Have you ever grown tired of waiting on God? That’s what happened to Abraham’s wife, Sarah. She decided to take matters into her own hands. Since she had not been able to have children, she told Abraham to sleep with her maidservant Hagar, which he did. Hagar became pregnant, and Sarah became jealous. Hagar finally ran away to escape the mistreatment. The angel of the Lord found her near a spring in the desert.

Genesis 16:7-10
The angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur. And he said, “Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from my mistress Sarai.” The angel of the Lord said to her, “Return to your mistress and submit to her.” The angel of the Lord also said to her, “I will surely multiply your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for multitude.”

The angel of the Lord was distinct from Yahweh. However, he spoke in the first person as though to be identified as Yahweh. When Hagar saw the angel of the Lord, she believed she saw God himself. Hagar was not the only one who believed the angel of the Lord was God. Moses (Exodus 3:2-5), Gideon (Judges 6:11-23), and Manoah (Judges 13) all believed the same thing. Many conclude that the angel of the Lord was the pre-incarnate Christ. He never appears in Scripture after the birth of Jesus.

I believe the angel of the Lord is Jesus, the second person of the Trinity. John reminds us, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God” (John 1:1-2). Jesus did not stand idly by until his birth in a Bethlehem stable. He always has been, is today, and always will be at work in the lives of his people.

Lord Jesus,
Thank you for always being at work in the lives of those who follow you. You are the Word and have always delivered a message of power and comfort. Thank you for your work in creation, in history, and in my life today. In your name, I pray. Amen.