MONDAY September 30th
There is, following on from our previous devotion another answer to the question as to what did Jesus do in the time before he came into this world as a babe in Bethlehem?
The clue is found in some of the Old Testament accounts where we read of a particular Angel of the LORD appearing to individuals and conversing with them. It is widely accepted that these are what theologians call a ‘Theophany’ or a ‘Christophany’ where the pre-incarnate Jesus appeared in the form of a man, generally described as an angel to give a message or an instruction to an individual.
The following are examples, first in Genesis 16:7-10 where it says ‘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.”’
Then in Judges 6:11-14 where we read ‘Now the angel of the LORD came and sat under the terebinth at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, while his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites. And the angel of the LORD appeared to him and said to him, “The LORD is with you, O mighty man of valor.” And Gideon said to him, “Please, my lord, if the LORD is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all his wonderful deeds that our fathers recounted to us, saying, ‘Did not the LORD bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the LORD has forsaken us and given us into the hand of Midian.” And the LORD turned to him and said, “Go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian; do not I send you?”
Then the third in Daniel 3:28 at the time when Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego had been thrown into the fiery furnace and we read these words
‘Nebuchadnezzar answered and said, “Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who has sent his angel and delivered his servants, who trusted in him, and set aside the king’s command, and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any god except their own God.
If you go back to verse 25, we read ‘He (Nebuchadnezzar) answered and said, “But I see four men unbound, walking in the midst of the fire, and they are not hurt; and the appearance of the fourth is like a son of the gods.”’
The account from Daniel reads differently in the KJV compared to the NIV and the ESV, and this was a bone of contention when the NIV was first released and was one of the reasons which caused (and still causes) many to be anti any version but the KJV. Here are the other translations,
NIV ‘He said, “Look! I see four men walking around in the fire, unbound and unharmed, and the fourth looks like a son of the gods.”’
KJV ‘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.’
What we need to learn is this. The KJV has translated the scene as to who the fourth person was in the furnace, as being ‘like the Son of God’ and is with hindsight or is a retrospective translation, but the modern versions translate it to exactly as it would have been seen to those who were actually there, ‘like a son of the gods’, for remember they were pagans, they believed in multiple gods in contrast to the Hebrew lads who believed in the one and only true and living God, that is why they were in the furnace! so they the pagans who didn’t believe in the One and only true God would have assumed it was a son of one of the gods. But thankfully the King soon recognised that this was no mere god, but rather an Angel sent from God, who was none other than the Son of God, for he had heard the lads say back in verse 17 ‘ If this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand, O king.’
And save them he did. So, this was just a few thoughts over the last few devotions answering the question, ‘What was the Son of God doing before he came a babe to Bethlehem.’