah 33:15 in those days and at that time I
42:0742:07 - will cause a righteous branch of David to Spring forth and he shall execute Justice and righteousness on the earth
42:1442:14 - zecharia Zechariah 3:8 now listen Joshua the high priest you and your friends who are sitting in front of you indeed they
42:2342:23 - are men who are a symbol for behold I am going to bring in my servant the branch and then Zechariah
42:3242:32 - 6:12 then say to him thus says the Lord of hosts Behold a man whose name is Branch for he will Branch out from where
42:4042:40 - he is and he will build the Temple of the Lord okay so all this to show that far from this place in Exodus chapter 3
42:5042:50 - kind of being an anomaly as in why is this symbolism present in Exodus 3 why is God speaking to Moses through a bush
42:5942:59 - well it’s because we have this analogy that’s actually well attested through the other prophets in the Old Testament
43:0643:06 - and all of this prophecy uh especially with the hindsight we have now that we have the New Testament is very obviously
43:1243:12 - Messianic pointing to Jesus Christ he is the branch out of the stem of Jesse right he is the one in the divic line
43:2243:22 - who fulfills all of these things okay so that’s the identity of Jesus Christ as the bush as the branch as you know the
43:3143:31 - outshoot of Pless if you will but the fire here represents the Judgment of the cross that does not consume him so that
43:4143:41 - not consuming him bit is important because most things that burn um you know burning is actually a chemical
43:4943:49 - reaction and the output of it is you know it takes oxygen from the air and all this stuff happens and well at the
43:5643:56 - end of it you get ashes you have burned the thing you know you it is no longer in the same state as it was it is not
44:0344:03 - burned without being consumed that’s not the normal state of things here in this world that’s not how physics works if
44:0944:09 - you want to put it that way um however this idea of the branch burning yet not being consumed well that didn’t just
44:1844:18 - happen for no reason either and that is because that represents the Judgment that Jesus Christ took for us upon the
44:2644:26 - cross um so I’m not going to read this whole chapter because this is rather lengthy and it’s part of the law but in
44:3344:33 - Leviticus chapter 1 um it actually starts off talking about the legal codes relate relating to Burnt offerings and
44:4244:42 - so under the law they had blood sacrifice was part of it but they also had burnt offerings as in with fire and
44:5044:50 - elsewhere we know that fire um is definitely a symbol for judgment um and so for example a rather famous passage
45:0045:00 - in the New Testament where uh John the Baptist is speaking of baptism with spirit and with fire well if you
45:0645:06 - interpret that passage correctly baptism with fire is not something you want um this is not talking about Pentecost with
45:1245:12 - the tongues of fire representing baptism of the holy spirit it’s not that baptism with fire is like the Lake of Fire in
45:1845:18 - eternity right the fire in the Lake of Fire is God’s judgment um so Leviticus chapter 1 under the symbols of the law
45:2845:28 - the the system that the priests after the uh you know like the the levitical priesthood they made all these
45:3545:35 - sacrifices and they followed all these regulations for burnt offerings because that is symbolic of the Divine judgment
45:4445:44 - that accompanies the Forgiveness of sins um so here in um Exodus chapter 3 where we have the bush that is on fire facing
45:5545:55 - the Judgment of God yet not being consumed this is the work of Jesus Christ upon the cross the the God man
46:0446:04 - dying for Humanity in their place yet bearing it in his body through that hypostatic Union is what we call it
46:1246:12 - right the idea that he’s fully God and fully man and he had to be both in order to pay for our sin all of that is
46:1946:19 - symbolized here um so I know I’ve talked for a long time here you can just see though that we’ve pulled in a lot of
46:2646:26 - other things that are related to this right we talked about all these passages that mention Jesus Christ as the branch
46:3446:34 - you know coming in the line of David he’s a prophecied successor uh who will bring Justice and righteousness to the
46:4246:42 - world well the bush is representing this and then the fire here represents his judgment and the fact that he’s not
46:5046:50 - consumed is foreshadowing what happens on the cross where he burns in payment of our sins
46:5746:57 - yet is not overcome by it because human beings would just be annihilated we would cease to exist we can’t pay for
47:0447:04 - our own sin only Jesus could um so all of that is actually caught up here in this first appearance which as we’ve
47:1247:12 - talked about is the definite article Angel of the Lord who is also said to be Yahweh tetragramaton the god of Abraham
47:2147:21 - and Isaac and Jacob are said to be one and the same and so that’s why we know that this one has to be christophany
47:2847:28 - because Jesus Christ is obviously representing for and speaking for the Father Here In this passage in Exodus
47:3447:34 - chapter three so was a little bit rambly but aie you have I’m sure other things we can talk about here
47:4347:43 - um yeah um okay first of all I’ll apologize for um any noise from my little one apparently she decided she
47:5447:54 - didn’t want to sleep after all so she’s up again um I think that one thing that I want to
48:0448:04 - say is it’s less about making an argument for whether or not you know everything that Moses actually
48:1148:11 - experienced was a christophany and more about showing
48:1648:16 - just um the many the multitudinous ways in which this was
48:2548:25 - foreshadowing the coming of the Messiah because there is one overarching proof that everything that
48:3448:34 - Moses run into was a christophany and it’s that the Bible States unequivocally that no man can see
48:4148:41 - the father so every um interaction that Moses had with God was necessarily with some other member of the Trinity it
48:5248:52 - couldn’t be the father he could not have seen the father so having established that we we we are demonstrating now just
49:0449:04 - how this is a rich um Revelation so to speak of Jesus Christ before he actually came into the world this was a we get
49:1749:17 - pictures of what it would be like when he finally comes so for example in this very first instance we see a clear
49:2549:25 - demonstration of what his coming would actually be so the very first time that he meets with Moses who is going to be
49:3649:36 - the quintessential purveyor of the law and remember what happened when Jesus came he’s rejected especially by the
49:4649:46 - Pharisees and teachers of the law as someone who is sort of encouraging a Breaking of the law the very first time
49:5449:54 - that Moses has this interaction with God it is the Lord Jesus himself that he is speaking to and we will see eventually
50:0250:02 - that it is the Lord Jesus who gave him that law which was why later on when he says to the Pharisees and the teachers
50:0950:09 - of the law I am or the son of man is the lord of the Sabbath he was not just talking
50:1750:17 - and he was not just trying to be provocative he was telling them the absolute truth he had given them the law
50:2450:24 - of the Sabbath so when we take all of that together we should see just how great what it is
50:3250:32 - we’re talking about is this is the greater one of whom Hebrews were speaking the actual owner of the house
50:4150:41 - in which Moses had proved faithful this is him commissioning Moses for that work so we see then that’s even in this
50:5350:53 - capacity of course um there are those who will argue because when you go to Revelation you’ll see the angel who is
51:0051:00 - um speaking for the Lord Jesus and it seems as if it is the same Angel who is saying I Jesus have sent my angel to
51:0751:07 - such and such and it’s like well that’s that’s proof that when the fact that an angel is speaking does not mean that he
51:1451:14 - cannot speak as if he is God which is rubbish because that angel could not have been saying I Jesus have sent my
51:2051:20 - Angel and even if he was saying I Jesus have sent my angel it would have been a very interesting thing he actually said
51:2851:28 - I jesus sent an angel in this case we don’t see the angel saying anything of that sort but note that when first this
51:3651:36 - person in the burning bush is mentioned we hear that he is the Angel of the Lord after that it seems like nothing is said
51:4351:43 - anymore of him being the angel we hear God God God God throughout that passage and um uh when he does
51:5251:52 - speak when he does speak when we see him interacting with mes um he speaks okay so the fact that
52:0252:02 - he actually starts out the first thing that we hear about him being the angel of the Lord is actually pointing to
52:0752:07 - something because after that it’s doesn’t seem relevant anymore to mention that he is the messenger of the Lord but
52:1452:14 - the reason that’s the first introduction we get is to keep our eyes on the fact that this is not the father so to speak
52:2452:24 - and there is a reason for that remember man is supposed to be um cast out so to speak you’re not
52:3352:33 - allowed to have this interaction with the father but the father has not left you bereth he sends someone to come and
52:4152:41 - do this work of bringing his children back his children who have been thrown out of the house because of their bad
52:4852:48 - behavior and now this person is supposed to guide them back and this person is acting like a messenger of the Lord so
52:5552:55 - that is something that I think um will be front and center of every discussion that we see about the angel of the Lord
53:0453:04 - that even though he is truly God in his own right and that will continue to be the case every time we run into him we
53:1053:10 - will see that the the the the very first thing that we’re supposed to see every time we run into him is that he is
53:1853:18 - speaking for the father he is acting for the Father which is what creates a lot of the confusion that people run into
53:2353:23 - and why is that it will continue to be that his job is to bring God’s children back to him that’s also why In This Very
53:3353:33 - in this first instance the thing that we see is him in the burning bush that’s because that’s what he has
53:4353:43 - to do to bring the children of God back to the father yeah I mean it’s the message that he Bears you know we’ve
53:5153:51 - talked about this I think probably in just our previous lesson about how Jesus is coming as the agent or the
53:5953:59 - representative of the father that’s his mission that is how he appears to us he is not appearing on his own authority
54:0854:08 - but with the authority of the one who sent him and it gets confusing because he speaks with that Authority right is
54:1654:16 - Jesus the father no Jesus is not the father but he speaks for the father right they have perfect Unity of will
54:2254:22 - one of the other things that AI mentioned you know just as he was opening up here was that you know the
54:2854:28 - Bible obviously doesn’t make this argument that we’re making in so many words right as in look the angel of the
54:3454:34 - Lord is you know Yahweh the angel of the Lord is this it’s just there you know we we made this argument when we talked
54:4054:40 - about uh the Trinity as a general concept that the Bible doesn’t argue for it in what I would call
54:4854:48 - the the the manner of of philosophical deductive proofs right it’s simply there it’s simply asserted
54:5754:57 - and the Bible doesn’t set out to argue or Justified it’s just there um that is just so in this case as well um this
55:0855:08 - point that we’re making and why we’re emphasizing it and drilling on it by the way is because it is rather important
55:1455:14 - this idea of the son’s role even before the Incarnation I think really does go underappreciated by a lot of folks and
55:2255:22 - it is kind of a big deal in properly interpreting the roles of the trinity as they correspond to all of creation right
55:3055:30 - past present and future um so it’s not like minor but the reason why we’re setting this up in what I would term you
55:3755:37 - know like we’re arguing for it it’s because it’s useful theologically but it is right for us to point out that the
55:4355:43 - Bible itself actually doesn’t make the argument in quite so many words right um it is simply there and present in the
55:5255:52 - text and it is good and proper for us to be connecting these dots like I’m not trying to say we shouldn’t
55:5955:59 - but we just need to keep in mind what the Bible does and does not say right and so this this argument that we’re
56:0656:06 - making here about how all of these appearances of the Angel of the Lord are actually christophany appearances of the
56:1356:13 - pre-incarnate Jesus Christ it is a good thing for us to be focusing on and be justifying but in all the other passages
56:2156:21 - as we’ll see it’s just the same as this one the angel of the Lord through context is clearly associated
56:2956:29 - with God but that that’s not like the point of any of these things right um that’s just merely incidental to what
56:3856:38 - ends up happening um yeah yeah I mean we’ve already kind of been over this this concept you know we we we talked
56:4556:45 - about this a lot when we were talking about the Trinity just r large that it is important for us to note that the
56:5256:52 - Bible doesn’t argue for these things in the way that some people who want the very
56:5756:57 - uh like what I might call like full accounting of things you they want it all spelled out with bullet points
57:0257:02 - that’s not the kind of book that the Bible is that’s not to say that the Bible doesn’t give us truth that’s the
57:0757:07 - whole point of the Bible but it it doesn’t do it on our terms according to our preconceived notions of what it
57:1557:15 - ought to give us right um yeah it is perfect in the way that God has given it to us for his purpose for it but we
57:2357:23 - don’t get to find fault with him for you know it not being like a bullet point list of propositions you know that’s not
57:3157:31 - how it works um so we we we we can actually make our peace with the fact that if the Bible is asserting something
57:3957:39 - or just taking something for granted and not making an argument for it it it’s we are supposed to take it the same way if
57:4657:46 - we have any in credulity about it we should just wait until we actually stand before the Judgment seats of Christ
57:5157:51 - he’ll explain everything at that point but we shouldn’t be too worried if if things are not argued um as you have
58:0158:01 - said systematically breaking everything down Point by point and Rel because in the end in a lot of ways the Bible is
58:0858:08 - also a dictionary it states things categorically a lot of things is take them categorically take them or you
58:1558:15 - leave them so that’s the case in in many of the issues we’ll be dealing with including this particular one too yeah
58:2458:24 - yeah and we’ll see this as I say so just keep your eyes peeled as we go through the next uh several appearances of the
58:3158:31 - angel of Exodus um you know the angel of the Lord showing up in this Exodus narrative um that that’s not the focus
58:3858:38 - and that’s fine that’s what we’re trying to say here um but it is simply asserted it is there it’s present in the text but
58:4558:45 - it isn’t argued in so many words and that is something that is absolutely fine for us because it you know we can
58:5358:53 - make that connection even if we don’t put it the bullet points that might satisfy Skeptics because that’s not the
59:0059:00 - point of all this um so we won’t get more off topic there but this was us looking at this first appearance of
59:0859:08 - Christ to Moses in the burning bush and all of that foreshadows about the cross and you’ll see that theme uh come back
59:1559:15 - up as we go through the other passages here too Dr luging bill has done a very good job of tying all of these
59:2159:21 - appearances of the Angel even in some ways that I hadn’t connected myself before
59:2659:26 - to the work of Christ on the cross um the symbolism once you see it is quite powerful it really does Point directly
59:3459:34 - to the cross and what Christ did for us on it so you’ll see what I mean as we get to the other ones here in just a
59:4259:42 - sec so the next appearance here that we’re going to be talking about the angel of The Exodus here is in Exodus CH
59:5059:50 - 14 verse 19 where we are told that the angel of God the angel of the Lord right who had been going before the camp of
59:5959:59 - Israel moved and went behind them and the pillar of cloud moved before them and stood behind them with the angel of
01:00:0501:00:05 - the Lord right Angel of the Lord’s in the cloud pillar well that’s Exodus 14: 19 but previously last chapter in Exodus
01:00:1401:00:14 - Exodus chap 13: 211 we we are told that the Lord was going before them in a pillar of cloud by day to lead them the
01:00:2101:00:21 - way and a pillar of Fire by night to give them light that they might travel by day and by night okay so critical
01:00:2701:00:27 - thing again you’ll see small caps Lord here this is the tetr Graton this is Yahweh Jehovah the God of Abraham the
01:00:3401:00:34 - god of Isaac and the god of Jacob right in the same way that we saw that in Exodus chapter 3 with uh the being
01:00:4101:00:41 - speaking from the burning bush first being identified as the angel of the Lord and then as Yahweh proper so to
01:00:4801:00:48 - here I guess the orders flipped right in Exodus 13 we’re told that it’s the Lord and then in Exodus 14 we’re told that
01:00:5401:00:54 - it’s the angel of God right messenger of God right remember Angel just means Messenger right and so people get
01:01:0101:01:01 - tripped up because we use Angel as a label for a separate class of creatures that are not human um but angel in Greek
01:01:1001:01:10 - and Hebrew just means Messengers so we think of this as the messenger of God who had been going before them it’s not
01:01:1601:01:16 - an angel creature it is Jesus Christ in reincarnate St that’s what we have been arguing here so God himself is said to
01:01:2401:01:24 - be the one going ahead head of the Israelites in the column of cloud and fire that’s what Exodus 13: 211 says but
01:01:3101:01:31 - in Exodus 14:19 we see that that is the angel of God the messenger of God and so the Lord and the angel that is the
01:01:3901:01:39 - messenger are identified as one and the same and here’s where I mentioned that all of these tieback Dr lville has done
01:01:4801:01:48 - a good job tying back all the symbolism to the Cross we’re gonna spend a few minutes kind of digging deep into this
01:01:5501:01:55 - one to try to convince us that this really is true the symbolism is actually there it’s not fanciful um so when the
01:02:0301:02:03 - column of fire comes to stand over the place of the Ark in the Tabernacle where the blood representing Christ sacrifice
01:02:1201:02:12 - would be sprinkled on the day of atonement we there to have a picture of Christ saving work enduring judgment on
01:02:2001:02:20 - our behalf okay so again the idea here is that this foreshadows and symbol IES Christ payment for our sin so we’ll
01:02:2901:02:29 - start with Leviticus 16 because this is pretty easy just like on the last section we mentioned Leviticus 1 that
01:02:3601:02:36 - section of the law code dealing with burnt offerings well Leviticus 16 deals with the law of atonement and
01:02:4301:02:43 - specifically this idea of Aaron as the high priest or you know the high priest generally going into the most holy place
01:02:5101:02:51 - to make atonement for the people for their sin offering right right so uh verse 13 here in Leviticus chapter 16
01:03:0101:03:01 - says that all this stuff is dealing with the mercy seat on the uh the Arc of the testimony you’ll see that here that’s
01:03:1001:03:10 - verse 13 the Ark of the testimony right we’re talking about the Arc of the Covenant here where the law is um and so
01:03:1601:03:16 - there’s a lot of you know more things that go into it here but this is discussing about where this takes place
01:03:2401:03:24 - is obviously dealing with the Ark of the Covenant that’s placed in the most holy place in one of the specific tents that
01:03:3301:03:33 - were erected when the people of Israel made camp now when they were going through the Wilderness um you know going
01:03:4001:03:40 - from Egypt to Canaan well they had to carry everything with them they didn’t have a static place for uh the ark of
01:03:4801:03:48 - the covenant for God to quote unquote reside with them in fact um later on in the narrative in the Old Testament it’s
01:03:5601:03:56 - a really big deal when they make a kind of static permanent Temple for God because previously the Ark of the
01:04:0201:04:02 - Covenant had been traveling with them all this time kind of in a mobile fashion so I don’t want to get super off
01:04:0801:04:08 - topic the point here is that Leviticus chapter 16 is talking about blood sacrifice for atonement right which
01:04:1501:04:15 - should sound an awful lot like what Jesus did for us on the cross right okay so that’s Leviticus 16 the part of the
01:04:2101:04:21 - law code dealing with blood sacrifice for atonement and we said in verse 13 here we hear about the mercy seat on the
01:04:2801:04:28 - Ark of the Covenant right um so we know that that’s the location of this sacrifice that has all that symbolism
01:04:3601:04:36 - right and so if we compare that to Numbers chapter 9 verse 15 which here we say that the pillar of cloud and fire
01:04:4701:04:47 - that we’ve been talking about actually shows up it covers the Tabernacle the tent of testimony and the evening it was
01:04:5601:04:56 - like an appearance of fire over the Tabernacle until morning right remember we said fire has all sorts of symbolism
01:05:0201:05:02 - too so we have blood sacrifice going on in this tent and the pillar of fire over it representing what we’ve already
01:05:0901:05:09 - discussed well how do we know that these two things are happening at the same place that’s the question here so in
01:05:1701:05:17 - Numbers chapter 9 verse1 15 we see this socalled tent of testimony so what is the tent of testimony how do we know
01:05:2501:05:25 - that that’s where the Arc of the Covenant is right this is something that ichus just quotes here and he’s not
01:05:3101:05:31 - wrong as we’ll see I I’ll dig into it a little bit more just for our own benefit on the video because I wanted to trace
01:05:3701:05:37 - this a little bit just to make sure I understood properly how we know all of this well we are not the first people in
01:05:4401:05:44 - the world to ask this so this is a question on What’s called the hermeneutic stack exchange so
01:05:4901:05:49 - hermeneutics is kind of the study of interpretation and have you never been on stack exchange sites anymore people
01:05:5401:05:54 - ask questions and you get some answers so I don’t buy 100% of what this guy says in the answer but it was a good
01:06:0001:06:00 - starting place just to kind of show us here that um when this gets mentioned later in Revelation chapter 15 uh here’s
01:06:0801:06:08 - what the Greek looks like um well this thing that we’re talking about comes up again in the New Testament right the
01:06:1501:06:15 - Temple of the Tabernacle of testimony in heaven was open right I’m not going to go dig into the context there because I
01:06:2101:06:21 - don’t want us to get even more off topic than we’re inevitably going to be here but the point is is that this is kind of
01:06:2601:06:26 - a defined place in Scripture it has meaning it’s not just kind of like mentioned offand and so to really
01:06:3301:06:33 - establish how we know that what we’re talking about is where that sacrifice happens we’re going to go look at a
01:06:4001:06:40 - passage in Numbers chapter 17 here um so if you are familiar with Aaron’s Rod budding um uh and producing almonds uh
01:06:5101:06:51 - that’s verse eight here numb 17 ver8 well this story is interesting for lots of other reasons but specifically what
01:06:5801:06:58 - we’re going to be looking at is this idea of the location how can we line up that Pillar of Fire which represents the
01:07:0601:07:06 - presence of God over the place where the sacrifices of atonement were done right presence of God sacrifices of atonement
01:07:1401:07:14 - well that’s what Jesus did on the cross right that’s how we make the connection all right so you’ll see here in Numbers
01:07:2001:07:20 - chapter 17 we have this mentioned here you’ll deposit the staffs I’m so just a little bit of context they’re getting a
01:07:2801:07:28 - rod or a staff for each one of the father’s households 12 rods from all their leaders according to their
01:07:3401:07:34 - father’s households and Aaron’s name gets put on the rod of Levi so Moses is told to put these things in the tent of
01:07:4301:07:43 - meeting in front of the testimony um so we’ll Circle back to that when we look at a different translation again in a
01:07:5101:07:51 - second this is nasb 1995 version so uh pretty strict literal interpretation of this says the testimony there um and so
01:08:0001:08:00 - you can see that Moses went into the tent of the testimony aha that is the same place that we saw here in Numbers
01:08:0901:08:09 - Chapter n where we have the tent of testimony where the pillar of cloud and fire set to be right hovers over this
01:08:1801:08:18 - place and what we’re trying to do is make sure that that lines up with where the atonements happen in Leviticus
01:08:2401:08:24 - chapter 16 right that’s kind of the purpose of why we’re going through all this so Moses
01:08:3001:08:30 - deposits these things the staff in front of the testimony in the tent of testimony that’s what the context of
01:08:3901:08:39 - this passage in Numbers chapter 17 says and then Aaron’s Rod sprouts and put forth Buds and Blossoms and then later
01:08:4801:08:48 - on here we we read that Moses brought out all the rods from the presence of the Lord and they looked and each man
01:08:5401:08:54 - took his rod but God tells Moses put back the rod of Aaron before the testimony to be kept as
01:09:0201:09:02 - a sign of the rebels that you may put an end to their grumblings against me so that they may not die okay so the rod of
01:09:0801:09:08 - Aaron gets put back in this so-called tent of testimony so before we move on what
01:09:1601:09:16 - exactly does before the testimony mean like you’ll see this a here is a footnote um so if we look here that
01:09:2201:09:22 - shows up in verse four here as well right right in front of the testimony and so we get some cross references if I
01:09:2901:09:29 - look at this we’ll just go ahead and examine those real briefly here Oops I did not actually mean to go jump there
01:09:3701:09:37 - um because if I hover we can get it um so Exodus chapter 25 verse 16 says you should put in the arc the testimony that
01:09:4601:09:46 - I shall give you right what goes in the arc well the law tablets go in the ark right Exodus chap 25: 21 you should put
01:09:5401:09:54 - The Mercy Seat on the top of the Ark and in the arc you shall put the testimony that I give you now this is the nasb
01:10:0101:10:01 - 1995 version that’s the translation being used here and then verse 22 also talking about Above The Mercy Seat we
01:10:0901:10:09 - have the cherubim that are on the Ark of the testimony which you’ll also hear called the Ark of the Covenant right
01:10:1601:10:16 - I’ll speak with you about all of that given to the Commandment of Israel okay so with that going to point us towards
01:10:2401:10:24 - same Passage Numbers chapter 17 now we’re going to look at it in the New International Version which is a little
01:10:3001:10:30 - bit it’s not that it’s a loose translation but it tries to capture the meaning a little bit more rather than
01:10:3501:10:35 - just plugging in strict definition tries to makes it perhaps a little bit more thought forth thought versus word for
01:10:4101:10:41 - word not going to get into translation debates here but if we look at verse seven here in this particular
01:10:4901:10:49 - translations it says that the staffs that Moses was commanded to put back in this place were put in the tent of the
01:10:5601:10:56 - Covenant law the Covenant law goes in the Ark of the Covenant which as we were told before in Leviticus chapter 16 is
01:11:0601:11:06 - where the sacrifices of atonement are made right tracking so far okay so we see that this translation by
01:11:1601:11:16 - interpretation this is what we’re talking about here this testimony that gets mentioned in the nasb version is
01:11:2201:11:22 - talking about the Ark of the Covenant so the Ark of the Covenant is placed in the tent of
01:11:2801:11:28 - testimony so if you’re not always con if you’re not already convinced by all this going to look at one more passage here
01:11:3401:11:34 - and then I’ll get off my digression in Hebrews chapter 9 veres 3 to 4 we hear about the curtain um this is the chapter
01:11:4301:11:43 - where we hear about how Christ sacrifice was once for all as opposed to the yearly sacrifices of the high priest who
01:11:5001:11:50 - go into the most holy place to do their sacrifice of atonement well that’s kind of the point of Hebrews 9 uh and
01:11:5701:11:57 - following the the later verses of Hebrews chapter 9 contrast finality and efficacy of Christ’s single sacrifice
01:12:0301:12:03 - and contrast that with the repeated sacrifice of the high priests but in verses 3 to four we see that behind the
01:12:0901:12:09 - second curtain we have the room called the most holy Place what’s in the most holy Place well we have the golden altar
01:12:1601:12:16 - of incense and the gold covered Arc of the Covenant this art contained the gold jars of mana and look it contains
01:12:2301:12:23 - Aaron’s staff that had budded and in Numbers chapter 17 verse 10 God tells Moses to stick the rod back in the tent
01:12:3301:12:33 - of testimony which is why we know that because of this verse here in Hebrews chapter 9 that’s why we know that the
01:12:4101:12:41 - Ark of the Covenant must have been in the tent of testimony because that’s where the rod is said to be and the
01:12:4601:12:46 - staff is said to be in the Ark of the Covenant along with the stone tablet of the law QED basically so I’m sorry that
01:12:5301:12:53 - was a bit of a digression but why I’m saying all of this is because that’s why when Dr Lugano lines up the presence of
01:13:0101:13:01 - God with the altar on the Ark of the Covenant where the sacrifices of atonement are that’s why when you marry
01:13:0901:13:09 - these Concepts we get a picture of Christ’s saving work enduring judgment on our behalf and paying that price of
01:13:1701:13:17 - atonement so I hope that wasn’t too Technical and we didn’t get too far off in the weeds but I just wanted to trace
01:13:2301:13:23 - out a little bit because it’s really cool when you see the links it’s it’s there I mean we’re not just making
01:13:2901:13:29 - things up it’s there in scripture but we had to do a little bit of digging to put all that together to see that this
01:13:3601:13:36 - really is the place where those sacrifices of atonement were made and that is where the presence of God rests
01:13:4301:13:43 - and it doesn’t rest over this specific tent for no reason it rests there because that is conceptually where the
01:13:5101:13:51 - presence of God is and that is where the atonement is done well when you put those two things together you see
01:13:5801:13:58 - that God is the one who pays for the atonement right um so uh AI you have anything you want to
01:14:0801:14:08 - go here I know I got a little bit sidetracked but um was rich I mean seriously what what
01:14:1501:14:15 - you went into was um a very good expansion of what he discussed here I’m not sure I’m not sure what I could add
01:14:2401:14:24 - to sorry so reviewing the main point of this slide that interesting tangent aside was actually talking just about
01:14:3201:14:32 - what we talked about before how the angel who’s said to go before them is basically said to be God right which
01:14:3901:14:39 - means has to be christophany I mean which is I’m not saying that point isn’t interesting but uh it was the figuring
01:14:4701:14:47 - out exactly how we TI all the other things together was what caught my attention here but the fundamental Point
01:14:5201:14:52 - here is that the column of cloud and fire that’s mentioned all throughout the Exodus narrative that leads the
01:14:5901:14:59 - Israelites that is the Angel of the Lord that’s what Exodus 14 say but it’s also said to be the Lord Yahweh Jehovah tetr
01:15:0701:15:07 - Graton in Exodus chapter 13 basically meaning that they’re one and the same so God leads his people
01:15:1501:15:15 - personally right Jesus Christ sent on behalf of the father to guide his people it’s a christophy
01:15:2301:15:23 - um yeah yeah yeah um I I honestly don’t know what I could add to that suffice to say that it’s it’s well tied together
01:15:3401:15:34 - Exodus 13:21 told us who was in the cloud the column of cloud and fire Exodus 14: 19 tells us who was so one
01:15:4201:15:42 - could if if people want to argue that God was with an Angel just as he was when he went to visit Abraham they
01:15:5101:15:51 - welcome to argue that but I think that we have more than enough reason to identify that angel with the Lord
01:15:5901:15:59 - himself especially because of how the angel talks he doesn’t talk like most pretty much any other angel that you you
01:16:0801:16:08 - would have read in the scriptures anywhere else no angel who has come to speak for the Lord tends to identify
01:16:1601:16:16 - himself with the Lord they don’t do that so um that is one thing that’s definite but again and again
01:16:2501:16:25 - it the the the particularly amazing thing and that’s one of the reasons I really love the foray that um Steven
01:16:3401:16:34 - went into right here the amazing thing about um this identification of the Angel and the the
01:16:4301:16:43 - various ways in which he appears to Moses and to the Israelites with the um cross is especially when you start
01:16:5301:16:53 - working through the Hebrew series that Prof Robert is wrri is writing right now it’s very significant because all of
01:17:0001:17:00 - these things are things that should have told Israel especially when the Lord Jesus came this is the same person the
01:17:0901:17:09 - the the the pillar of cloud and fire was speaking to the Judgment of the cross the um the Burning Bush was speaking to
01:17:1901:17:19 - the Judgment of the Cross and all of this somehow in Exodus 14 the law had not yet been given we can see that by
01:17:2801:17:28 - Exodus 20 it is given so you we we see that even preceding this whole business of you’re going to be performing these
01:17:3701:17:37 - sacrifices you’ll have a pruit of this sort you will have um uh so many uh uh regulations you’re supposed to keep to
01:17:4801:17:48 - dietary requirements and whatnot all of that actually follows these symbols of of the Cross which seems I mean that’s
01:17:5801:17:58 - why it is actually incredible that Jesus had the opposition that he had when he came because it’s
01:18:0601:18:06 - like how Beyond actually spelling it out for you saying that at such and such a time in history I will come and die on a
01:18:1501:18:15 - cross Beyond doing that as in if if we if we were to say okay if he does not SP it out literally
01:18:2501:18:25 - in those ways what other way could he have told them that this was what was going to happen right so we see it over
01:18:3201:18:32 - and over again in these symbols the way that this Angel of the Lord showed up and again and again we see that the
01:18:3901:18:39 - angel of the Lord accepted the role of a messenger that’s why he he continues to be called The Angel the angel even
01:18:4701:18:47 - though he’s identified with the Lord which is the same thing that happened with Jesus Christ much later he never
01:18:5201:18:52 - denied that he was God but he did not claim that position either you know so everything that that that was happening
01:19:0001:19:00 - when he came when we say he never claimed it it doesn’t mean that he was like um being humble or anything it was
01:19:0801:19:08 - more like he didn’t just like the angel of the Lord did not put that in the face of of Moses or in the face of the
01:19:1401:19:14 - Israelites he was God but he was pointing to the father more than he was pointing to himself that’s what Jesus
01:19:2201:19:22 - also did when he came so in for us who who are seeing these things we might not need to be told that this was the Lord
01:19:3101:19:31 - Jesus so it’s less about actually being persuaded that the angel of the Lord the angel of God as we saw as we seeing in
01:19:3901:19:39 - Exodus was Jesus Christ but we can see in all of these discussions how this was speaking to what Jesus would do
01:19:4901:19:49 - later on in history and what it has to do with our reconciliation to the father we we we should see also how none of
01:19:5801:19:58 - this was an accident the Lord was not reacting to anything all of this was planned and carried out by the Lord from
01:20:0601:20:06 - start to finish that we would sin that we would be redeemed that we will be brought into this eternal glory with um
01:20:1501:20:15 - the father in the end because of the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus this has been front and center and you’ll see
01:20:2101:20:21 - throughout the discussion of the Trinity that’s actually one sorry theology that’s actually one reason that whenever
01:20:2601:20:26 - I think about writing uh um a Systematic Theology of my own when I think about writing theology I don’t know any way to
01:20:3401:20:34 - represent the thing as well as profor Robert has done it or even better I can’t think of any way because the way
01:20:3901:20:39 - that he structured that teaching was to focus on the cross that this was this is the Lynch pin of God’s plan that
01:20:4701:20:47 - ultimately everything creation is possible because Jesus will die on the cross and we see that front and center
01:20:5401:20:54 - as weing talking about the revelation of God in the Old Testament especially through the angel of God the angel of
01:21:0201:21:02 - the Lord as we keep seeing him showing up signs symbols of the Cross are coming they’re coming along with that um um
01:21:1001:21:10 - revelation of himself at that point so for us again like I said we it might bore us so to speak to be uh having
01:21:2001:21:20 - these arguments laid out for why the angel of the Lord was God himself but I think that we should be particular
01:21:2801:21:28 - about noticing too how in each of these instances the angel of the Lord is showing us how the cross is a big part
01:21:3801:21:38 - of the plan that the Lord not the big part it is the entirety of God’s plan we see that even before the law is given
01:21:4601:21:46 - the law on which the the Pharisees were claiming to stand to eventually crucify their own God
01:21:5501:21:55 - yeah now we should be a bit fair to point out this concept of progressive revelation really helps us right we have
01:22:0301:22:03 - hindsight um and that makes a lot of difference right because all of this is illuminated most helpfully by the New
01:22:1101:22:11 - Testament um absolutely and so if you wonder you know why didn’t they see it um it’s not so shockingly blindingly
01:22:1901:22:19 - obvious that I mean I certainly think wise people in the past read this and had
01:22:2601:22:26 - questions that is likely right but how do they answer them you know and this is why it always comes down to a matter of
01:22:3501:22:35 - faith God gives us the information we need in our circumstances to put our trust in him right um so I’ve often
01:22:4201:22:42 - thought that some of what we’re talking about here is perhaps some of what Jesus said on the road to Emmas right they ask
01:22:4901:22:49 - about the scriptures that speak of him Exodus chapter 3 is a great example right the burning bush burning yet not
01:22:5701:22:57 - consumed you know um Jesus also you know pre prefigured his death and payment for sin upon the cross he told people this
01:23:0401:23:04 - now people didn’t understand it until afterwards but I mean it’s all there um now yeah one reason that I personally
01:23:1501:23:15 - don’t cut the Pharisees any slack I mean I do agree with you that largely a lot of these things were hidden from view it
01:23:2301:23:23 - was only after the cross that they became brilliantly obvious is that someone like
01:23:2901:23:29 - David knew it he might not have known exactly how Jesus would pay the price he might not have fully understood just
01:23:3701:23:37 - like a lot the truth of this is that how what would happen at the coming of the Messiah was hidden from view but in Isa
01:23:4501:23:45 - in in Psalm 51 what does um David say that God does not take the light in burnt offerings that he wants a broken
01:23:5501:23:55 - heart a contrite spirit so we see that even even Believers such as he recognized that the law was really
01:24:0401:24:04 - pointing to something else it’s not that God wants these sacrifices it’s not that he wants someone who is very meticulous
01:24:1001:24:10 - about keeping the law it’s someone who understands his need for salvation that’s going to be paid for by another
01:24:1701:24:17 - person so even though in many ways the cross was not an obvious fact before before it happened they did not
01:24:2601:24:26 - understand the truth of it they didn’t understand much of what the Messiah would do but we’ve talked about for
01:24:3201:24:32 - example Genesis chapter 3 where again we can see that the Lord was being a bit cryptic when he said that
01:24:4301:24:43 - the serpent would bruise the heel of the seed of the woman but the seed of the woman would crush his head maybe that
01:24:5101:24:51 - sounds like a proverb an idiom or whatever it’s not it’s not very straightforward we we don’t get much
01:24:5701:24:57 - about the cross out of that but then following upon that there was the provision of the coats of skin and not
01:25:0401:25:04 - only that not too long after that we have this issue of Cain and Abel with Abel clearly understanding precisely
01:25:1201:25:12 - what was expected of him and Cain acting as if it made no difference what God has said to his parents so it’s not as if
01:25:2101:25:21 - this was so completely obscure that those who kind kind of understood it where Geniuses of some sort the Lord did
01:25:2901:25:29 - make sure that the Brilliance of the light of this truth was not hidden it might the very details of it how the the
01:25:3701:25:37 - the Son of God the the the Messiah would pay the price how he would redeem um the the world might not be clear in its
01:25:4601:25:46 - details but life was going to be given for life that much was known it was known by Adam and Eve by Abel by no
01:25:5501:25:55 - by everybody who performed the sacrifice and it was enshrined in the law but here is the the thing that actually struck me
01:26:0101:26:01 - I’d never thought about it until we actually started having this conversation that from the beginning of
01:26:0701:26:07 - the revelation of himself to Moses the very start of it symbols of the Cross attended every part of it so that seemed
01:26:1501:26:15 - to be saying yes I’m going to give you a look but don’t miss the points yeah I mean and also I just want to make
01:26:2301:26:23 - emphasize that we modern folks we forget the absolute visceral physical connection to blood sacrifice it doesn’t
01:26:3301:26:33 - hit us you know we understand intellectually you know animals were sacrificed as symbols but we have never
01:26:4101:26:41 - held a knife and taken the life of another living being in such a conscious way right or had a priest do it on our
01:26:5001:26:50 - behalf yeah I mean and I’m not you know obviously this was done for a purpose right God didn’t you know as that that
01:26:5901:26:59 - Psalm that AI read it’s not like God just wanted us to kill animals right like that is not the point here the
01:27:0601:27:06 - point is what that symbolism was but it would hit a lot harder if we actually understood this is what they did you
01:27:1501:27:15 - know I don’t think that as a person who is conscientious enough to want to follow the law that you bring a
01:27:2201:27:22 - sacrifice one does not go through the motions when you’re taking the life of another living being I’m sure some
01:27:2801:27:28 - people did obviously the Pharisees did but for people who had even the barest amount of care for why would God ever
01:27:3801:27:38 - instruct us to do this it’s right there exactly right um yeah one other thing I want to bring up
01:27:4401:27:44 - in this um this is G be sound like kind of I’m just changing the subject randomly but um I don’t want to forget
01:27:5001:27:50 - that’s why I want to bring it up um so when we talk about angels as a title Jesus is a messenger of God um so when
01:27:5901:27:59 - we hear the angel of the Lord think in your head the messenger of God is a title um I was I’m always so amused when
01:28:0801:28:08 - little kids think that Jesus’s last name is Christ have you ever come across this you know in Greek it’s Yus Christos
01:28:1601:28:16 - right that’s what we hear we hear Jesus Christ Jesus Christ Jesus Christ now we don’t know exactly I don’t know if their
01:28:2301:28:23 - names in Hebrew society were patronymic um I could probably go look that up but you know he would be Jesus the son of
01:28:2901:28:29 - Joseph right Joseph and Mary yeah exactly that’s what he would know or you know Jesus the one from
01:28:3601:28:36 - Nazareth right um butus Christos kristos is a title um and we forget this you know we refer to him
01:28:4401:28:44 - by title as Christ Christ did that Christ did this you know um but it’s not a last name um and so we are very
01:28:5201:28:52 - comfortable saying Jes Jesus Christ this Jesus Christ that and when we say Jesus Christ really what we are saying is
01:28:5901:28:59 - Jesus the Messiah Jesus the Messiah that’s what Christ means um yes pretty much we have we have Jesus the Messiah
01:29:0601:29:06 - and we also have the messenger of God see what I’m saying it’s the same prely um it is not different here we have the
01:29:1601:29:16 - messenger of God is just a title no more no less and that is a title that Jesus Christ bears in the same way that he
01:29:2201:29:22 - Bears the title ch Messiah um yeah so I I just I hadn’t really it hadn’t hit me before but I
01:29:3001:29:30 - think it’s really parallel because we don’t get to make great hay out of Christ it’s just a title it just
01:29:3701:29:37 - represents who Jesus is in the same way angas in Greek here or Malak in Hebrew it’s just a title it just is
01:29:4601:29:46 - saying The Messer you know definite article of God it’s what he does it’s talking about who he is and what he does
01:29:5401:29:54 - um and so we shouldn’t make it more complicated than that it’s what it is um yeah yeah true all right well we far
01:30:0301:30:03 - fared fared we went kind of far a field here um but this is just it’s a very good poignant discussion for us of how
01:30:1201:30:12 - all of this points to the cross in the future um like Audi said I hadn’t actually in the same way I hadn’t really
01:30:2101:30:21 - connected all the dots and been wow from the very beginning when God speaks to Moses as AI says cross is in view the
01:30:2801:30:28 - whole time every step of the way um I really put that together before but it just CHS that this was always the plan
01:30:3801:30:38 - we’ve been over this before too right um the cross was always the plan it was there from day one Genesis chapter 3
01:30:4501:30:45 - like we’ve talked about um Believers throughout all history look towards this with Faith and only in that revealing of
01:30:5201:30:52 - the plan did everything become clear to us right um the mystery was revealed and we are blessed to be able to understand
01:31:0001:31:00 - it um so yeah well that’s the second one here we have a couple more to go speaking of
01:31:0901:31:09 - appearances of the Angel of the Lord here in this Exodus narrative pointing us not only to the angel of the Lord
01:31:1701:31:17 - being God but also this Angel of the Lord being Christ crucified um so we look at a couple more examples when we
01:31:2601:31:26 - pick up so the next topic that we’re going to talk about with respect to the angel of
01:31:3501:31:35 - the Lord in Exodus so the angel of The Exodus and we’re just kind of using that as a title for the being who guided the
01:31:4301:31:43 - people of Israel um out of their flight from Egypt to Canaan uh and they wandering in the wilderness for all
01:31:4901:31:49 - those years uh so we are going to be talking here about the Angel sent who is said to be sent before the Israelites to
01:31:5701:31:57 - guard them on the way in their travels and so as part of the giving of the law to Moses on Mount Si and this uh at
01:32:0601:32:06 - least this particular thing we’re going to read comes from Exodus chapter 23 verses 20 to 23 um and this is the being
01:32:1601:32:16 - who is speaking to Moses in this particular uh place in Exodus so during the giving of the law that being says I
01:32:2401:32:24 - am going to send an angel before you to guard you on the way and bring you into the place which I have prepared be on
01:32:3101:32:31 - your guard before him and obey his voice do not be rebellious towards him for he will not pardon your transgression since
01:32:3801:32:38 - my name is in him but if you truly obey his voice and do all that I say then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an
01:32:4401:32:44 - adversary to your adversaries for my angel will go before you and bring you into the land of the amorites the
01:32:5101:32:51 - Hittites the perizzites the Canaanites the h ites and the jebusites and I will completely destroy them all right so the
01:32:5901:32:59 - thing that complicates the interpretation here is we’ve already argued um in something we talked about
01:33:0501:33:05 - in the past uh you know I know we’re a couple weeks separated now since we’re recording these in chunks but um these
01:33:1101:33:11 - verses here that talks about how the law was given through angels and we talk about not like Angels plural as in
01:33:1801:33:18 - creature Angels but we argued that all of these verses so Galatians chapter 3: 19 Hebrews chapter 2: 2 the word spoken
01:33:2601:33:26 - through Angels acts 7: 38 uh which talks about um together with the angel who was speaking to him on Mount Si this one’s
01:33:3601:33:36 - real CA it’s Angel singular acts 7:38 and then acts 7:53 you know the law is ordained by Angels um so the being that
01:33:4601:33:46 - we mentioned who is speaking in Exodus chap 23 is said to be a messenger um and so the complic bit here is that Jesus in
01:33:5601:33:56 - his christophany which is what we’re arguing is happening in this passage here in the giving of the law is saying
01:34:0401:34:04 - that an angel is going to be sent before the Israelites and he says that he’s going to send that angel now the thing
01:34:1001:34:10 - that complicates this and why I think a lot of people tend to think that the father was the one uh you know present
01:34:1801:34:18 - during the given of the law is that Jesus is here speaking as a representative of the father and so if
01:34:2401:34:24 - you if you think yourself into knots here you’ll say well how is Jesus going to send himself because it’s obvious
01:34:3201:34:32 - that the Angel that’s being sent before them is Jesus right he is the christophany the messenger the one who
01:34:3901:34:39 - is protecting them in the pillar of cloud and fire like we just talked about so Jesus is saying he’s going to send an
01:34:4501:34:45 - angel before them to guard them but he is that angel um but the reason why we know that how all this works is because
01:34:5401:34:54 - you can see that the the person being sent is said to have my name in him um so we know that the the being speaking
01:35:0201:35:02 - what we mean by this name is we know that the the members of the Trinity share an Essence and so when the person
01:35:0901:35:09 - speaking in Exodus chapter 23 here says that my name is in him I.E the person who is going to be sent that’s a clear
01:35:1601:35:16 - indication that that being that’s going to be sent is God that’s it’s kind of what we’re to take this to mean
01:35:2401:35:24 - but we already know that it is said that the person speaking here during the giving of the law is the Lord like tetr
01:35:3101:35:31 - Gaton is used in Hebrew uh it is definitely God himself but then we have all these passages that we just
01:35:3901:35:39 - mentioned here you know like that acts 7381 who was the angel who was speaking to him on Mount Si so was it God or was
01:35:4501:35:45 - it an angel the only way to reconcile it is that it was a messenger of God but it was the messenger of God and so
01:35:5401:35:54 - we should not be troubled by the fact that Jesus is speaking here the words from the father are given to him to tell
01:36:0201:36:02 - to Moses here and that the one who he is saying is going to be sent to guard the Israelites is him he is the Angel of the
01:36:1201:36:12 - Lord um and so he is serving as the messenger and if you want to think about it like this in human history when kings
01:36:2001:36:20 - sent you know important documents to other kingdoms for war treaties or trade agreements or whatever those people
01:36:2801:36:28 - basically spoke on the authority of the king they had the king’s words and that is the sense uh with which we need to
01:36:3501:36:35 - take this particular topic of Jesus in a christophany in the giving of the law saying that the angel of the Lord will
01:36:4301:36:43 - be sent to guard the Israelites on their way there is no contradiction in that and we’ve talked about some of the
01:36:5001:36:50 - nonsensical uh things that people who try to rle out the Trinity do like so for example in the baptism of Jesus they
01:36:5701:36:57 - would say that you know uh the father uh you know was baptizing the father and the spirit descended on the father and
01:37:0401:37:04 - they’re all the father it just doesn’t make sense conceptually the way in which this is not that is that we are talking
01:37:1301:37:13 - about the words that were given to the messenger who then gave them to Moses um it’s a different situation um so I’m not
01:37:2101:37:21 - going to spend too much time on that maybe we’ll disc discuss that a bit as we go here um but the point here uh
01:37:2701:37:27 - vises the angel of The Exodus is that this Angel of the Lord was sent to guard them on the way he’s going to send the
01:37:3701:37:37 - angel before the Israelites to lead and guard them and this is in exactly the manner that Christ is sent by the father
01:37:4301:37:43 - um he is the visible person of the Trinity to us when we operate in the world and so Moses is also here told
01:37:5001:37:50 - that they are supposed to obey the angel because my name is is in him I I mentioned that that is a clear reference
01:37:5701:37:57 - to deity that’s what that phrasing means um and we’re going to actually look at another passage here uh in Revelation
01:38:0401:38:04 - chapter 19 that will strengthen this connection that we know this is Jesus Christ and so this is when Christ
01:38:1001:38:10 - Returns the second coming the end of the tribulation when he comes to destroy the armies of the Antichrist at Armageddon
01:38:1801:38:18 - um so picking up at verse 11 so Revelation 19: 11 and following say and I saw heaven opened and behold a white
01:38:2601:38:26 - horse and he who sat on it is called faithful and true and in righteousness he judges and wages War his eyes are a
01:38:3201:38:32 - flame of fire and on his head are many diadems and he has a name written on him which no one knows except himself so
01:38:4101:38:41 - notice the name written on him right um verse 13 He is clothed with a robe dipped in Blood and his name is called
01:38:4801:38:48 - the word of God you know name again uh this is obviously speaking of Jesus Christ and the armies which are in
01:38:5501:38:55 - heaven clothed in fine linen white and clean were following him on white horses from his mouth comes a sharp sword so
01:39:0201:39:02 - that with it he may strike down the Nations and he will rule them with a rod of iron and he Treads The Wine Press of
01:39:0801:39:08 - the fierce wrath of God the almighty and on his robe and on his thigh he has a name written king of kings and Lord of
01:39:1601:39:16 - lords so again verse 12 he has a name written on him which no one knows except himself himself as God and then verse 16
01:39:2401:39:24 - he has a name on his thigh written king of kings and Lord of lords and so if we go back and we look at this passage that
01:39:3201:39:32 - we were looking at in Exodus chapter 23 this idea of the name of God being in the angel of the Lord it is very
01:39:4201:39:42 - parallel to this passage in Revelation chapter 19 this is Jesus Christ we’re talking about here in other words it is
01:39:4801:39:48 - a christophy so that’s this idea and of course the angel being sent to guard
01:39:5401:39:54 - them on the way is the angel in the pillar of cloud and fire it’s not like there’s two of them it’s just this is An
01:40:0001:40:00 - Occurrence uh in Exodus chapter 23 where we hear another mention of this person who is sent with the Israelites you know
01:40:0801:40:08 - another way in which it stated that this Angel Of The Exodus as we’re calling him was sent to guide and protect them that
01:40:1501:40:15 - just shows up here in this passage in Exodus 23 so Audie do you have anything you want to say uh I think the hardest
01:40:2101:40:21 - part of all this is is kind of making sense of Jesus speaking to Moses about sending the angel of the Lord if we’re
01:40:2801:40:28 - saying that the angel of the Lord is Jesus in both places well how do we think about that um you might be able to
01:40:3301:40:33 - explain it better than I did I’m pretty sure that there is no better explanation than that it’s
01:40:3901:40:39 - precisely what you said he was speaking for the father as a messenger and uh um speaking of himself you know so we have
01:40:5101:40:51 - to understand that even if did not say thus says the Lord and so on and so forth even in his appearances he was not
01:40:5801:40:58 - really appearing as a second member of the Trinity he was appearing as the father so to speak that is the people
01:41:0501:41:05 - who were interacting with him were supposed to be interacting with God right so it wasn’t for his own sake that
01:41:1501:41:15 - he was interacting with Moses and all the others he was doing that on behalf of the father so he was speaking on
01:41:2201:41:22 - behalf of the father and therefore the words he was speaking to Moses at that time they pertained to himself but they
01:41:3001:41:30 - were really the father’s words this is a position he takes even when he comes um In the Flesh he keeps saying the words I
01:41:3901:41:39 - speak to you and they’re not my words I’m speaking to you what I heard from the father stuff like that he’s
01:41:4501:41:45 - maintained that same attitude throughout his uh engagement with um Humanity from the beginning until now
01:41:5601:41:56 - so that’s really the it shouldn’t be a conundrum for anybody but if anybody struggles with it that’s the answer it’s
01:42:0601:42:06 - it’s not at all as you said it’s not at all like uh the situation where um uh God sent himself and and also spoke to
01:42:1601:42:16 - himself from the earth is like there’s a bit Insanity for the people who are doing these things it doesn’t apply here
01:42:2301:42:23 - M yeah I think another thing that could help is when we understand that God is Trinity then it’s accurate to say God
01:42:3101:42:31 - did this and God did that and God did that for actions of all three of them right and in particular when we talk
01:42:3701:42:37 - about his name the tetragrammaton is shared between all of them it gets at that Divine existence
01:42:4401:42:44 - that is part of the essence of God that we talked about in our past studies you know the essence and nature of God those
01:42:5001:42:50 - come from the shared Essence three persons one Essence that Essence is tied up in the Divine name and so when we
01:42:5901:42:59 - have members of the Trinity and we say um God told Moses in Exodus 23 that he was going to send God to guide the
01:43:1001:43:10 - Israelites do you see how when we think of it in terms of the Trinity that maybe makes a little more sense right it do it
01:43:1701:43:17 - does because you know that is an accurate statement and because we repeat the same being
01:43:2501:43:25 - there you know like I don’t know if that helps at all I’m I just think maybe that’s a useful concept for us thinking
01:43:3001:43:30 - about talking about it um that is precisely the point once you take the Trinity out of the explanation the whole
01:43:3801:43:38 - thing becomes either insane or just um not outlandish what’s the word that I would use it has now left the realm of
01:43:4901:43:49 - trying to make sense and now we’re in the realm of mysticism where it is possible Right In in this case if we are
01:43:5701:43:57 - going to make sense of the fact that one person is saying that he will send a messenger who has his
01:44:0801:44:08 - Essence now we if once you remove the Trinity from that discussion now what we’re talking about essentially is that
01:44:1601:44:16 - a schizophrenic person is actually it’s it’s it’s a mad situation it’s like you’re splitting into multiple
01:44:2301:44:23 - personalities that’s what’s happening but with the Trinity it makes sense Jesus can speak for the father about
01:44:3001:44:30 - himself that’s it yep yep I really don’t think it’s more complicated than that and I don’t think we need to jump on
01:44:3801:44:38 - people for kind of squinting at it and being like that’s hard to understand it is a bit hard to understand um it’s it’s
01:44:4601:44:46 - this is where the Triune nature of the Trinity and the three persons one Essence bit when we plug that in to the
01:44:5601:44:56 - the what we shall call the characters here right the one talking to Moses in Exodus chapter 23 and the one who is
01:45:0201:45:02 - sent before the Israelites well in both cases it is God a member of the Trinity who is involved and so happens is the
01:45:1001:45:10 - same member here but because they share that will in essence the the words that are given to Jesus Christ to say to
01:45:2001:45:20 - Moses come positionally from the father father and so that’s why it’s really not it’s not a contradiction uh it’s not
01:45:2701:45:27 - something that we should get uh uh you know troubled by we just need to understand that this is how the Trinity
01:45:3401:45:34 - Works in its operations with Jesus as the messenger of the father not just speaking words the father gives him but
01:45:4101:45:41 - basically speaking as the father right he is god um and so you know it it it stretches our brain a little bit but
01:45:5001:45:50 - that doesn’t necessarily mean that there’s anything wrong with that’s what I’m trying to emphasize um yeah yeah
01:45:5901:45:59 - agreed so next uh in this sequence of the appearances of the Angel of the Exodus we’re going to be talking about
01:46:0701:46:07 - the one who Moses among other people knew and spoke to face to face so uh we have been told previously in the study
01:46:1501:46:15 - that no one has ever seen the father while on this Earth so I’m just going to briefly reread a couple of those verses
01:46:2001:46:20 - we have 1 Timothy 6:16 that says uh who you know this is talking about the father you know in
01:46:2801:46:28 - context whom no one has seen or can see um talking about the father there um John
01:46:3601:46:36 - 1818 uh no one has ever seen God meaning the father but the one and only son who is himself God and is in closest
01:46:4501:46:45 - relationship with the father has made him known so in both of these we’re talking about the father we’ve already
01:46:5101:46:51 - made this point previously in our studies here here but we are told that you know despite this fact that no one’s
01:46:5701:46:57 - ever seen the father we’re told that the elders saw the god of Israel in the company with Moses and Aaron so there’s
01:47:0401:47:04 - this passage in Exodus chapter 24 where you know they’re eating with the Elders of Israel so Moses went up with Aaron
01:47:1101:47:11 - naab and abaho and 70 of the Elders of Israel and they saw the god of Israel and under his feet there appeared to be
01:47:1701:47:17 - a pavement of sapphire as clear as the sky itself yet he did not stretch out his hand against the Nobles of the sons
01:47:2301:47:23 - of Israel and they saw God and they ate and drank so well can’t be the father right that’s what we just said so when
01:47:3201:47:32 - we’re talking about them seeing the god of Israel and we understand that the spirit is the Unseen member of the
01:47:3801:47:38 - Trinity that is his characteristic um well by process of elimination has to be Jesus Christ a
01:47:4501:47:45 - pre-incarnate Jesus Christ as in a christophy so that’s Exodus 24: 9 through1 that we just read and we also
01:47:5201:47:52 - know that Moses entered a Cloud of Glory and spoke with the Lord on SI you know we we’re just in Exodus chapter 23 um
01:47:5901:47:59 - Exodus chap 24 verses 16- 18 says that the glory of the Lord rested on Mount Si and a cloud covered it for six days and
01:48:0801:48:08 - on the seventh day he called to Moses from the midst of the cloud and to the eyes of the sons of Israel the
01:48:1401:48:14 - appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a consuming fire on the Mountaintop Moses entered the midst of the cloud as
01:48:2201:48:22 - he went up to the mountain and Moses was on the mountain for 40 days and 40 nights so Moses went into the midst of
01:48:2701:48:27 - the cloud where you know the glory of the Lord was and so he saw the glory of the Lord because he went inside the
01:48:3401:48:34 - cloud again can’t be the father because no one can see the father uh according to those verses we read and then uh you
01:48:4201:48:42 - know Moses actually further petitioned God here to show him his glory we we see that in Exodus 33 um you know uh so I’ll
01:48:5301:48:53 - read that Exodus 33: 18-23 then Moses said I pray you show me your glory and he uh being the Lord here
01:49:0301:49:03 - said I myself will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim the name of the Lord before you and I will
01:49:0901:49:09 - be gracious to whom I will be gracious and will show compassion on whom I will show compassion but he said you cannot
01:49:1501:49:15 - see my face for no man can see me and live then the Lord said behold there’s a place by me and you shall stand there on
01:49:2101:49:21 - the Rock and it will come about while my glory is passing by that I will put you in the Clift of The Rock and cover you
01:49:2601:49:26 - with my hand until I have passed by then I will take my hand away and you shall see my back but my face shall not be
01:49:3201:49:32 - seen um so complexity here is well who’s being talked about right we know that on Sinai it’s a christophany but when he
01:49:4201:49:42 - talks about no one can see my face and live while are we talking about the christophany um we’ll kind of pull back
01:49:4701:49:47 - to that may let aie take a crack at it when we get to it as well but the point here is that we know from New Testament
01:49:5501:49:55 - passages that it cannot be the father um because the Bible is very clear that when we talk of uh appearances of God in
01:50:0501:50:05 - the Old Testament we talk of who is seeing the Lord then the Bible says itself like first John here that no one
01:50:1201:50:12 - has ever seen the father except for the son John 1118 um so we just we have to interpret in light of that uh that
01:50:2101:50:21 - progressive revelation that we have in the New Testament is the only way we can take it because that’s right there in
01:50:2601:50:26 - the Bible so we also have here in numbers 12:8 um where uh you know we said to speak mouth to- mouth openly not
01:50:3701:50:37 - in dark sayings and he beholds form of the Lord why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant against Moses
01:50:4401:50:44 - so Moses is said to behold the form of the Lord again compare those verses that we were uh writing there the Lord speaks
01:50:5201:50:52 - to him M to mouth he speaks openly with him um directly we would say and then uh even clearer we have the
01:51:0101:51:01 - the idiom here face to face you know that’s an presumably an idiom in Hebrew as well um as in English here uh so
01:51:0801:51:08 - since that time uh no Prophet has risen in Israel like Moses whom the Lord knew face to face so Moses knew God face to
01:51:1801:51:18 - face again despite these passages we talked about with 1 Timothy 6 16 John 1:18 and others talking about no one can
01:51:2501:51:25 - see the father well all of this points to that these occurrences that we’re talking about are once again the angel
01:51:3301:51:33 - of the Lord not the actual presence of the father but the appearance of the one who is sent by him speaks for him and
01:51:4001:51:40 - who has undertaken to fulfill his Plan of Salvation in this world and that person is our Lord and Savior Jesus
01:51:4601:51:46 - Christ appearing in pre-incarnate christophany so before he took on a human nature before he was born of Mary
01:51:5401:51:54 - and came into this world as the Messiah the prophecied people or prophecied person who would deliver his people
01:52:0201:52:02 - Jesus Christ in pre-incarnate christophany well he was the one who talked to Moses face to face and ate
01:52:0801:52:08 - with the Elders of Israel and showed Moses his glory on Mount Si so I think the concept is pretty straightforward we
01:52:1701:52:17 - have to interpret this way simply because everything in the Bible is true and if these other verses say that no no
01:52:2301:52:23 - one has seen the father except for the son well it just has to be that way because you know Moses would have seen
01:52:2801:52:28 - the father if it was the father in that passage so um aie I wonder if you could maybe do a better a better job than me
01:52:3501:52:35 - explaining this passage here in Exodus 33 where we talk about specifically no man seeing my face you know is it the
01:52:4301:52:43 - words of the father or is Jesus talking about his face that sort of thing um you’re talking you’re
01:52:4901:52:49 - muted sorry um yeah I think uh you captured it completely the the position of the
01:52:5901:52:59 - scriptures is that no one can actually see the father so everything we see of the appearance of of uh of God
01:53:0701:53:07 - necessarily has to be another member of the Trinity so yeah so when we see um statements like the one you are talking
01:53:1801:53:18 - about it’s still the Lord Jesus who is making such a statement then when we see um how are you not afraid to speak of
01:53:2901:53:29 - Moses I speak to him face to face still the Lord Jesus that’s the thing um so it’s all it’s all the Lord Jesus that’s
01:53:3901:53:39 - the thing we we cannot take just one part of the Bible and ignore the rest we can’t get confused about this because
01:53:4701:53:47 - we’re isolating that you know we have to take it all together if if the Bible tells us in in the New Testament and no
01:53:5401:53:54 - and not just in the New Testament but let’s go with the New Testament that no man has ever seen the father and we know
01:54:0101:54:01 - that there were multiple examples of people who saw God Isaiah did the Elders of Israel you name it so that tells you
01:54:1101:54:11 - something it didn’t see yeah I think I just want to just to push on this I was just going to give
01:54:1801:54:18 - you a chance um but this verse in particular in Exodus 33:20 I think why people stumble on this is because this
01:54:2601:54:26 - sounds like the father right like you can’t see me and live right um but why do we have in our heads that that sort
01:54:3501:54:35 - of thing only applies to the father and I just want us to take a second to stop and think about it Jesus in his
01:54:4101:54:41 - pre-incarnate form was like his glory was not veiled under kinosis like it was during the
01:54:4801:54:48 - Incarnation and so why exactly is that we suppose that you know we look at God in the eye and
01:54:5601:54:56 - we wouldn’t have consequences for it and I’m talking about Jesus Christ here and that’s exactly what he tells Moses no
01:55:0301:55:03 - one can see my face no one can see me and live right um yes but why do we think that can’t apply to the pre the
01:55:1101:55:11 - pre-incarnate Jesus Christ see that’s the problem that people have with this passage is they say well you know people
01:55:1701:55:17 - saw Jesus just fine when he was walking around as a human being and even after his glorification when he had a human
01:55:2201:55:22 - nature but we’re talking about pre-incarnate Jesus here and if the Bible says this then it is so you know
01:55:3001:55:30 - and and simple as that you know and so when the person who’s talking in Exodus 33 has to be the son saying you cannot
01:55:3801:55:38 - see my face for no one can see me and live has to be the sun saying this we know that from what we’ve gone through
01:55:4401:55:44 - this statement has to apply to the son and there is no contradiction in this because it can be equally true that no
01:55:5001:55:50 - one can see the father and live and no one can see the Sun and live both those things can be true but it’s not that we
01:55:5501:55:55 - can see the Sun at all is that they can’t see his face they can’t look him in the eye in this way when he is
01:56:0201:56:02 - showing his glory that’s the other big contextual thing here is that Moses asked to to for him to show me uh
01:56:1101:56:11 - basically Show Me Your Glory um he asked the Lord for that and we know that his face glowed at this point but by you
01:56:2001:56:20 - know by understanding this we know that you know on Mount Si the Israelites saw God like fire it’s what the text says on
01:56:2801:56:28 - if not here I don’t remember if that’s here exactly but like we know this that it was massive overwhelming what we
01:56:3501:56:35 - would call pyrot Technics if you will um that is what we mean by the glory of the Lord but when Jesus talks to Abraham I’m
01:56:4301:56:43 - going to skip ahead we we’ll get to these other slides and stuff in in Genesis Chapter 18 and he wrestles with
01:56:4801:56:48 - Jacob and the man who appears to Joshua and and all of these other things do we see that fire do we see the pyrot
01:56:5701:56:57 - Technics the glory of the Lord completely unveiled well we don’t right because we have no indication then when
01:57:0501:57:05 - Abraham was chatting with this person there was like Flames everywhere right the the the glory of the Lord shining
01:57:1101:57:11 - from him kind of in this unmistakable way his identity was veiled we’ll get to this in a couple slides when we talk
01:57:1901:57:19 - about some of these other christophanies in the old Testament but this passage with Moses that’s the second big
01:57:2601:57:26 - contextual thing to keep in mind here is this you cannot see my face and live business this is talking about Jesus in
01:57:3201:57:32 - christophany but the other big thing is that we’re talking in context here specifically about when Jesus isn’t
01:57:3801:57:38 - bailing his glory at all um and so some people also have they try to draw a contradiction here while they say well
01:57:4501:57:45 - you know all these other people saw God in the Old Testament but look here in Exodus 33 it says that you can’t see him
01:57:5001:57:50 - and live contrad it’s not because in the ofes his glory he could not do this even Jesus Christ under christophany and so
01:58:0001:58:00 - at no point in any of this is there any contradiction um yeah I mean that’s just what it is
01:58:0901:58:09 - you know and and people do struggle with this and they try to proof text this specifically to find fault with the
01:58:1601:58:16 - Bible or say that it contradicts itself or or whatnot but the the person here is Jesus we as we’ve already been over has
01:58:2401:58:24 - to be him from the New Testament references that says no one’s ever seen the father um and Jesus says you cannot
01:58:3001:58:30 - see his face and live um so that’s why Moses is allowed to see his back when his glory is fully revealed when he’s
01:58:3701:58:37 - not veiling anything in his pre-incarnate form um so yeah it’s kind of a lot to get through there but um I
01:58:4501:58:45 - hope that helps us not be troubled by this um you know because I do think this is one of those occurrences in the Old
01:58:5201:58:52 - Testament where I think people I mean you can kind of be forgiven for it a little bit people associate that no one
01:58:5801:58:58 - has seen the father and no one can see me and live here they tie those things together and they think that means this
01:59:0501:59:05 - had to be the father but that actually kind of like contradicts itself right but um yeah you know uh but I’m just
01:59:1201:59:12 - saying because like the these verses in John 1118 no one has seen the father it’s like well seeing his back is still
01:59:1901:59:19 - seeing the father right see what I’m saying um so the only way that this works is if Jesus is the one saying this
01:59:2601:59:26 - um yeah well in discussion on this uh after we paused for a sec I think we came up with several other good ways to
01:59:3401:59:34 - explain this topic which is admittedly a little bit hard to wrap our heads around so one of the analogies that came up in
01:59:4001:59:40 - our discussion was kind of like looking at an eclipse and so we’re not supposed to do this with our eyes directly
01:59:4801:59:48 - because if you do that you get the full dose of looking at the sun you go blind um it hurts your vision um and that’s
01:59:5501:59:55 - sort of the sense here you know light is a is a metaphor for Glory all throughout the Bible like 2 Corinthians chapter 3
02:00:0202:00:02 - for example we hear about Moses’s face reflecting light and you know there’s this idea of light being Glory um and uh
02:00:0902:00:09 - at any rate uh when we think about this in terms of the eclipse we have to use sunglasses when we look at it we cannot
02:00:1702:00:17 - bear the full dose of that light um so to speak that’s the same thing that we’re talking about here with Moses so
02:00:2502:00:25 - uh when Moses says he wants to see the glory of God God kind of says okay but then he puts him in a rock and he only
02:00:3202:00:32 - lets him see his glory as he’s passed by from behind this is the in our analogy this is using sunglasses it’s not Moses
02:00:4102:00:41 - did not get the full dose of God so to speak of Jesus’s in his christophany the pre-incarnate Christ he did not get the
02:00:4902:00:49 - full dose of his unveiled Glory um now when we were discussing this the other main point aside from the uh the uh sort
02:00:5902:00:59 - of eclipse analogy and not getting the full dose was the fact that the father just never veils his glory this is why
02:01:0602:01:06 - there’s a difference it’s because all three members of the Trinity share the same Essence all three of them are holy
02:01:1202:01:12 - they are intolerant of sin cannot be in the presence of sin but Jesus veils his glory um sometimes like as when he’s
02:01:1902:01:19 - talking with Abraham in Genesis 18 He looks like a man right he’s not he’s not lighting up the entire top of Mount
02:01:2702:01:27 - Si like he is in this place right when he’s speaking with Moses in the cloud but he can do that and like when he
02:01:3302:01:33 - leads the Israelites um so it’s a matter of how much Jesus has uh uh veiled himself from us but the the point is the
02:01:4302:01:43 - father never does that and so that’s why it’s true that people can’t see the father at all but when Jesus removes
02:01:5002:01:50 - those limits when he does not Veil his divinity in that way and the pre-incarnate Christ remember didn’t
02:01:5702:01:57 - have a human body at this point we’re still talking about before the Incarnation so even at this point like
02:02:0202:02:02 - when God walks with Moses in Genesis Chapter 18 which we’ll get to um he’s doing that you know he’s manifesting
02:02:0902:02:09 - this physical form within the world to interact with other human beings well he’s doing that even without a physical
02:02:1402:02:14 - body but he’s doing that with his divinity Veil um so it’s not really kosis it’s not the same concept as that
02:02:2302:02:23 - really but it’s this idea that the sun is the one who appears to us but his role he is veiling that full essence of
02:02:3202:02:32 - divinity because if he didn’t that would be looking at the eclipse with no sunglasses full on that would be
02:02:3802:02:38 - blinding to us it would kill us we’d be destroyed because of God’s holiness and so when you think about it like this
02:02:4702:02:47 - then this whole thing I think makes a little bit more sense because no one can see the father no one has seen the
02:02:5202:02:52 - father because the father never veils his glory that’s his uh he he represents the the unapproachable side of deity
02:03:0102:03:01 - right he is the representation of deity within the Trinity um and so the father never veils his glory we can only see
02:03:0802:03:08 - the sun headon we can only get the full dose when he is veiling his glory that’s what this passage here in Exodus chapter
02:03:1602:03:16 - 33 ver 18 and foll is talking about is that even when we’re talking about the son if the son fully unveils himself in
02:03:2602:03:26 - the same way that the father is his glory is not veiled it all at any time if the sun does the same thing we still
02:03:3302:03:33 - die just as much because he’s God because the only time when we aren’t immediately annihilated upon this sort
02:03:3902:03:39 - of thing is when God Is veiling His glory and so this whole passage um you know Moses being put behind in the Clift
02:03:4802:03:48 - of a rock and only seeing his back what we are being told here in essence is that he did not get the
02:03:5402:03:54 - full dose that he would if Jesus unveiled his glory and we didn’t have these circumstances that made him kind
02:04:0202:04:02 - of see less than the fully unveiled glory of the Son of God of Jesus Christ in his pre-incarnate form so hopefully
02:04:1002:04:10 - that kind of helps explain things a little more here um uh you know help us work through you know is it the son is
02:04:1702:04:17 - it the father how do we know um there’s no contradictions that that whole thing we’ve been talking about here to clear
02:04:2202:04:22 - up this passage um some of those things in discussion I just kind of think help us maybe get a little bit more intuition
02:04:2702:04:27 - for it which just sometimes makes it easier for us to understand believe it accept it that sort of thing so hope all
02:04:3502:04:35 - of that has been helpful in our understanding of this point here in Exodus chapter
02:04:4202:04:42 - 33 all right so the last occurrence here of appearances of the Angel of the Exodus that’s the section we’ve kind of
02:04:5102:04:51 - been going through here we’re going to be talking about uh this reference in Judges chapter 2 where uh the angel is
02:04:5902:04:59 - talking about the one who led them up from Egypt um so Judges chapter 2 veres 1-5 I’m just going to go ahead and read
02:05:0702:05:07 - this just like we’ve been doing all the other passages so Exodus 21 or sorry Judges chapter 2 verse one um now the
02:05:1402:05:14 - angel of the Lord came up from gilgal to boim and he said I brought you up out of Egypt and led you into the land which I
02:05:2102:05:21 - have warn to your fathers and I said I will never break my Covenant with you and as for you you shall make no
02:05:2702:05:27 - Covenant with the inhabitants of this land you shall tear down their altars but you have not obeyed me what is this
02:05:3302:05:33 - you have done therefore I also said I will not drive them out before you but they will become as thorns in your sides
02:05:4002:05:40 - and their gods will be a snare to you when the angel of the Lord spoke these words to all the sons of Israel the
02:05:4602:05:46 - people lifted up their voices and wept so they named that place boim and there they sacrificed to the Lord so the
02:05:5302:05:53 - operative points here is that the angel of the Lord is the one speaking but he says this speaking in the first person I
02:06:0002:06:00 - brought you up out of Egypt into this land which I have sworn to your fathers and I said I will never break my
02:06:0602:06:06 - Covenant with you so the angel of the Lord uses the first person when we’re talking about the Covenant between the
02:06:1302:06:13 - people of Israel and the god of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob ero christophany this one is
02:06:2002:06:20 - really not that complicated relative to the others that we’ve been talking about um the angel claims to be the one who
02:06:2602:06:26 - led them up from Egypt and reminds the Israelites that he will never break my Covenant with you only the father could
02:06:3302:06:33 - make such a claim or someone representing him that is his servant our Lord Jesus Christ who would fulfill that
02:06:4102:06:41 - Covenant and he would make a new one he would Minister a new one for us in his blood that’s what he did for us on the
02:06:4802:06:48 - cross um New Covenant not old Covenant but point is the Angel of the Lord is talking about his Covenant the Covenant
02:06:5602:06:56 - that he first person made with the people of Israel and he has to be doing that sent as a representative of the
02:07:0302:07:03 - father um so I think this one is pretty straightforward is there anything else you want to add
02:07:0902:07:09 - aie so um like you said pretty straightforward it’s would be quite
02:07:1602:07:16 - arrogant for any ordinary Angel to be saying all that right we we we have said that in the other example Jesus was
02:07:2502:07:25 - speaking for the father but there’s a special status that Jesus actually occupies other Angels would they
02:07:3202:07:32 - wouldn’t speak like that it would be it would be Madness to speak that way so you kind of think of this in terms of
02:07:4102:07:41 - in debate or philosophy there’s something called a reductio adab zurin it’s Latin for like a reduction to the
02:07:4702:07:47 - Absurd right if you say that this being that we Angel well is it a creature angel or is it the angel of the Lord if
02:07:5402:07:54 - you say this is a creature Angel we know elsewhere that creature Angels like AI just said they don’t talk like this it
02:08:0202:08:02 - doesn’t make any sense um and and we know from elsewhere and actually we can we can do this we don’t have to rely on
02:08:1002:08:10 - kind of inferential arguments we know elsewhere that the person who is said to have brought the people out of Egypt and
02:08:1602:08:16 - lead them into the land and make covenants with them is you know t Graton god um Yahweh Jehovah um because of that
02:08:2702:08:27 - that’s where we get this equivalence between the angel of the Lord and God himself as in second member of the
02:08:3302:08:33 - Trinity because the angel of the Lord is said to have done these things right here in this passage in Judges chapter 2
02:08:4102:08:41 - but also God is said to have done these things you know Alim tetr grammaton you know The God Who to them they would have
02:08:5002:08:50 - viewed him probably not as Triune yet but we understand that it is the god of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob he is God
02:08:5802:08:58 - it’s what we’re saying the angel of the Lord is God and for that reason it’s the second member of the Trinity which means
02:09:0502:09:05 - this is christophany um yes so now we’re going to be talking
02:09:1402:09:14 - about references to the angel of the Lord elsewhere in the Old Testament so we’ve just finished now talking about
02:09:2202:09:22 - appearances of the Angel of the Lord sort of in The Exodus account so so-called Angel Of The Exodus guiding
02:09:2902:09:29 - the people of Israel out of Egypt and uh through the Wilderness to the promised land and we know that God did this you
02:09:3702:09:37 - know the the Lord uh Yahweh Tetra Graton God did this and we know that he’s also described as being the angel
02:09:4602:09:46 - of the Lord um so that is you know this passage that we just got done with here um in judges 15 um well the angel of the
02:09:5502:09:55 - Lord you know that’s where we get this phrase from among other places it’s used directly there in judges so that’s who
02:10:0002:10:00 - we’ve been talking about well it’s the same being that we’re going to be addressing now except we’re going to
02:10:0602:10:06 - just kind of go over a bit of a wider stretch of passages a couple of these will be familiar a couple of these we’ve
02:10:1102:10:11 - kind of already talked about but just multiple instances in the Old Testament where we know it is an actual appearance
02:10:1902:10:19 - of God and as we’ve talked about four when we have an appearance of God in the Old Testament you know that is what the
02:10:2702:10:27 - word theophany means we are making that point that all such appearances are actually appearances of a pre-incarnate
02:10:3402:10:34 - Jesus Christ not the father because as we’ve gone over quite a lot already um we only know the father through the son
02:10:4302:10:43 - only the son has seen the father that this is what the New Testament says very clearly about this so it has to be a
02:10:4902:10:49 - christophany that is the point that we’ve been emphasizing that’s where we’ve been going uh for our last uh you
02:10:5502:10:55 - know kind of few topics we’ve gone over here and so now you’re just going to see aside from The Exodus account where God
02:11:0202:11:02 - is leading his people out of Egypt and through the Wilderness to Canaan well aside from that which we went over a few
02:11:0902:11:09 - examples of uh appearances of the Angel of the Lord so for example to Moses on Mount Si uh you know the pillar of fire
02:11:1602:11:16 - and pillar of cloud things like this well aside from that narrative we have all the other instances as well where
02:11:2302:11:23 - it’s pretty clear that this is God we’re talking about is an appearance of God in the Old Testament and that means that
02:11:3002:11:30 - it’s a christophy um and so you’ll see what I mean as we go here um lots of instances and all of these a just
02:11:3702:11:37 - upfront note points to that symbolism of the blood of Christ and what his sacrifice represents for us just as we
02:11:4502:11:45 - kind of introduced with uh some of the other uh the passages and topics we were going through before uh so for example
02:11:5302:11:53 - the pillar of fire being over the the part of the Tabernacle where uh the high priest goes into on the day of atonement
02:12:0002:12:00 - the holy of holies representing Christ’s judgment you know the shedding of blood for the Forgiveness of sins on that sort
02:12:0602:12:06 - of thing well think in terms of that as we go about uh talking about some of these passages too so not all of them
02:12:1302:12:13 - some of them are way more clear than others and you’ll kind of see what I mean when we get there so the first
02:12:1802:12:18 - instance we’re going to be talking about that is another clear instance of an appearance of God in the Old Testament
02:12:2402:12:24 - that we’re identifying as a christophany is when Jacob wrestles with the angel and this is in Genesis chter 32 picking
02:12:3202:12:32 - up in verse 22 so as I say lots of scripture that we are going to be uh a that’s interesting the reference
02:12:4102:12:41 - from exus picks up at verse 22 looks like verse 24 is kind of where it starts but regardless maybe 24 through 32 um so
02:12:4802:12:48 - uh reading lots of scripture here to just give that account of the situations
02:12:5302:12:53 - we’re talking about so uh Genesis CH 32 picking up at verse 24 says then Jacob was alone and a man wrestled with him
02:13:0202:13:02 - until Daybreak when he saw that he had not prevailed against him he touched the socket of his thigh so the socket of
02:13:0802:13:08 - Jacob’s thigh was dislocated while he wrestled with him then he said let me go for the Dawn is Breaking but he said uh
02:13:1702:13:17 - he being Jacob here I will not let you go unless you bless me so he said to to him what is your name and he said Jacob
02:13:2302:13:23 - he said your name shall no longer be Jacob but Israel for you have striven with God and with men and have prevailed
02:13:3002:13:30 - then Jacob asked him and said please tell me your name but he said why is it that you ask my name and he blessed him
02:13:3602:13:36 - there so Jacob named the place penel for he said I have seen God face to face yet my life has been preserved now the son
02:13:4502:13:45 - Rose upon him just as he crossed over penel and he was limping on his thigh therefore to this day the sons of Israel
02:13:5302:13:53 - do not eat the sine of the hip which is on the socket of the thigh because he touched the socket of Jacob’s thigh in
02:13:5902:13:59 - the sen of the hip so a couple interesting things to point out is that Jacob knows at least he does at the
02:14:0702:14:07 - point of verse 30 he knows that this being who he wrestled with was God and that he saw God face to face not an
02:14:1402:14:14 - Angel um but you know Elohim here right God himself rather than uh another creature um and so uh you know whether
02:14:2502:14:25 - or not he knew that from the first as Paul it but he also asks for a blessing earlier on in the passage which you know
02:14:3302:14:33 - would he ask angels for blessings you have some interpretive things like that but the point is Jacob knew that this
02:14:3902:14:39 - was an appearance of the Lord and that the being that he saw here face to face um as we have talked about before has to
02:14:4902:14:49 - be reincarnate Jesus Christ because no one sees the father um so this is another place in the Old Testament where
02:14:5602:14:56 - we see an appearance of the Angel of the Lord um and in fact Hosea 12 confirms that this occurrence here um so we’re
02:15:0602:15:06 - told that it was God here in Genesis 32:30 Jacob says I have seen God face to face yet my life has been preserved well
02:15:1402:15:14 - how do we know it’s not the father well among other reasons we know this is the Angel of the Lord because of hoseah
02:15:2002:15:20 - chapter 12 so in Hosea 12: 3- 4 um this is speaking of Jacob it says that in the womb he being Jacob took his brother by
02:15:3002:15:30 - the heel and in his maturity he contended with God okay so that’s God again as we saw in Genesis chapter 32
02:15:3702:15:37 - verse3 but then in verse four of chapter 12 of Hosea we see that Jacob wrestled with the angel and prevailed notice the
02:15:4602:15:46 - angel so we just said contended with God wrestled with the angel so the Angel is God right he wept and sought his F favor
02:15:5402:15:54 - he found him at bethl and there he spoke with us so the angel and God just as we’ve talked about multiple times before
02:16:0102:16:01 - are equated with one another here um and this parallelism that you’ll see here he contended with God yes he wrestled with
02:16:0802:16:08 - the angel and prevailed that parallelism is very common in Hebrew um uh and different languages sort of have their
02:16:1502:16:15 - different uh think about the right word it’s not strictly like Poetic syntax but um this destruction if you want to call
02:16:2202:16:22 - it that uh these things are being put in opposition to one another the angel is God as we’ve been going over all this
02:16:3002:16:30 - time before but that’s how we know here that this particular occurrence of Jacob wrestling with this being in Genesis
02:16:3702:16:37 - chapter 32 well not only is it said to be God but we know that it is the Angel of the Lord that Jacob wrestled with
02:16:4402:16:44 - because hoseah 12 says it’s the angel so this is another occurrence of Christ in the Old Testament now another one here
02:16:5402:16:54 - um that we’re going to look at is Genesis 18 and so um this is uh you know talking about the birth of Isaac and
02:17:0402:17:04 - you’ll see um this one’s a little bit long here um but we have uh Jacob or sorry Abraham speaking with the Lord so
02:17:1402:17:14 - again small caps Lord means we know that we are speaking of the god of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob uh yah way Jehovah
02:17:2202:17:22 - um this is the tetr Gaton in the Hebrew so the Lord appeared to him in being Abraham by The Oaks of mamra where he
02:17:3002:17:30 - was sitting at the tent Door In the Heat of the day and so when Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked behold three men
02:17:3702:17:37 - were standing opposite him and when he saw them he ran to the tent door to meet them and bowed himself to the Earth and
02:17:4302:17:43 - said my Lord if I have now found favor in your sight please do not pass your servant by please let a little water be
02:17:4902:17:49 - brought and wash your feet and rest your El under the tree and I will bring a piece of bread that you may be that you
02:17:5402:17:54 - may refresh yourselves after that you may go on since you have visited your servant and they said so do as you have
02:17:5902:17:59 - said um and so Abraham and Sarah um basically uh you know this is where the
02:18:0902:18:09 - birth of Isaac is prophecied um but uh it’s very clear In this passage in Genesis Chapter 18 that um Abraham is
02:18:1802:18:18 - actually speaking with the Lord um and I’m not going to go ahead and read the whole thing um just because uh you know
02:18:2702:18:27 - it it basically the point that we’re making here is that the Lord appeared to him right and again that is the the
02:18:3502:18:35 - language be talking about the appearance of the Lord theophany and this has to be christophy for all the reasons we’ve
02:18:4102:18:41 - said now the other people the other beings who were present here that Abraham saw as well well it’s not like
02:18:4902:18:49 - this is like the three members of the trinity not the right way to take this it was that it would have been the
02:18:5302:18:53 - pre-incarnate Jesus Christ in angels as well um so uh but basically this appearance to Abraham is well of the
02:19:0302:19:03 - Lord because the passage itself says that the Lord appeared to him um not just an angel but God himself um and so
02:19:1202:19:12 - a uh sorry uh Genesis Chapter 18 uh the appearance of the Lord to Abraham uh this is another place where where well
02:19:2102:19:21 - it’s not exactly The Exodus narrative but it is an appearance of God in the Old Testament which we take to be a
02:19:2702:19:27 - christophany um so again I just mentioned lots of passages we’re going to go through here reading scripture the
02:19:3502:19:35 - next one we’re going to look at is the man who appeared to Joshua in Joshua chapter 5 who said to be the commander
02:19:4402:19:44 - of the Lord’s host um and so we’ll go ahead and read this passage and then come back to our descript destion of it
02:19:5102:19:51 - so Joshua 5 picking up at verse 13 says now it came about when Joshua was by Jericho that he lifted up his eyes and
02:19:5902:19:59 - looked and behold a man was standing opposite him with his sword drawn in his hand and Joshua went to him and said to
02:20:0502:20:05 - him are you for us or for our adversaries he said no rather I indeed come now as captain of the host of the
02:20:1302:20:13 - Lord and Joshua fell on his face to the Earth and bowed down and said to himwhat has my Lord to say to his servant the
02:20:2102:20:21 - captain of the Lord’s host said to Joshua remove your sandals from your feet for the place where you are
02:20:2602:20:26 - standing is Holy and Joshua did so so a couple things point to this person here the commander of the Lord’s
02:20:3602:20:36 - host actually being reincarnate Jesus Christ so uh number one Joshua worships him he bows down in actual worship now
02:20:4702:20:47 - he is not the only person in the Bible to bow down at the appearance of of some being who’s obviously not human but in
02:20:5302:20:53 - Revelation chapter 19 when John does this taken away in his prophetic Vision when he does this for an Angel and the
02:21:0102:21:01 - angel scolds him and says no no um I am a fellow servant of yours and your brethren who hold the testimony of Jesus
02:21:0802:21:08 - Christ worship God for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of Prophecy so um John says this in Revelation 19:10 and
02:21:1702:21:17 - similar thing here in Revelation 22:9 he does it again and the angel says don’t do that I’m a fellow servant of
02:21:2402:21:24 - yours and your brethren and the prophets who heed the words of this book worship God and so we know from the Bible that
02:21:3102:21:31 - if humans try to Bow Down and Worship Angels the Angels would be like don’t do that uh don’t worship me worship God but
02:21:4002:21:40 - you’ll notice that in this particular passage in Joshua chapter 5 the being who appears before Joshua doesn’t
02:21:4702:21:47 - say no stop I’m a fellow servant of yours he accepts the worship and then he tells Joshua to remove his sandals
02:21:5502:21:55 - because he’s standing on ground that is Holy and uh that should sound real familiar because we talked about the
02:22:0102:22:01 - burning bush not so long ago where we burning bush is very obviously christophany we we talked about that a
02:22:0902:22:09 - few slides back well the wording here is very nearly identical remove your sandals from your feet for the place on
02:22:1602:22:16 - which you are standing is Holy Ground yeah that showed up in Exodus 3 versus you know like five and following where
02:22:2302:22:23 - Moses comes to the burning bush that same phrasing is used here in Joshua chapter 5 when Joshua is talking to the
02:22:3002:22:30 - commander of the Lord’s host so third example here of an appearance of the pre-incarnate Christ in the Old
02:22:3802:22:38 - Testament as a christophany um you know aside from the the ones dealing with the angel of The Exodus that we’ve already
02:22:4502:22:45 - been over um and so this one next one that we’re going to look at uh in Exodus chapter 24 we’ve actually already talked
02:22:5202:22:52 - about this one um overlaps a bit here with what we’ve already talked about where the Elders of Israel so Exodus 24:
02:23:0102:23:01 - 9-1 the Elders of Israel saw the god of Israel and under his feet there appeared to be a pavement of sapphires clear as
02:23:0702:23:07 - the sky himself yet he did not stretch out his hand against the Nobles of the sons of Israel and they saw God and they
02:23:1202:23:12 - ate and drank together with him so um this particular not just Moses and Aaron but actually the Elders of Israel as
02:23:1902:23:19 - well seeing God on Mount Si in The Exodus narrative um we’ve already been over this once I’m not going to spend
02:23:2502:23:25 - too much time on this but something that is worthy of note and this is presumably why Dr L will brings it back up again in
02:23:3202:23:32 - the study is that the symbolic meal of fellowship with him um which probably going to blow your mind a bit when we
02:23:3902:23:39 - when we talk about this this is clearly foreshadowing communion based on the blood of Jesus Christ and so I think
02:23:4802:23:48 - sometimes this particular particular significance not that I want us to get super off topic here sometimes we might
02:23:5402:23:54 - not make this connection uh when people think of communion as a hyper ritualized you know they they call it a uh one of
02:24:0302:24:03 - the things in the church that I don’t know why the word’s escaping me um you know it’s like marriage
02:24:1002:24:10 - um whatever um you know basically if you make it a ritual you rob it of the fact that communion has always been about
02:24:1802:24:18 - sharing a meal that’s what it was when Jesus first instituted it with the apostles it’s about this idea of
02:24:2502:24:25 - Fellowship shared in the blood of Christ and so this is clearly a precursor to it is symbolizing foreshadowing prophesying
02:24:3602:24:36 - that future institution that Jesus gives to us to commemorate what he did on the cross um it’s foreshadowing you know
02:24:4402:24:44 - that is what prop prophetic typology does here um and so that is a connection that we hadn’t
02:24:5202:24:52 - explored before but um this is what I meant about keep in mind all of these places where we were pointing everything
02:24:5902:24:59 - back to the Cross to what Jesus did how all of these things uh foreshadow it they they tell of what Jesus would do um
02:25:0802:25:08 - even all of these appearances in the Old Testament now we’re about to see two more that even more clearly say that so
02:25:1502:25:15 - keeping on as I say long section here um the next one that we’re going to look at is in Judges chapter 6 and so this is uh
02:25:2402:25:24 - when the angel of the Lord appears to Gideon um so Judges chapter 6 picking up in verse 11 um this one is a little bit
02:25:3402:25:34 - longer but I am going to read this whole one it’s not quite as long as the Genesis 18 passage from before so then
02:25:4102:25:41 - verse 11 then the angel of the Lord came and sat under the oak that was in arra which belonged to joash the abz as his
02:25:5002:25:50 - son Gideon was beating out wheat in the wine press in order to save it from the midianites the angel of the Lord
02:25:5702:25:57 - appeared to him and said to him the Lord is with you oh Valiant Warrior then Gideon said to him oh my Lord if the
02:26:0402:26:04 - Lord is with us why then has all this happened to us and where are all his miracles which our fathers told us about
02:26:1002:26:10 - saying did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt but now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian the
02:26:1802:26:18 - Lord looked at him and said go in this your strength and deliver Israel from the hand of Midian have I not sent you
02:26:2502:26:25 - he said to him oh Lord how shall I deliver Israel behold my family is the least in manasse and I am the youngest
02:26:3102:26:31 - in my father’s house but the Lord said to him surely I will be with you and you shall defeat Midian as one man so Gideon
02:26:3902:26:39 - said to him if now I have found favor in your sight then show me a sign that is you who speak to me please do not depart
02:26:4602:26:46 - from here until I come back to you and bring out my offering and lay it before you
02:26:5002:26:50 - and he said I will remain until you return Then Gideon went in and prepared a young goat and unleavened bread from
02:26:5702:26:57 - an aath of flour he put the meat in a basket and the broth in a pot and brought them out to him under the Oak
02:27:0302:27:03 - and presented them the angel of God said to him take the meat and the unleavened bread and lay them on this rock and pour
02:27:0902:27:09 - out the broth and he did so then the angel of the Lord put out the end of the staff that was in his hand and touched
02:27:1502:27:15 - the meat and the unloving bread and fire sprang up from the Rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened bread then the
02:27:2302:27:23 - angel of the Lord vanished from his sight when Gideon saw that he was the angel of the Lord he said alas oh Lord
02:27:3102:27:31 - God for now I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face the Lord said to him peace to you do not fear you shall not
02:27:3902:27:39 - die all right so passage where God is calling Gideon he is basically giving him a job and Gideon says well how do I
02:27:4902:27:49 - know it’s you God and through the sacrifice that is consumed in fire Gideon is given a sign to understand
02:27:5602:27:56 - that this is God he’s talking to and you’ll notice all throughout the passage the person in question here is said to
02:28:0202:28:02 - be the angel of the Lord right so that that particular connection there between God and the angel of the Lord is one
02:28:0902:28:09 - we’ve made over and over here but the symbolism that we’re going to just give a nod to here is that the angel
02:28:1702:28:17 - identifies himself with the sacrifice by touching it with his staff and so that is towards the end of the passage
02:28:2502:28:25 - here um verse 21 the angel of the Lord put out the end of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the
02:28:3102:28:31 - unloving bread and fire sprang up from the Rock and consumed the meat and the unloving bread um so we kind of talked
02:28:3802:28:38 - already about how in the Mosaic law they had a particular set of uh regulations concerning burnt offerings uh this came
02:28:4702:28:47 - up before when we were talking about the symbolism there well when this goes up in Flames this represents typologically
02:28:5502:28:55 - the Judgment of God that Christ was to undergo on our behalf and so this is again perhaps not something that you
02:29:0302:29:03 - would have seen um taught on much but the symbolism is there um this is not like a huge stretch we’re making here
02:29:1102:29:11 - that we are speaking of the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ and the offering that Gideon gives to him is
02:29:1902:29:19 - going to be representing God’s fire consuming the offering you know basically put up for the Redemption of
02:29:2602:29:26 - all of our sins um and so that particular theme of redemption tracing throughout all these appearances of God
02:29:3402:29:34 - it’s just something that I hadn’t seen before until we connect the dots when we go through the appearances of Christ in
02:29:4102:29:41 - the Old Testament like this so more as well um next one probably even more uh overt
02:29:5002:29:50 - in this connection um actually pretty similar um so in Judges chapter 13 we hear about the parents of Samson um so
02:30:0002:30:00 - uh see it’s been a second since I’ve looked at this but um you know so the the birth of Samson is prophecied here
02:30:0702:30:07 - um you know uh we have this it’s not even like a literary theme because we know the Bible is true but this idea of
02:30:1402:30:14 - a barren woman given birth uh you can also compare uh uh you know Elizabeth the mother of John the Baptist and and
02:30:2102:30:21 - Sarah of course the wife of Abraham well um so we have a certain man of Zora of the family at the day nights whose name
02:30:2902:30:29 - was monoa and his wife was baren and had borne no children so we have the birth of Samson prophecied here and he is said
02:30:3602:30:36 - that he will be Nazarite and um you’ll note that at this particular time uh the angel of the Lord appears but at this
02:30:4402:30:44 - point they are not tracking so much that the one who appeared was God um so verse three uh we are said that the angel of
02:30:5202:30:52 - the Lord appeared to the woman who was Barren and said to her uh you know so on um but in verse six the woman comes and
02:31:0002:31:00 - gets her husband saying a man of God came to see me and his his appearance was like the angel of the angel of God
02:31:0702:31:07 - very awesome and I did not ask him where he came from nor did he tell me his name um so they aren’t 100% here um and they
02:31:1702:31:17 - can suspect right because we see that the appearance of of the angel of God was very awesome but when when Noah
02:31:2402:31:24 - entreats the Lord later on um you know basically hold on let me look at the passage for a sec here
02:31:3202:31:32 - um so he comes back I’m I’m looking for the let me see the particular passage was through verse
02:31:4102:31:41 - 23 uh right um so I’m I’m skipping some stuff in the middle I’m sorry I just I this section is already going to be
02:31:4802:31:48 - pretty long um but uh we have this idea of an offering again here um so when monoa and his wife do this um they
02:31:5902:31:59 - prepare an offering for the Lord um because you know uh this is just what was arranged well then uh basically
02:32:1002:32:10 - monoa asks the name um of the person that they’re talking to um but the angel of the Lord ascends in the flame of the
02:32:1902:32:19 - altar so when Noah and his wife saw this they fell on their faces to the ground because they knew that this was the
02:32:2602:32:26 - angel of the Lord so again there’s this idea we will surely sigh for we have seen God very parallel to the end of
02:32:3202:32:32 - this passage in Judges chapter 6 where you know Midian sees he he sees that the angel of the
02:32:4102:32:41 - Lord touched his burnt offering with his staff and then the fire consumed it and then that was the sign and then he he
02:32:4902:32:49 - recognizes that he he’d seen the angel of the Lord face to face and then God says you know peace to you do not fear
02:32:5402:32:54 - you won’t die well similar sort of thing happens at the end of this passage in Judges chapter 13 uh like verse
02:33:0202:33:02 - 2223 um monoa and his wife realized that they have seen God that this was the angel of the Lord that they were talking
02:33:0902:33:09 - to um but he does not heal them right this is the understanding that the being before them was this reincarnate appear
02:33:1902:33:19 - of Christ so I’m sorry a bit rambly I forgotten how long this one was um so the angel uh the connection that we’re
02:33:2502:33:25 - going to make here is that the angel is described as such throughout the passage but manoah and his wife though realizing
02:33:3302:33:33 - that an angel has appeared to them and is obviously you know not a human being they don’t completely realize that this
02:33:4002:33:40 - is in fact the angel of the Lord until his departure in verse 21 when they exclaim that they have seen God so in
02:33:4902:33:49 - the passage we talked about in Judges chapter 6 where um we spoke of Gideon’s sacrifice and symbolism of the sacrifice
02:33:5902:33:59 - being consumed by the fire prefiguring uh Jesus’s judgment upon the cross it’s even more explicit here in this passage
02:34:0702:34:07 - with the parents of Samson um because um when they offer this one sec um right the the bit I have
02:34:1802:34:18 - highlighted right now um the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame of the altar he becomes associated with it he
02:34:2602:34:26 - goes through the Flames um and so this is just a clearer parallel here um it’s more distinctly drawn how ikus puts it
02:34:3302:34:33 - is more distinctly drawn in this passage for he ascended quote unquote in the flame of the burnt sacrifice the very
02:34:3902:34:39 - picture of Christ being judged on our behalf teaching Old Testament Believers to look forward to God’s future
02:34:4402:34:44 - forgiveness of sins through a sacrifice that he would provide um so the symbolis here it is particularly noteworthy that
02:34:5402:34:54 - the angel of the Lord that we’re talking about is Jesus Christ he is the one who ascended Through the flames of judgment
02:35:0102:35:01 - um and this is one of those reasons why getting this idea of christophany correct theologically
02:35:0902:35:09 - speaking that these appearances in the Old Testament of this being are of Jesus Christ has that symbolic punch to it
02:35:1702:35:17 - because it points everything forward to the Cross we understand that this is the visible member of the Trinity who would
02:35:2402:35:24 - be sent to die for our sins okay so we have my four more four more passages left here um so we have
02:35:3502:35:35 - talked about all of these places so wrestling with Jacob appearing to Abraham um the man who appeared to
02:35:4102:35:41 - Joshua the commander of the Lord’s host uh the being who ate with the um the Elders of Israel and Moses and a in
02:35:4902:35:49 - prefiguring communion uh the angel of the Lord who appeared to Gideon when Gideon was called the angel of the Lord
02:35:5602:35:56 - appearing to the parents of Samson um well we’re gonna talk now about a couple of prophetic Visions which through some
02:36:0602:36:06 - interpretive leg work we can identify as actually being Jesus Christ so uh we will cross reference some of this with
02:36:1302:36:13 - Revelation because we have a description of Jesus Christ in Revelation but in the book of Isaiah um Isaiah has a vision of
02:36:2102:36:21 - Israel’s King and this is in Isaiah chapter 6 um and so you know somewhat long chapter not going to entirely go
02:36:2902:36:29 - through it here but if you compare the Lord sitting on the throne lofty and exalted with a train of his robe filling
02:36:3702:36:37 - the temple and then you know I’m going to go on and read a little bit here um this is it the first part of Isaiah
02:36:4402:36:44 - chapter 6 picking up at verse one um so that person sitting on the throne in the temple with his robe filling the temple
02:36:5202:36:52 - sarim stand above him this is picking up at verse two each having six wings with two he covered his face and with two he
02:36:5802:36:58 - covered his feet and with two he flew and one called out to another and they said holy holy holy is the Lord of hosts
02:37:0402:37:04 - the whole earth is full of his glory and the foundations of the thresholds trembled with the voice of him who
02:37:0802:37:08 - called out while the temple was filling with smoke and then Isaiah speaks of being a man of unclean lips for he has
02:37:1602:37:16 - seen the king the Lord of hosts um so um um okay so that’s Isaiah chapter 6 well how do we know that this is Jesus Christ
02:37:2502:37:25 - um we have somewhat of an oblique reference to this in the Gospel of John in John 12: 41 because Isaiah is said to
02:37:3302:37:33 - have seen his glory and he spoke of him and so you have to do some uh some BL work there um you have to do a bit of of
02:37:4302:37:43 - interpretation to get here but that particular passage in Isaiah chapter 6 we’re talking about with the being on
02:37:4902:37:49 - the throne uh you know with the seraphim in present we line this up with this reference in the Book of John and we
02:37:5902:37:59 - understand that Isaiah was seen to uh he saw a vision of Jesus Christ and one of the other reasons why we know this um is
02:38:0702:38:07 - that the altar upon which this being stands when the Cole is taken from the altar that is what takes away the sin of
02:38:1602:38:16 - Isaiah here um so you can kind of take my word for uh we don’t quite have enough time to go into all the
02:38:2202:38:22 - connections there but this is one vision of Jesus Christ enthroned in glory we talked about him as the father’s uh
02:38:3102:38:31 - representative or messenger carrying basically as the Crown Prince Regent of this world he carries that monarchy that
02:38:3902:38:39 - is part of his you know he has his mission and uh what he’s been sent to do but part of that is that he will reign
02:38:4502:38:45 - he will be the king of king and the Lord of lords um so we have a kind of similar thing so that was Isaiah chapter 6 in
02:38:5202:38:52 - Ezekiel chapter 1 uh shorter this time so Ezekiel chapter 1 picking up at verse 25 through verse 28 um so Ezekiel 125
02:39:0202:39:02 - and there came a voice from above the expanse that was over their heads whenever they Stood Still they dropped
02:39:0802:39:08 - their wings now above the expanse that was over their heads there was something resembling a throne like lapis lazuli in
02:39:1402:39:14 - appearance and on that which resembled a throne high up was a figure with the appearance of a man and I noticed from
02:39:2002:39:20 - the appearance of his loins and upward something like glowing metal that looked like fire all around within it and from
02:39:2602:39:26 - the appearance of his loins and downward I saw something like fire and there was a Radiance around him and the appearance
02:39:3202:39:32 - of the rainbow in the cloud as the appearance of the rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day so was the appearance of
02:39:3802:39:38 - the surrounding Radiance such was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord and when I saw it I fell on
02:39:4402:39:44 - my face and I heard a voice speaking so obviously being represented in the glory of the radiance about him
02:39:5302:39:53 - that idea of visible light being a manifestation of God’s God’s glory um well that’s where this comes from in
02:40:0102:40:01 - Ezekiel well when we compare what we just read in Ezekiel chapter 1 with the description of the glorified Christ
02:40:0802:40:08 - found in Revelation um you know and also the appearance of the one who you know ate with the elders uh who were upon the
02:40:1702:40:17 - pavement of sapphire in Exodus CH 24 like we already read well when we go compare what we just read in Ezekiel
02:40:2402:40:24 - chap 1 to the description of uh Jesus Christ in Revelation CH 1 verses 12- 16 um well picking up at
02:40:3302:40:33 - verse 12 we said I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me and having turned I saw seven golden lampstands and
02:40:3802:40:38 - in the middle of the lampstands I saw one like a son of man Flo in a robe reaching to his reaching to the feet and
02:40:4502:40:45 - gted across his chest with a golden sash his head and his hair were like white wool like snow and his eyes were like a
02:40:5202:40:52 - flame of fire his feet were like burnished bronze when it has been made to Glow in a furnace and his voice was
02:40:5802:40:58 - like the sound of many Waters in his right hand he held the Seven Stars and out of his mouth came a sharp two-edged
02:41:0302:41:03 - sword and his face was like the sun shining in its strength so same idea of the outpouring of Glory with light um we
02:41:1302:41:13 - also have uh you know his feet burn his bronze made to Glow in a furnace and you can compare that to
02:41:1902:41:19 - you know the uh basically from his loins downward something like fire this Radiance coming out from him in Ezekiel
02:41:2702:41:27 - again you do some interpr interpretive leg work here but we can line the being seen in ezel up with the glorified Jesus
02:41:3702:41:37 - Christ um and so these are a little bit distinct from some of the appearances that that we’ve talked about in the
02:41:4402:41:44 - physical manifestations these are appearances of Jesus Christ and prophetic Visions now the thing that
02:41:4902:41:49 - complicates this a little bit not that we’re going to get super far into it because the section’s already super long
02:41:5402:41:54 - is that you can also have visions of the father um so difference between appearances of God in the world those
02:42:0202:42:02 - are always Jesus Christ is that you can have prophetic visions of the father is well um and so doing the interpretive
02:42:0802:42:08 - leg work to show this is actually a vision of the glorified Christ rather than the father that is actually
02:42:1302:42:13 - something that you have to do um but again we’re kind of skipping over that here so you apologize but um well
02:42:2102:42:21 - another prophetic passage to kind of seal the the several that we’re going to look at here comes from Zechariah
02:42:2602:42:26 - Chapter One um so H see am I gonna read this whole thing
02:42:3502:42:35 - um well so basically we have a okay I’ll go ahead and read the whole thing just to give us all the context so Zechariah
02:42:4302:42:43 - 1: 7 and following on the 24th day of the 11 month which which is the month Shabbat in the second year of Darius the
02:42:5202:42:52 - word of the Lord came to Zechariah the prophet the son of bariah the son of Ido as follows I saw at night and behold a
02:43:0002:43:00 - man was riding on a red horse and he was standing among the Myrtle trees which were in the Ravine with red sorl and
02:43:0602:43:06 - white horses behind him then I said my Lord what are these and the angel who was speaking with me said to me I will
02:43:1202:43:12 - show you what these are and the man who was standing among the Myrtle trees answered and said these are those whom
02:43:1802:43:18 - the Lord has sent to patrol the Earth so they answered the angel of the Lord I note the angel of the Lord’s here in
02:43:2502:43:25 - verse 11 who was standing among the Myrtle trees that is the Angel of the Lord is the one standing among the
02:43:3002:43:30 - Myrtle trees and said we have patrolled the Earth and behold all Earth is peaceful all the Earth is peaceful and
02:43:3602:43:36 - quiet then the angel of the Lord said oh lord of hosts how long will you have no compassion for Jerusalem in the cities
02:43:4202:43:42 - of Judah with which you have been indignant these 70 years the Lord answered the angel who was speaking with
02:43:5202:43:52 - me gracious words comforting words so the angel who was speaking with me said to me Proclaim saying thus says the Lord
02:43:5802:43:58 - of hosts I am exceedingly jealous for Jerusalem and Zion but I am very angry with the Nations who are at ease for
02:44:0402:44:04 - while I was only a little angry they furthered the disaster therefore thus says the Lord I will return to Jerusalem
02:44:1102:44:11 - with compassion my house will be built in it declares the Lord of hosts and a measuring line will be stretched over
02:44:1702:44:17 - Jerusalem again Proclaim saying thus says the Lord of hosts my cities will again overflow with prosperity and the
02:44:2302:44:23 - Lord will again Comfort Zion and again choose Jerusalem all right so this one is
02:44:3102:44:31 - notable because in this part of Zechariah here um you know uh the word of the Lord came to Zechariah the
02:44:4002:44:40 - prophet well we know this to be more than just a figure of speech because we know that is the Angel of the Lord who
02:44:4702:44:47 - is standing in the Myrtle tree speaking to Zechariah here that’s what verse 11 tells us but the thing that is so
02:44:5202:44:52 - crucial to helping us understand how this works you know when we talk about who is talking who is appearing and the
02:45:0002:45:00 - distinctions between the people of the Trinity now remember Zechariah the Old Testament here is that the angel of the
02:45:0702:45:07 - Lord who appears said right so the angel of the Lord said oh lord of hosts he’s addressing a different being he’s
02:45:1702:45:17 - addressing some other person in the Trinity um should blow our minds a little bit right the angel of
02:45:2402:45:24 - the Lord in this passage in Zechariah Chapter 1 is distinct from The Lord of hosts um but we know from other places
02:45:3202:45:32 - in the Old Testament that they’re both god um so um that is the takeaway here and I mean this is all this evidence
02:45:4402:45:44 - that we’ve gone through all of these other places in the Old Testament that we see the appearance of the Angel of
02:45:5002:45:50 - the Lord equated with God or appearing to all these people this is why we are saying that
02:45:5602:45:56 - the uniform conclusion is that all of these appearances are of Jesus Christ in a pre-incarnate state um and if all of
02:46:0402:46:04 - that weren’t enough to finally top it all off we have the fact and again this is something I never put together until
02:46:1102:46:11 - I read this part on ichus that after the birth of Christ Angels appear plenty right there are still more appearances
02:46:1702:46:17 - of angels in the Bible but never again does the angel of the Lord appear in scriptures we only hear of Jesus Christ
02:46:2602:46:26 - right Jesus Christ appears after this you know as in the God man who is now perfectly God and perfectly man the
02:46:3302:46:33 - hypostatic union that man appears but we don’t hear anymore of the Angel of the Lord who as
02:46:4102:46:41 - we’ve just gone through appears many places in the Old Testament has this this role of speaking authoritatively
02:46:4902:46:49 - for god well the one that we see doing that in the New Testament is Jesus Christ if you want to compare the quote
02:46:5802:46:58 - unquote job descriptions of the Angel of the Lord in Jesus Christ they’re the same and so this is why we know Jesus
02:47:0502:47:05 - Christ is the Angel of the Lord and this argument from Silence if you want to call it that that after Jesus Takes on a
02:47:1202:47:12 - human nature after he becomes human he’s born during the Incarnation we no longer see appearances of the Angel of the Lord
02:47:1902:47:19 - we only hear about appearances of Jesus Christ is perhaps some of the strongest evidence of all that these two beings
02:47:2602:47:26 - have always been the same person that this is how the plan of God has worked so that was an awful lot we’ve gone
02:47:3202:47:32 - through here um all of these things point to that that truth that we’ve been outlining this entire time that when we
02:47:4102:47:41 - hear of God appearing to people in the Old Testament in all of these ways even in Visions sometimes we know that we are
02:47:4802:47:48 - speaking of Jesus Christ this is the member of the Trinity who appears who is visible to us who represents the
02:47:5602:47:56 - authority of the father so that’s actually where we’re going to wrap this particular section
02:48:0402:48:04 - talking about christophanies and appearances of Jesus Christ in the Old Testament it’s actually where we’re
02:48:1002:48:10 - going to be ending this study here that we’ve been going through of theology proper as well so we started out talking
02:48:1602:48:16 - about the uh the nature of God his infinite nature and his perfect character and then we shifted into
02:48:2302:48:23 - talking about the Trinity and that’s kind of The Wider section that we’re wrapping up here um appearances of God
02:48:2902:48:29 - in the Old Testament manifesting Jesus Christ the second person of the Trinity being present even from the earliest
02:48:3502:48:35 - parts of scripture um but the takeaway point that Dr lugan bille has Us close on here is that the Lord Jesus Christ
02:48:4502:48:45 - has always been the win the has always been and will always be the person with whom we have to do in whom we must
02:48:5402:48:54 - believe in order to have an eternal relationship with the father it’s only Christ who has quote unquote made the
02:49:0002:49:00 - father known it’s what John chapter 1 verse 18 says to us um no one has seen God the only be the only begotten is in
02:49:0902:49:09 - the bosom of the father he has explained him so Jesus Christ is the only one who has seen the father um and only through
02:49:1602:49:16 - him do we come to possess uh the quote knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ that’s quoting 2
02:49:2302:49:23 - Corinthians 4:6 for God who said light shall shine out of darkness is the one who has shown in our hearts to give the
02:49:3002:49:30 - light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ so you can also compare the first part of Jesus
02:49:3602:49:36 - Christ or sorry the first part of Hebrews chapter 1 talking about how Jesus is the exact representation of the
02:49:4302:49:43 - glory of the father um so in the Old Testament we hear the father appearing through the pr incarnate son in the New
02:49:5002:49:50 - Testament we see and hear the Incarnate son speaking the father’s words so Jesus Christ and this is what I was getting at
02:49:5702:49:57 - before in his pre-incarnate appearances as the angel of the Lord the function if you want to call it that
02:50:0702:50:07 - that he served in the division of labor that the Trinity split their roles he in both cases was the representative of the
02:50:1602:50:16 - Father the agent sent to act on behalf of the father um that has been consistent across his appearances as the
02:50:2302:50:23 - angel of the Lord pre-incarnate Jesus Christ as well as after the Incarnation um so to wrap all this up into a nice
02:50:3102:50:31 - neat bow this particular section here the Trinity has always been present in God’s revelation of himself to those who
02:50:3802:50:38 - believe and follow him we saw that just before in that passage in Zechariah Chapter one you know the angel of the
02:50:4402:50:44 - Lord said to the Lord of hosts if you don’t see the Trinity there um it’s right there in the text right
02:50:5302:50:53 - the Trinity has always been present in God’s revelation of himself to those who believe and follow him as Christians
02:50:5902:50:59 - whenever we say the word God we should keep in mind that for us this means the Trinity the father and the Son and the
02:51:0602:51:06 - Holy Spirit um and I don’t think this is uh think I the right way to say this like we think of God and God is one
02:51:1602:51:16 - because he has one essence know the shared Essence between the members of the Trinity um however we know that the
02:51:2402:51:24 - three persons of the Trinity all work together in perfect Unity to bring about that plan as we’ve talked about um so is
02:51:3102:51:31 - there anything else you want to say to to close us off here this particular section on uh basically you know uh us
02:51:3902:51:39 - seeing everything through Jesus Christ as the representative of the father or us thinking of God in terms of the
02:51:4402:51:44 - Trinity when we consider him anything else at all Audi before we close this one
02:51:5102:51:51 - out I I hope you’ll be able to hear me my um connection has been pretty bad um there isn’t very much to say we can
02:52:0402:52:04 - say for certain that um God is one and God is three and those three
02:52:1602:52:16 - persons self assign Rose themselves in order to bring about the plan that God had from eternity the
02:52:2502:52:25 - whole point of discussing and exploring the nature of God is to understand who we’re
02:52:3402:52:34 - dealing with there are all sorts of conceptions about God out there there are all manner of
02:52:4202:52:42 - things that people have to deal with in negotiating life with God in charge of our Affairs think about
02:52:5202:52:52 - this if if you were voting in an election generally you want to know what sort of person you would be giving the
02:53:0502:53:05 - right to set the environment for the choices you’ll be making so depending on what kind of person it
02:53:1302:53:13 - is you might end up with some with some really hard choices or with some really easy
02:53:1902:53:19 - choices so we tend to want to know everything we can learn in order to make best choices we
02:53:2602:53:26 - can now it’s the same thing when we’re talking about eternity there are all manner of candidates out there for what
02:53:3502:53:35 - God we want to serve the goal is not just what happens to us in this life even though a lot of
02:53:4302:53:43 - people think that that is what it’s about whether you’re having a good time living in this world or you’re
02:53:5102:53:51 - having a miserable time yes it doesn’t matter what quality of life we can have in this world to
02:53:5802:53:58 - some degree because if you can’t make any choices at all about eternity
02:54:0402:54:04 - then well it’s out of your hands what sort of Eternity you will have so the quality of life does matter to some
02:54:1302:54:13 - extent but it only matters because we have to make a choice about eternity life in this world is extraordinarily
02:54:2302:54:23 - temporary no one has managed to survive from the beginning of the human race until now so we can take for granted
02:54:3202:54:32 - everybody will die if you do believe in cryogenics and all the scientific mumbo jumbo about
02:54:4202:54:42 - eventually uh making it possible for human beings to live forever well I don’t think I can say much to you I
02:54:5002:54:50 - think that should that that does belong in the realm of Science Fiction and that is where it should
02:54:5602:54:56 - stay but if we know that we’re going to die and Eternity is a reality and the question we have to answer is with all
02:55:0702:55:07 - of these things claiming to be God and there are very many claims out there just as I believe it’s First Corinthians
02:55:1502:55:15 - says there are gods and Lords many for us who believe of course there is only one God but then if we’re going to
02:55:2402:55:24 - make the best choice for eternity it does matter who are we going to believe if anyone claims to be God how
02:55:3302:55:33 - do we know that their claim is true and if we choose to follow the scriptures well this is what the
02:55:3902:55:39 - scriptures tells us or tell us about who the true God is it tells us that he’s a trinity that there are three persons who
02:55:4902:55:49 - are in perfect unity and share one Essence so that they are one God now that might break your brain or it might
02:55:5702:55:57 - not whichever the case is it’s what the Bible says do you believe it is the question then it tells us that these
02:56:0502:56:05 - three persons have self- assigned roles to themselves in order to bring about the plan the objective that God had for
02:56:1402:56:14 - creating everything that exists and along the way in understanding his plan we come to see
02:56:2402:56:24 - that because of sin the father took the role of being the face of God to us the one who says who speaks to us uh
02:56:3702:56:37 - authoritatively as God he acts as God to was on behalf of the three of them and the Lord Jesus Took the role of the
02:56:4702:56:47 - servant of the father for our sakes in order to realize
02:56:5402:56:54 - our Redemption because of sin we have to keep that in mind it is because of sin that all of this is happening and the
02:57:0102:57:01 - Holy Spirit took up the role of empowering everything that God wants done in
02:57:0802:57:08 - creation so it is for this reason that we talk about the manifestations of God in creation it’s not just an academic
02:57:1702:57:17 - topic it’s not just an interesting thing to maybe waste a little time over since we’re Christians we have to talk
02:57:2202:57:22 - Christian stuff no there is a reason for exploring this we come to appreciate how intimately involved God has been with
02:57:3202:57:32 - this matter he’s not been absentee even though the father has been in the third heaven now keep that in mind even though
02:57:4102:57:41 - he is actually omnipresent just like the son is omnipresent and the Holy Spirit is omnipresent there is a symbolism here
02:57:4902:57:49 - there is a metaphor there is something they’re communicating with how they’ve arranged things the father being in the
02:57:5602:57:56 - third heaven is essentially to say I do not tolerate sin I must be separated from sin so that I can save
02:58:0802:58:08 - The Sinner that’s a very important lesson for us to show us that it is out of his love for the Sinners who are his
02:58:1602:58:16 - enemies that he separat himself from them to give them a chance to come to repentance so that they can be brought
02:58:2402:58:24 - back to him as his children and in order for them to be brought back as his children a member of
02:58:3202:58:32 - the Trinity has to play the role of the servant of the father in order to bring them home to their
02:58:4202:58:42 - father that’s exactly the role that Jesus plays that’s why we see this whole business of the Angel of the Lord and
02:58:4902:58:49 - and um the christophanies being theophanes and or theophanes being christophanies and all of that it’s not
02:58:5502:58:55 - just the nice intellectual exercise to have it is a description of God’s love for us something God did not have to do
02:59:0602:59:06 - one bit he didn’t have to create a single thing but he did because he is love and sharing himself with
02:59:1402:59:14 - intelligent creatures who are capable of making a choice to accept his gift or to deny or to reject his gift that is the
02:59:2402:59:24 - essence of his character that’s what we see in this matter so all this discussion that we are having is to put
02:59:3302:59:33 - us in the right position to appreciate that this person is the right God to serve of all the claims out there who
02:59:4402:59:44 - has gone as far as he has gone who has done what he has done how what wisdom has been demonstrated To Us by any other
02:59:5302:59:53 - God that even remotely matches what we have seen that that Jesus himself would play
02:59:5902:59:59 - the role not just of the servant but as the representative of the father in way that he did appearing to Moses appearing
03:00:0703:00:07 - to uh old time Old Testament Believers in all the ways that we have seen in order to bring that plan to pass that
03:00:1603:00:16 - required him to end up on the cross paying a very Dreadful price for our sin the the amount of thought that had to
03:00:2403:00:24 - have gone into that in order to see us become Believers and become children of God saved for all eternity that is what
03:00:3403:00:34 - we are exploring it’s not just a very nice um theological discussion where we can pick a camp and decide whether we
03:00:4503:00:45 - are trinitarians or not trinitarian Etc that’s um what I think I have that yeah um and uh it is a good sort of Koda
03:00:5803:00:58 - to this very long study that we are now concluding here is that when we get to the end of such things as these you know
03:01:0603:01:06 - if we have spent all this time and energy on this it does not go to waste because this is the stuff that spiritual
03:01:1303:01:13 - growth is made of um when we go through this it’s not you know academic as AI has been saying it is so that when we
03:01:2203:01:22 - study and learn about who God is we can use that understanding the spirit will use it as capital so to speak in our
03:01:3003:01:30 - heart to help us do what we’re supposed to as Christians this is the sort of thing that helps us better understand
03:01:3903:01:39 - God his purposes his plans and that in turn is what we’re here to do uh we have to learn this because it’s the only way
03:01:4703:01:47 - that we can actually serve God as he wishes for us so excellent discussion to recap here we are doing all of this
03:01:5403:01:54 - because this understanding we gain of God through this close study through all of the details that we’ve been going
03:02:0003:02:00 - over is what helps us to actually know him um know him as the Bible says not in some sort of Airy fairy sense of well I
03:02:0903:02:09 - I talk to God therefore I know him but we know what he is like and how he operates and what his goals and plans
03:02:1603:02:16 - are because then we can fit ourselves into what he wants us to do so we’ll close one sec in uh just a moment here
03:02:2403:02:24 - going over everything that we’ve done in this last section but this is a good stopping point for this study um it is
03:02:3103:02:31 - one of the most Central topics for us as Christians understanding exactly who God is uh specifically what Jesus did for us
03:02:3903:02:39 - there is almost nothing more Central than understanding the nature of the God we
03:02:4603:02:46 - serve all right all right so uh this review is going over everything that we’ve done in this last lesson here in
03:02:5403:02:54 - the study where we’ve been talking about actual appearances of Christ in the Old Testament so not just the concept of it
03:03:0003:03:00 - but actual occurrences by reading all these passages going over the appearances of the Angel of the Exodus
03:03:0703:03:07 - so the one who led the Israelites out of Egypt through the Wilderness to the promised land um we talked about all
03:03:1303:03:13 - these separate cases that we identified as clear christophanies the burning bush the column of cloud and fire the angel
03:03:2103:03:21 - sent before the Israelites to guard them on the way uh the being who spoke to Moses and the elders and and other
03:03:2703:03:27 - people face to face and the angel who is said to have led the Israelites out of Egypt on that Judges chapter two passage
03:03:3503:03:35 - all of these all of these point to the angel of the Lord who is a pre-incarnate Jesus Christ and then after that we
03:03:4103:03:41 - talked about um all sorts of references here uh to other appearances of the Angel of the Lord in the Old Testament
03:03:4903:03:49 - so wrestling with Jacob appearing to Abraham in Genesis Chapter 18 uh appearing to Joshua as the commander of
03:03:5503:03:55 - the Lord’s host in Joshua 5 uh you know appearing to Gideon in Judges chapter 6 the parents of Samson in Judges chapter
03:04:0303:04:03 - 13 these visions that we identified in Isaiah chapter 6 and Ezekiel chapter 1 and then zechariah’s vision of the Angel
03:04:1003:04:10 - of the Lord addressing the Lord of hosts as a different person in Zechariah Chapter 1 and we might go on even I’m
03:04:1703:04:17 - not not sure this has been completely comprehensive but in all of this we see that the pre-incarnate Jesus Christ has
03:04:2503:04:25 - been the messenger of the Father the one bearing of Father’s plan for us from the very beginning and that didn’t just
03:04:3303:04:33 - start after the Incarnation but it has always been the case and so um this concludes this particular study that
03:04:4003:04:40 - we’ve gone through here uh going over theology proper the study of God um his his nature his infinite nature his
03:04:4703:04:47 - perfect character and now his his uh how he is in the matter of the Trinity um three persons one Essence um all of
03:04:5603:04:56 - these things that we’ve gone over help us get that picture of who God really is and that in turn helps us understand
03:05:0303:05:03 - what he has done for us in redeeming Humanity out of our sins