When the Old Testament says that “the word of the LORD” came to a prophet, it identifies God as the source of the message. Some passages also describe a vision or a personal encounter with Him. John later identifies the eternal Word as the Son who became flesh. I read those earlier encounters in light of that fuller revelation, while letting each account explain how the LORD made Himself known.
The LORD Revealed Himself at Shiloh
In 1 Samuel 3, Samuel was still a boy serving under Eli at Shiloh. Eli’s sons were priests, but they had corrupted the worship they were supposed to lead, and Eli had failed to restrain them. The priests still offered sacrifices at the tabernacle, yet the chapter says that the word of the LORD was rare and there was no widespread revelation. Carrying on with the services had done nothing to remedy the wickedness Eli was allowing in his own household.
When the LORD called Samuel at night, the boy thought Eli wanted him. He went to the priest three times before Eli recognized who was speaking and told him how to answer. The message Samuel then received announced judgment against Eli’s household because Eli knew about his sons’ wickedness and had failed to restrain them.
Samuel had to deliver that judgment to the man under whose care he had been serving. He was afraid to tell Eli the vision, but when Eli insisted on hearing it, Samuel told him everything and hid nothing (1 Samuel 3:15-18). God went on to establish Samuel as a trustworthy prophet in Israel. The chapter closes by describing how the LORD continued to make Himself known.
Then the LORD appeared again in Shiloh. For the LORD revealed Himself to Samuel in Shiloh by the word of the LORD.
1 Samuel 3:21, NKJV
The LORD appeared and revealed Himself by His Word. I understand this as more than entrusting Samuel with information to repeat. He was making Himself known to the boy He had called, and His speaking belonged to that encounter. Samuel had not arranged a meeting or discovered a way to reach God. The LORD took the initiative and taught him to listen.
The Hebrew wording translated “revealed Himself” describes something being uncovered or made known. The word dabar, translated “word,” can refer to speech, a matter, an event, or a thing, depending on the context. Here, “by the word of the LORD” explains how the LORD revealed Himself. Those meanings clarify the sentence, but they cannot by themselves establish a visible appearance of Christ. The New Testament also helps us identify the One who makes God known.
The Word Comes with Personal Authority
The LORD also spoke personally to Abram, long before Samuel’s birth. Genesis 15 describes a vision after Abram had rescued Lot from a coalition of kings. Abram had obeyed God’s call and left his homeland, but he still had no son through whom the promise would continue. The LORD addressed him in those circumstances.
After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, saying, “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward.”
Genesis 15:1, NKJV
The LORD assured Abram, “I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward.” Abram could bring his concern about remaining childless to the One who had called him. God answered with a promise about Abram’s own offspring and later made covenant with him. The promise rested on God’s faithfulness, not on Abram finding a way to produce an heir.
In 1 Samuel 15, the phrase “the word of the LORD” introduces a judgment against King Saul, who had disobeyed God’s command concerning Amalek. The LORD sent Samuel to confront him, and the king’s position did not entitle him to a more favorable verdict.
Now the word of the LORD came to Samuel, saying, “I greatly regret that I have set up Saul as king, for he has turned back from following Me, and has not performed My commandments.”
1 Samuel 15:10-11, NKJV
Saul had defeated the Amalekites, but he had spared their king and the best of their livestock, contrary to God’s command. He pointed to his victory and defended keeping animals for sacrifice, yet neither success nor a religious explanation could make his disobedience acceptable. Samuel had no right to soften God’s message because the man receiving it was king. A prophet’s responsibility was to deliver what the LORD said, not make it more palatable to an influential audience.
Jeremiah’s commission came centuries later, during Josiah’s reign and before Judah’s exile to Babylon. He would have to address rulers and priests who resisted God’s warnings about judgment. The LORD had appointed Jeremiah to this work before the prophet was born.
Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying: “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you; I ordained you a prophet to the nations.”
Jeremiah 1:4-5, NKJV
Jeremiah objected that he was young and did not know how to speak. The LORD commanded him to go where He sent him and say what He commanded, promising to deliver him. The account also says, “the LORD put forth His hand and touched my mouth” (Jeremiah 1:9). God personally commissioned Jeremiah and gave him the words he was responsible to speak. His youth did not excuse waiting until he felt ready to obey.
Abram, Samuel, and Jeremiah did not have identical experiences, but each heard from the same LORD. The authority of their messages rested with Him. A prophet’s eloquence could not make a false message true, and an unpopular message did not lose its authority because people resented hearing it. We can depend on God’s promises because He is truthful, and we need to heed His warnings because He is holy.
God’s Word Acts
The LORD’s speaking also accomplishes what He intends, whether He is fulfilling a promise or carrying out a judgment. Psalm 33 takes us back before the prophets and kings to the creation of the heavens.
By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, And all the host of them by the breath of His mouth.
Psalm 33:6, NKJV
God’s command brought the heavens into existence because He had the power to accomplish what He said. The words did not function as a spell with power independent of Him.
In Isaiah 55, the LORD invites the thirsty to come freely and calls the wicked to forsake their ways because He is ready to pardon. He explains that His thoughts and ways are higher than ours, then compares His Word with rain that waters the earth and causes it to produce food. What He sends accomplishes its purpose.
So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.
Isaiah 55:11, NKJV
I can trust God’s promise of mercy because He has promised to pardon those who return to Him. His Word will accomplish what He pleases, so I cannot use it to demand whatever outcome I want. Isaiah’s assurance should lead me to turn back to the LORD and receive His mercy on His terms.
His Word also exposes the lies of people who claim to speak for Him. In Jeremiah 23:29, the LORD asks, “Is not My word like a fire?” The false prophets spoke confidently, but that confidence could not make their claims true or protect them from His judgment. I find comfort in that when false teaching is persuasive and popular. God’s truth does not become weaker because someone has found an appealing way to contradict it.
The Son Makes the Father Known
The Old Testament also describes the LORD appearing to people, including Abraham, Jacob, Moses, and Manoah. How should we understand those encounters when the New Testament says that no one has seen God?
No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.
John 1:18, NKJV
John identifies the Son as the One who makes the Father known. Jesus said of the Father in John 5:37, “You have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form.” I read the Old Testament appearances in light of those statements. The people involved truly encountered the LORD through the Son, who reveals the unseen Father.
That is why I recognize the Son in the visible appearances of the LORD. The divine Angel of the LORD speaks as God, bears His name and exercises divine authority to forgive or judge, while remaining personally distinct from the One who sends Him. I also believe Melchizedek was the preincarnate Son exercising His eternal priesthood. Such an appearance before Christ became man is called a Christophany. The studies on the Angel of the Lord and Christophanies in the Old Testament examine the reasons for those identifications.
This does not mean every angel is Christ or that every prophetic message involved a visible appearance. Samuel’s account expressly connects the LORD’s appearing with His revealing Himself by His Word, and Genesis 15 describes a vision in which He addressed Abram. We should acknowledge those details where they are given and avoid adding them to passages that do not describe them.
The Word Was God and Became Flesh
John opens with “In the beginning,” recalling Genesis. He describes the Word as already existing when creation began.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.
John 1:1-3, NKJV
The Word was with God and was God. He is eternal and fully divine, yet personally distinct from the Father. We cannot account for John’s words by calling Him “a god” among other gods or an exalted creature. Nor is John describing an impersonal attribute that eventually developed into a person. He is writing about Someone who already existed with God in the beginning.
Verse 3 makes the claim even more explicit. Everything that was made came into existence through Him. If the Son were a created being, we would have to place Him among the things He Himself made, which makes no sense. John identifies Him as the Creator, not a distinguished servant within creation.
Being with God also rules out the idea that the Father and Son are the same Person changing roles. That view is called modalism. The Son speaks to the Father, obeys Him, reveals Him and returns to Him. Those relationships are real. Scripture teaches one God in three personally distinct, coequal and coeternal Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Son’s relationship with the Father does not make Him less than God.
The Greek word John uses for Word is Logos. Some readers look to Greek philosophy to explain the term, but John gives us his own explanation of who the Word is. He writes about creation and the light and life found in Him, then identifies the One whose glory the disciples saw, full of grace and truth. I would rather let John’s testimony explain Jesus than begin with Plato and try to fit Christ into that framework.
John’s explanation agrees with the earlier passages. Psalm 33 connects creation with God’s Word, Samuel’s account describes the LORD revealing Himself by His Word, and Isaiah declares that His Word accomplishes what He sends it to do. John identifies the eternal Person through whom all things were made and who makes the Father known. We should not assume that every Old Testament reader understood everything John would later explain. We can receive that fuller revelation while reading the earlier accounts in their own setting.
Then John tells us that the eternal Word became flesh. This was the incarnation: the Son truly became man without ceasing to be God. He did not appear briefly in a human disguise and then leave it behind.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
John 1:14, NKJV
The word translated “dwelt” carries the idea of pitching a tent or tabernacling. Israel’s tabernacle had stood among the people’s tents as the place God appointed for His presence and worship. John describes the Word living among His people in real human flesh. Jesus experienced hunger and weariness, and He wept. His obedience as man was real, as was the physical blood He would shed for sinners.
Paul brings the Son’s revelation of God together with His saving work at the beginning of Hebrews. God had spoken through the prophets in many ways. He has now spoken by His Son, the One through whom He made the worlds. This same Son provided cleansing from our sins.
God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
Hebrews 1:1-3, NKJV
Paul speaks of redemption through Christ’s blood in Colossians 1, the same chapter in which he describes Christ’s authority over everything created. The Savior who shed His blood for us is also the One who made us.
For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
Colossians 1:16-17, NKJV
The Son continues to sustain the creation He entered to save sinners. Wicked men tortured His innocent body and put Him to death. His sinlessness qualified Him as the perfect sacrifice for our sins, and He willingly gave Himself to be slain. He completed His saving work through His shed blood and death before His burial and bodily resurrection. His death was for the sins of the whole world. The Father did not punish or abandon Him; Father and Son were united in providing our redemption.
Having purged sins and risen bodily, He is seated at the Father’s right hand. I need to receive Him as my Savior and respond to what these passages reveal about Him. We receive salvation by grace through repentance and faith in Christ. Moral improvement and religious insight cannot earn it. His invitation is genuine and open to everyone, even though people can resist and reject it.
Someone who is truly born again becomes a new creation, indwelt and sealed by the Holy Spirit. That believer is eternally secure in Christ. I am speaking of God making a person new, not merely someone calling himself a Christian. The new life should become evident in our conduct. Obedience does not earn salvation or keep us saved, but assurance gives us no excuse to carry on in sin as though the Lord who saved us has no authority over how we live.
Revelation 19:13 calls the returning Christ “The Word of God.” The One who existed before creation and became flesh to save sinners will return as King.
Reading and Answering the Word Faithfully
The LORD who spoke to His prophets has given us Scripture as our final authority. It is inspired, inerrant and sufficient for the faith and obedience He requires. The Holy Spirit indwells believers and guides His people, but every spiritual claim must be tested by the written Word. I have no grounds to disregard a command in Scripture while asking God for fresh direction about whether I should obey it.
A strong feeling does not become God’s Word because I announce it confidently. The Holy Spirit will not contradict the Scripture He inspired, and no claim of private revelation can overrule it. If a leader demands obedience to his impressions while refusing to let anyone examine them by Scripture, the church needs to challenge that demand. The written Word gives us a standard the whole church can read and test, including the people being told to submit.
Samuel answered, “Speak, for Your servant hears” (1 Samuel 3:10). I want that willingness to listen when I open the Bible. If Scripture exposes a sin I have been excusing, I need to confess it and turn back to God. Looking for someone who will give me a more comfortable interpretation will not make disobedience acceptable. When Scripture offers comfort through Christ, I can receive that too, trusting His promise rather than trying to earn what He offers through His blood.
At Shiloh, worship continued while Eli left serious sin unrestrained. That makes me cautious about measuring a church’s health by an energetic schedule or polished programs. We need to ask whether Scripture is being taught and received with faith, and whether its correction is being acted on. Entertainment cannot supply the conviction and comfort that come from hearing God’s Word and responding to Him.
My Final Thoughts
I do not believe every “word of the LORD” passage describes a visible appearance of Christ. Each account needs to be heard on its own terms, whether it records a vision, an appearance or a prophetic message. What they share is the authority of the LORD who speaks. John reveals the eternal Word who was with God and was God, and who became flesh to save us. Samuel had to tell Eli what God said even when he was afraid to do so. I want to receive the Scripture that reveals this Savior with the same willingness to obey, including when I would rather avoid what He says.
Genesis 18 describes Abraham receiving the LORD as a visitor and speaking with Him about the judgment of Sodom. Although Jesus had not yet been born in Bethlehem, the Son already existed. I understand this as one of His appearances before He became man. The accounts give us reasons to recognize Him, and the New Testament helps us understand how the Son was making the Father known long before His human birth.
The Eternal Son Makes God Known
An appearance of Christ before the incarnation is called a Christophany. The broader word theophany means an appearance of God. Since Christ is fully God, both words can describe the same encounter, although calling something a theophany does not identify the divine Person who appeared. The passage must give us grounds for that identification.
We need to distinguish those appearances from the incarnation, when the Son took a true human nature. His encounters with Abraham and Moses were not earlier births or previous incarnations. When He became man, He did not cease to be God, and He remains fully God and fully man. The permanence of His humanity distinguishes the incarnation from those earlier appearances.
John opens his Gospel by telling us that the Word was already with God, that the Word was God, and that all things were made through Him. The One who later became flesh was the Creator of the world He entered. John then explains how the Son makes God known.
No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.
John 1:18, NKJV
If no one has seen God, who did Abraham and Moses encounter? Jesus said of the Father in John 5:37, “You have neither heard His voice at any time, nor seen His form.” I read these passages together: the unseen Father makes Himself known through the Son. Those Old Testament encounters do not mean that the people involved had seen the Father in contradiction to Jesus’ words.
Colossians 1:15 calls Christ the image of the invisible God, and Hebrews 1:3 describes Him as the brightness of God’s glory and the express image of His person. Paul also explains in Colossians that all things were created through Him. That includes the angels, so the Son cannot be one of the created servants He brought into existence. Hebrews 1 goes further and commands the angels to worship Him. Being sent to do the Father’s work does not make the Son a lesser being.
Jesus speaks of His existence before His human birth when He says, “Before Abraham was, I AM” (John 8:58). His words affirm that He existed before Abraham and agree with the eternal deity John describes. Genesis records events before the incarnation, but none took place before the Son existed.
The Son is fully God while remaining personally distinct from the Father who sends Him. The Holy Spirit is also a divine Person, not an impersonal force. This is what we mean by the Trinity: one God eternally existing as three coequal, coeternal Persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We are not saying that the Father became the Son or that there are three separate gods. The study on the Trinity explains those distinctions more fully.
Melchizedek, the Priest-King
Genesis 14 introduces Melchizedek after Abram had rescued Lot. He was king of Salem and priest of God Most High, and he came to meet Abram with bread and wine. He blessed Abram, who gave him a tenth. Genesis offers little background about this priest-king, but Psalm 110 and Hebrews 7 return to him to explain the Messiah’s priesthood.
Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was the priest of God Most High.
Genesis 14:18, NKJV
Psalm 110 declares that the Messiah will be a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. In Hebrews 7, Paul explains the significance of Melchizedek’s name and title: king of righteousness and king of peace. He presents him without father or mother, without genealogy, and without beginning of days or end of life. Melchizedek is described as “made like the Son of God” and as remaining a priest continually.
Some Christians understand Melchizedek to have been a human king whose appearance in Genesis foreshadowed Christ. That is called a type: a person or event that anticipates something God will reveal more fully later. On that reading, Genesis omits his ancestry so that the account can illustrate a priesthood which does not depend on descent from Levi.
I believe Melchizedek was the preincarnate God the Son. The description of this priest-king persuades me when I consider its details together, rather than the missing family record alone. Abraham received his blessing and gave him tithes, acknowledging his superior position. Paul explains that even Levi, whose descendants would serve as Israel’s priests, was subordinate to Melchizedek’s order through his ancestor Abraham. Hebrews describes his continuing priesthood, and Psalm 110 declares that the Messiah will hold that priesthood forever.
The phrase “made like the Son of God” is one reason readers disagree. Those who understand Melchizedek as a human type take it as a comparison with someone else. I read it within Paul’s explanation of an enduring priesthood that is not inherited through human ancestry. Those connections lead me to recognize Christ Himself, although Genesis does not explicitly introduce Melchizedek as the Son. The study on Melchizedek examines that argument in greater detail.
The permanence of Christ’s priesthood gives us reason to trust Him. He lives forever and will never need a successor. Because He lives to intercede for us, He can save completely those who come to God through Him. I do not have to fear losing my Priest to death or finding that He can no longer represent me before God.
The Angel of the LORD Speaks as God
In several other passages, the One introduced as a Messenger is also identified as the LORD. The word angel means messenger; it describes His work without settling whether He is a created being. A created angel can deliver God’s words. Here, however, we also need to account for Scripture naming the Messenger as God and attributing God’s own works to Him.
Consider Hagar in Genesis 16. She had fled after Sarai dealt harshly with her, and the Angel of the LORD found her beside a spring in the wilderness. He called her by name and promised, “I will multiply your descendants exceedingly” (Genesis 16:10). The account then calls the One who spoke to her the LORD, and Hagar names Him “You-Are-the-God-Who-Sees.”
The LORD sought out Hagar, a servant who had been mistreated, and spoke about her future. His compassion belongs in our understanding of His identity. If I defend Christ’s deity from this passage and dismiss a mistreated person as beneath my attention, I have failed to heed the example of the Lord who went to find her in the wilderness.
In Genesis 22, the Angel of the LORD called to Abraham from heaven and stopped him from killing Isaac. The command to offer Isaac was a unique test in God’s covenant dealings with Abraham, and God Himself prevented the sacrifice. The Angel then declared, “By Myself I have sworn, says the LORD” (Genesis 22:16). Hebrews 6 explains that God swore by Himself because there was no one greater by whom He could swear. Abraham was receiving God’s own oath confirming His promise. This encounter involved a voice from heaven rather than a visible visitor, but the words help identify the Messenger.
At the burning bush, Exodus 3 first names the Angel of the LORD as the One who appeared to Moses in the flame. It then says that the LORD saw Moses and that God called to him from the bush. Moses was approaching God’s presence when he heard this command:
Then He said, “Do not draw near this place. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.”
Exodus 3:5, NKJV
The Speaker then identified Himself as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Exodus uses Angel, LORD and God to identify the same Speaker throughout this encounter.
Later, Exodus 23 says that God’s name is in the Angel and commands Israel to obey Him. In Judges 2, the Angel speaks of bringing Israel out of Egypt and of His covenant with them. He claims the LORD’s deliverance and covenant as His own. Read alongside the burning bush, these statements give us reason to recognize more than a created servant passing along instructions.
Revelation 22:8-9 describes John falling before a created angel. The angel told him, “Do not do that” and “Worship God.” He refused worship because he was a servant. In the Old Testament passages we are examining, the Messenger is identified as the LORD while also being sent by Him. That personal distinction agrees with what the New Testament reveals about the Son, who is sent by the Father without ceasing to be God.
For those reasons, I recognize the divine Angel of the LORD as the Son before His incarnation. Being a Messenger describes His mission, just as being sent by the Father does in the New Testament. It does not make Him a created being. The study on The Angel of the Lord considers the individual passages more closely.
The LORD Appears to His Servants
Genesis 18 describes the LORD visiting Abraham without introducing the title Angel of the LORD. It says that “the LORD appeared” to him by the terebinth trees of Mamre. Abraham saw three men and welcomed them with a meal. The LORD spoke about Sarah and the promised son before the conversation turned to Sodom. The other visitors went toward the city, while Abraham remained before the LORD and pleaded concerning its judgment.
Abraham asked, “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” (Genesis 18:25). He knew he was addressing the One whose judgment would determine Sodom’s fate. Genesis describes the LORD appearing visibly, receiving hospitality and speaking with Abraham about His promise and the city’s sin. John’s explanation that the Son reveals the Father leads me to understand this visitor as Christ.
In Genesis 32, Abraham’s grandson Jacob wrestled through the night with a Man who touched his hip, changed his name to Israel and blessed him. Jacob called the place Peniel because, as he explained, “I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved” (Genesis 32:30). Hosea 12:3-5 looks back on that struggle and speaks of the Angel and the LORD God of hosts, confirming that Jacob had encountered the LORD.
Jacob’s struggle did not mean that he had overpowered God. The LORD allowed him to wrestle, yet could disable his hip with a touch. I see God confronting Jacob’s self-reliance here. He received a blessing and a new name, but had to walk away limping, dependent on the One who had blessed him. He could hardly point to that injured hip as proof that his own strength had secured God’s favor.
Before the battle at Jericho, Joshua encountered a Man holding a drawn sword. In Joshua 5, the Man identifies Himself as Commander of the army of the LORD. Joshua fell on his face and worshiped, and the Commander told him to remove his sandal because the place was holy. His acceptance of worship and His command about holy ground lead me to recognize another Christophany, even though the passage does not use the title Angel of the LORD.
Moses had stood on holy ground before being sent to Egypt; now Joshua stood on holy ground before the battle at Jericho. The LORD was continuing His work for Israel, and the men He appointed to lead were accountable to Him. Joshua had to bow and receive instructions from the true Commander. I need the same willingness to submit when I ask Christ to direct me. If I intend to disregard whatever interferes with my plans, I am asking Him to approve a decision I have already made.
Later, in Judges 6, Gideon was threshing wheat out of sight of the Midianites when the Angel of the LORD came to him. During their conversation the passage calls the Speaker the LORD, who commissioned Gideon to deliver Israel. After fire consumed the offering and the Angel departed, Gideon feared he would die because he had seen Him face to face. The LORD reassured him, “Do not fear, you shall not die” (Judges 6:23).
In Judges 13, the Angel announced Samson’s birth to Manoah’s wife. Later He directed Manoah to offer a sacrifice to the LORD and then ascended in its flame. Manoah cried, “We shall surely die, because we have seen God!” (Judges 13:22). His wife answered by considering what God had actually done. Why would He accept their offering and reveal His purpose for their child if He intended to kill them? She took His holiness seriously without letting fear overturn the reassurance He had given them.
Centuries later, Zechariah saw a vision involving Joshua the high priest, a different man from the Joshua who led Israel into Canaan. In Zechariah 3, the high priest stood before the Angel of the LORD in filthy garments, with Satan there to accuse him. The LORD rebuked Satan, and the Angel directed those standing before Him to remove Joshua’s filthy garments. He told Joshua, “See, I have removed your iniquity from you, and I will clothe you with rich robes” (Zechariah 3:4). His priestly office had not enabled him to remove his own guilt. The cleansing came from God, and the Angel announced it as His own work.
We see that mercy fully revealed in Jesus Christ, our righteousness and our Advocate, the One who speaks on our behalf before God. Gideon and Manoah feared death after encountering the LORD, while Joshua stood in garments that pictured his defilement. God dealt mercifully with each of them. Our peace with Him likewise depends on the Savior He has provided, rather than our ability to excuse guilt or make ourselves holy.
Daniel, Isaiah, and the Glory of Christ
In Daniel 3, Nebuchadnezzar ordered Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-Nego thrown into a furnace because they refused to worship his golden image. He expected three bound men to die. Instead, he saw four men walking freely in the fire and described the fourth as “like the Son of God” (Daniel 3:25). He later spoke of their God sending a messenger to deliver them.
I believe the fourth Man was a Christophany, although the king’s words alone do not establish His identity. Nebuchadnezzar was describing what he saw without the understanding of the eternal Son that John later gives us. I recognize Christ in the Deliverer who stood with God’s servants in the fire because that encounter agrees with the wider pattern of the Son making God known and rescuing His people. The identification is an inference from the account read alongside other Scripture; Daniel does not explicitly name the fourth Man as Christ.
Isaiah’s vision has a more direct New Testament explanation. In Isaiah 6, he saw the Lord high and lifted up on His throne as the seraphim cried, “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; The whole earth is full of His glory!” Isaiah declared himself undone, a man of unclean lips who had seen the King, the LORD of hosts. John later referred to Isaiah while explaining the unbelief that followed Jesus’ signs.
These things Isaiah said when he saw His glory and spoke of Him.
John 12:41, NKJV
John identifies the glory Isaiah saw as Christ’s glory, giving us an explicit connection in the New Testament. The Lord Isaiah saw enthroned is the same Son who later lived among men and endured their rejection. He remained fully God when He became man.
Reading These Appearances Without Guessing
These passages do not all identify the Son in the same way. John explicitly connects Isaiah’s vision with Christ, while my identification of Melchizedek and the fourth Man in the furnace draws together evidence from several passages. I believe those conclusions are well founded, but I should not present every identification as equally certain or pretend that each account explicitly names Him.
Some readers object that Christophany is not a biblical word. Neither is Trinity, but both can explain biblical teaching if we define them accurately. The label cannot establish an identity the passage leaves unexplained. Scripture describes created angels as well as symbolic visions, and each account needs to be read on its own terms. Daniel 6, for example, does not identify the messenger who shut the lions’ mouths as the Angel of the LORD or give enough information to know that He was Christ.
Others understand the Angel of the LORD as a created messenger speaking on God’s behalf. A created angel could repeat God’s words, but that does not adequately explain the accounts calling this Messenger the LORD, placing God’s name in Him, or describing His own oath and covenant acts. Taken together, those details persuade me of His divine identity. The New Testament’s revelation of the Son who makes the unseen Father known also explains how He can be sent by the LORD without ceasing to be God.
The Son who blessed Abraham and commissioned Moses later became man to accomplish the redemption those encounters anticipated. Jesus willingly gave Himself into the hands of wicked men, who tortured Him and put Him to death. He endured that bodily suffering and gave Himself to be slain as the perfect sacrifice for our sins. His sinless life qualified Him to offer that sacrifice. Through His shed blood and death, He completed our atonement before His burial and bodily resurrection.
The Father and Son remained united in that redemption. The Father did not punish, curse, abandon, strike, bruise, or pour wrath on Jesus. Christ willingly gave Himself for sinners and is our only Savior and Mediator between God and man. He died for the whole world, and His offer of salvation is genuine even though people can resist and reject it.
Everyone who repents and believes in Christ is born again, indwelt and sealed by the Holy Spirit. A truly born-again believer is eternally secure, but that assurance gives us no permission to excuse sin. Receiving new life is different from adopting a Christian name while refusing His authority. Obedience is evidence of that new life; it does not earn salvation or keep us saved. The Lord who commanded Moses and Joshua still calls His people to obey Him.
My Final Thoughts
The Son who met these people is the Lord I worship today. He sought out Hagar in the wilderness and commissioned Moses to deliver Israel, caring for people and keeping His promises long before Bethlehem. Studying those encounters calls me to trust Him as well as recognize Him. I need to hear His instruction with a willingness to change my conduct, just as the people He addressed had to respond to Him.
