If Christ existed before earthly birth, did He not interact with humans?

roamer_1 said:

No man has seen YHWH. Yet many men have seen YHWH.

Who was it in the burning bush?

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The One in the burning bush was the same One from whom Moses "hid is face, for he was afraid to look upon God."

roamer_1 said:

No man has seen YHWH. Yet many men have seen YHWH.

Who was it in the burning bush?

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Paul says it was an angel, a servant who is an extension of God...

2PhiloVoid said:

The One in the burning bush was the same One from whom Moses "hid is face, for he was afraid to look upon God."

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Better reread the passage.

Neogaia777 said:

Paul says it was an angel, a servant who is an extension of God...

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Yet He (the one in the burning bush) called himself YHWH - said it was His Name, and a remembrance to all generations... and upon more than one occasion, accepted worship AS YHWH.

Ronald said:

In Exodus 3:14, the pre-incarnate Jesus, who is God spoke to Moses. Moses asked, who shall I say sent me. God said, "Tell them I AM sent me to you." Prior to this, God said, "I am the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" as well.
This was God's introduction, not very descriptive, but it was to be fulfilled by Jesus. The "I AM" is complete when we look at these verses:
"I am the Light of the World"
"I am the Good Shepherd"
"I am the way, the truth and the life ..."
"I am the resurrection and the life"
"I am the door"
"I am the Bread which came down from heaven"
"I am the vine, you are the branches"
"I am the Alpha and the Omega"
"I am He" who was throughout the Old Testament, the LORD, prophesied as the SAVIOR/MESSIAH. And so He interacted with humans all along.
He is the CREATOR who emptied himself into a human baby and became a man and dwelt among us. All things were made by Him, For Him and through Him all things consist (hold together).
Only God can take our sins away, it requires Omniscience, Omnipotence and Omnipresence.
If you want to know what God is like, look at Jesus.

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My only issue is as i'm newly awakened. But, If Jesus is God and not begotten of him i.e a part of the heavenly father, then why did the devil dare even bother trying to tempt the lord and savior if he's god? And why did Jesus Reference himself as being of his father and making the distinction of a difference? There would be no need for such a distinction, nor would there be such as the Heavenly Father is Truth.

But maybe he did!


23 And these three men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, fell down bound into the midst of the burning fiery furnace.
24 Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astonished, and rose up in haste, and spake, and said unto his counsellors, Did not we cast three men bound into the midst of the fire? They answered and said unto the king, True, O king.
25 He answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God. - Daniel 3

And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden. - Genesis 3:8

Hank77 said:

And who was it that Moses saw the backside of from the cleft in rocks?

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Maybe it was God in His whole glory like the plural Elohim during creation? I don't know that's such profound mystery!!

HighwayMan said:

I find it hard to believe that whatever Christ was doing in heaven, when it comes specifically to his earthly involvement, he was sitting on the sidelines all the way until his birth in Bethlehem.

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Exodus 3
2 And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.

3 And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.

4 And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.

5 And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.

The Angel of the Lord in verse 2, verse 4 the lord saw, verse 5 Holy ground.

The ground was only Holy because the Lord was there. The Angel of the Lord, the word angel refers to being a messenger here. Verse 4 indicated that the Lord was in the fire on the bush where the Angel of the Lord was. This Angel of the Lord has to Be Jesus or the Father Himself.

Read John 1 and you will see that the word was made flesh, Jesus, and all things that were created were created by him and for him.

So He was not sitting on the side Lines, He said that the scriptures testify of me, referring to what we call the old testament.

roamer_1 said:

Better reread the passage.

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I think the general idea is that no one has seen "the Father," but they have seen His Angel (the Pre-Incarnate Logos of God). Angel (Messenger) of God = Logos (Word) of God.

2PhiloVoid said:

I think the general idea is that no one has seen "the Father," but they have seen His Angel (the Pre-Incarnate Logos of God). Angel (Messenger) of God = Logos (Word) of God.

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That's right. What ties it all together for me is Zech 12:8-14
Note the narrative is YHWH talking (I have replaced 'the LORD' with YHWH for clarity), and note the 'Angel of the Lord (Angel of YHWH)'



YHWH, House of David, Angel of YHWH, and whom they have pierced... All nice and tidy. Pretty hard to deny.

KWCrazy said:

God walked and talked with God.
No man has seen the face of God, ever.
So who did Adam speak with? Jesus.
Jesus has been the intermediary between God and man since man's creation. Made with a finite mind, the human mind could not grasp the appearance of God without being blinded or rendered insane. It will not be until we have a glorified body that we will be able and be worthy to see God.

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I don't think that "God as perceived and perceptible by material means" will ever be anyone other than Christ.

Mathew 16;26 said:

My only issue is as i'm newly awakened. But, If Jesus is God and not begotten of him i.e a part of the heavenly father, then why did the devil dare even bother trying to tempt the lord and savior if he's god? And why did Jesus Reference himself as being of his father and making the distinction of a difference? There would be no need for such a distinction, nor would there be such as the Heavenly Father is Truth.

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I suspect Satan presumed that incarnation made a difference--remember that "temptation" means "test"--indicating a necessity for Satan to determine whether indeed incarnation did make a difference.

A suggestion of a difference Satan hoped for may be that Jesus did not come to earth wearing the glory He always wore in His OT appearances--that glory being the tumult of creation (thunder, lightning, earthquakes, columns of fire, et cetera).

Of course the incarnate Jesus would have to refer to Himself as being "of" His Father. What else? He could not claim to be the totality of God in limited human form, although He was God limited human form.

RDKirk said:

I don't think that "God as perceived and perceptible by material means" will ever be anyone other than Christ.

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BINGO.

This is the meat of it.

No one [fallen] creature* can look at God the Father, and live, because God is a spirit, and He categorically destroys/repels sin. Any imperfect creature would die - His brilliance is even too much for the highest archon/angel/principality.

The only One who is [like] Him is His literal, breathing and potent Word of God. It is as literally God as if our words we speak could literally manifest into an image of us, and do our will.

So, when "material" beings interact with God - and live to tell about it - then they are talking to Christ, or even perhaps an angel. If the entity speaks on behalf of God, it could be an angel (like the Revelation incident, in which the angel spoke on behalf of God, but told John not to worship him because he was a fellowservent.)

But, anytime God is identifying Himself ("And, the Lord God Said... Thus, saith the Lord...") it is Christ. Christ is His literal Word, and the only one with authority to speak AS God, as opposed to simply being a mouthpiece (on behalf of God.)



*

RDKirk said:

Of course the incarnate Jesus would have to refer to Himself as being "of" His Father. What else? He could not claim to be the totality of God in limited human form, although He was God limited human form.

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Which is why He humbled Himself even more (I would say to the point of humiliation) by often calling Himself a "Son of Man."

Hello all.

Paul describes the one and only God of Israel.

1 Timothy 6
15 He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, 16 who alone possesses immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see. To Him be honor and eternal dominion!

One Sovereign, one King, one Lord.

Revelations 19
11 And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sat on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. 12 His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; and He has a name written on Him
which no one knows except Himself. 13 He is clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God. 14 And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. 15 From His mouth
comes a sharp sword, so 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 the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. 16 And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, “KING OF
KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.”

Mathew 16;26 said:

My only issue is as i'm newly awakened. But, If Jesus is God and not begotten of him i.e a part of the heavenly father, then why did the devil dare even bother trying to tempt the lord and savior if he's god? And why did Jesus Reference himself as being of his father and making the distinction of a difference? There would be no need for such a distinction, nor would there be such as the Heavenly Father is Truth.

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Praise God, newly awakened one! Keep on praying, studying, listening!

Did you know no one can worship angels? Well seems in the OT there was this ONE angel that was the host of Gods army and asked ..are you for us or them? Yet.. this "angel" told him.. the ground on which he stood was holy and what did that man do?

Yet... like Jesus told the.. if you believed in Moses (Mosheh) then you would believe in me for he talked about me. This OT is all about Yeshua/Jesus. it was hid, secret for a reason.

Were talking about GOD. When Jesus said if you seen me you seen the Father. We as man see this as and example.. His words, works so forth. Yet it was ALL in ALL for Him. Read how He talks about who He is in Rev. When He says me and the Father are one yet not.. He always means what He says. We can not grasp this. Nor will we till we get there. They are 3 yet one. Everything that was made was made by HIM. This was planned before this earth was made.

Again.. how can one not see Christ through out the OT alone?

Of I challenge you to find any clearcut OT example where Jesus speaks to someone. Put differently, I challenge you to find any scholarly Bible book commentary, whether or not by an evangelical scholar) that claims such an example. Did Christ speak to Moses through the Burning Bush or on Mount Sinai? No! Stephen's sermon in Acts identifies the speaker at the Burning Bush and the Lawgiver on Sinai as an angel, not Christ:

"God now sent [Moses] as both ruler and liberator through the angel who appeared to him in the bush (Acts 7:46)."
"He [Moses] is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him at Mount Sinai (7:38)."
"It [the Law on Sinai] was ordained by a mediator [Moses] through angels (Galatians 3:19)."

If Stephen and Paul thought these angels were manifestations of Christ, they would have said so! Yet it was God who spoke to Moses at the Burning Bush and on Sinai, but (and this is crucial) God as represented by an angelic manifestion. That is how Stephen and Paul understand this. Similarly, the "man" with whom Jacob wrestled was "God," not in the sense of Christ, but in the sense of an angel as God's representative (Genesis 32:27, 30).

Was the "fourth man in the fire Jesus? No, he was "like a son of the gods (Daniel 3:25)"--a standard description of any angelic being. The Babylonian king is a pagan and is not divinely inspired to refer to Jesus here!

We don't get to impose a preconceived notion of the Trinity on Scripture without specific biblical authorization and without a recognition that, because no one can see God, God manifests His presence through representative angels. To claim that any OT angel is Christ must be demonstrated from the text, not pontificated from doctrinal preconceptions!

Blade said:

Did you know no one can worship angels? Well seems in the OT there was this ONE angel that was the host of Gods army and asked ..are you for us or them? Yet.. this "angel" told him.. the ground on which he stood was holy and what did that man do?

Yet... like Jesus told the.. if you believed in Moses (Mosheh) then you would believe in me for he talked about me. This OT is all about Yeshua/Jesus. it was hid, secret for a reason.

Were talking about GOD. When Jesus said if you seen me you seen the Father. We as man see this as and example.. His words, works so forth. Yet it was ALL in ALL for Him. Read how He talks about who He is in Rev. When He says me and the Father are one yet not.. He always means what He says. We can not grasp this. Nor will we till we get there. They are 3 yet one. Everything that was made was made by HIM. This was planned before this earth was made.

Again.. how can one not see Christ through out the OT alone?

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Hello Blade.

Good post, looking at Jesus, is looking directly at the Father.

John 14:7
If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him.

We cannot distinguish between the Son and the Father.

John 17:5
Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was.

They exist together.

Jesus cannot be separated from the Father, they are one.

Deadworm said:

I challenge you to find any clearcut OT example where Jesus speaks to someone. Put differently, I challenge you to find any scholarly Bible book commentary, whether or not by an evangelical scholar) that claims such an example. Did Christ speak to Moses through the Burning Bush or on Mount Sinai? No! Stephen's sermon in Acts identifies the speaker at the Burning Bush and the Lawgiver on Sinai as an angel, not Christ:

"God now sent [Moses] as both ruler and liberator through the angel who appeared to him in the bush (Acts 7:46)."
"He [Moses] is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness with the angel who spoke to him at Mount Sinai (7:38)."
"It [the Law on Sinai] was ordained by a mediator through angels (Galatians 3:19)."
Yet it was God who spoke to Moses at the Burning Bush and on Sinai, but (and this is crucial) God as represented by an angelic manifestion. That is how Stephen and Paul understand this. Similarly, the "man" with whom Jacob wrestled was "God," not in the sense of Christ, but in the sense of an angel as God's representative (Genesis 32:27, 30).

Was the "fourth man in the fire Jesus? No, he was "like a son of the gods (Daniel 3:25)"--a standard description of any angelic being. The Babylonian king is a pagan and is not divinely inspired to refer to Jesus here!

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Hello Deadworm.

The word, 'angel', should be translated as, 'messenger', in the Old Testament. A messenger is simply one who is sent. So when the Old Testament verses, speak of the angel of the Lord. They should be translated as, the messenger of YHWH. A messenger does not have an exact identity, unless the messenger identifies itself to mankind.

So if a messenger in the Old Testament, does not reveal it's identity or name. Then we know that the messenger, or the one sent, will be the same identity, as the one sent in the New Testament.

The unidentified messenger of YHWH, in the Old Testament was also worshiped a number of times. The identified messenger in the New Testament was also worshiped eight times.

The worship of the Old Testament messenger was permitted.
The worship of the New Testament messenger was permitted.

We will worship only God and Him alone.