Who is the Angel of the LORD?
The term “angel of the Lord” (or “of God”) appears 48 times in the Old Testament in 14 different books and 19 times in the New Testament in 3 books. What that description means is not clearly known. Ramm is helpful in his statement, “There is some obscurity … which an honest exegesis will not overlook.”9 Following are several different suggestions for the meaning of “angel of the Lord”: 1. A representation and a type of God.10 2. God himself. This suggestion is gleaned from the fact that “angel of the Lord” is interchanged many times with “the Lord” or “God.”11 3. A manifestation of Christ prior to His incarnation on earth.12 This suggestion relates to the fact that the term, “angel of the Lord” is interchanged with only “the Lord” in a few places. 4. A special servant of God.13 5. An angel of higher stature than others with special ministries for Yahweh.14 6. The voice of God—the voice of the sender in the voice of the one sent.15 7. The Holy Spiri