Can you read the signs of our times today? In the midst of the tear-gas can you see the chaos building? Have you seen the polls that suggest murdering political opponents is considered acceptable? Have you heard that there is a price or rewards offered for causing trouble?
But on the other side of the street, you hear stories about revivals cropping up everywhere, from Australia to the UK. Turning Point USA now has over 130,000 campus chapter requests to fulfill. Meet me at the Water is baptizing folks by the thousands according to some reports. Something is happening!
The bible verse that most directly discusses reading the signs of the times is Matthew 16:3, where Jesus rebukes the Pharisees and Sadducees for being able to predict the weather but not to interpret the spiritual and historical signs of their generation.
At the end of last weeks show, I mentioned that the phrase “an Angel of the Lord spoke” was mentioned 59 times in the Bible. Both Mark and I thought that was a pretty significant number of mentions. So I decided to do a deeper dive into this topic using AI as my search agent.
Here's a few references.
Exodus 3:2: "And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire from the midst of a bush."
Genesis 16:1-13, 21:9-19 -- The angel of the Lord, Hagar, and her son
Genesis 22:9-18 -- The angel of the Lord, Abraham, and Isaac
Judges 2:1-5 -- The angel of the Lord rebukes Israel.
Judges 6:11-24 -- The angel of the Lord and Gideon
1 Kings 19:1-8 -- The angel of the Lord strengthens Elijah before his long journey.
2 Kings 1:1-17 -- The angel of the Lord instructs Elijah what to say to king Ahaziah.
1 Chronicles 21:1-27 -- The angel of the Lord comes to destroy Jerusalem
Zechariah 1:7-13 -- The angel of the Lord mediates between God and Jerusalem.
The Greek phrase angelos kuriou (angel of the Lord) is found in the New Testament, but these passages are generally understood to refer to ordinary angelic messengers, not the divine figure from the Old Testament.
Would you consider a word or visit from an angelic messenger ORDINARY? Me neither!
I am more moved by the fact that Angels Spoke to people just like you and me.
Whether they were “ordinary angelic messengers" or the pre-incarnate appearance of Christ, to me is NOT THE POINT. The most significant point that we need to ponder here is…DID WE LISTEN TO THE VOICE AND DO WHAT IT SAID?
Which begs the question…What is the Angel of Lord saying to us today? What is He telling you? What is the Angel of the Lord saying to ALL THOSE THAT WILL LISTEN, WHO ARE CALLED BY HIS NAME.
I don’t know where you sit on this front, but I for one believe that when an “ordinary” or an unordinary angelic messenger speaks” we need to be listening with all our senses and willing to do whatever were asked to do.
