Hi all,
I ended last week talking about how the phrase; ‘Word of the Lord came to ____ the prophet’, was not a prophet’s hand moving as if by invisible divine guidance as they journaled, but was in fact a visitation of the person who is called the Word of the Lord.
That phrase used in I Samuel 3: 21, “The Lord revealed Himself to Samuel as ‘the Word of the Lord'”, defined for the prophets that followed down through the centuries, the phrase ‘the Word of the Lord’. It means the Person who is the Word of the Lord, the Son of the Father, appeared to the prophets down through the centuries….amazing…
A small disclaimer…
That doesn’t mean every single time you see the phrase ‘the word of the Lord’ in the Old Testament it means a visitation with the Lord – often the scripture is unclear – sometimes like in our day, we might say ‘the Lord told me’ or ‘this is the Lord’s word to me about it’…But very often scripture is clear that it was a visitation, especially at the start of the books or start of a word for Israel or Judah, when you see that phrase.
For example…
In Jeremiah 1: 1-9 we have this:
“The words of Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah…to whom the Word of the Lord came in the days of Josiah…in the 13th year of his reign…the Word of the Lord came to me saying, ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you came out of the womb I set you apart as a prophet to the nations.’ Then I said, ‘But Lord, I’m but a young boy (Heb: na’ar: young teenager, about 13 years old) ‘…Then the Lord put out His hand and touched my mouth…”
So here we see the Word of the Lord came to Jeremiah as a Person, the Word of the Lord, for he says in v9, “…He stretched out His hand and touched my mouth.” The whole conversation which became the book of Jeremiah was the Lord appearing to Jeremiah in a series of visitations as the Word of the Lord, to give him words for the nation.
Isaiah, Ezekiel, and the rest…
Isaiah 1:1 starts: “The vision of Isaiah…” and in v10: “Hear the Word of the Lord…” His ‘word’ came as a vision.
In Ezekiel 1:3 he says, “The Word of the Lord came to Ezekiel the priest…” as he is standing on the bank of a tributary of the Euphrates river, when he is in the Spirit and sees the throne of God, complete with the cherubs as balls of fire flying the throne platform directly to him. He describes the rainbow over the throne, the clear flooring, and how the Lord appeared as a being of fire and light…and then the Lord started talking to him about his nation.
Hosea 1:1: “The Word of the Lord that came to Hosea…and the Lord said to me (Hosea)…” 3:1: “Then the Lord said to me…”
Amos 1: 1, 3, 6: “The words of Amos…which he saw concerning Israel..thus says the Lord…thus says the Lord…”
Obadiah v1: “The vision of Obadiah, thus says the Lord God…
Jonah 1: 1, 3; 3:1: “Now the Word of the Lord came to Jonah saying…” But Jonah rose up and ran from the presence of the Lord…and went to a ship headed to Tarshish (Spain) from the presence of the Lord.” And the Word of the Lord came a second time to Jonah saying…”
(We miss the text telling us directly Jonah ran from His presence – the root word presence, ‘paneh’ in Hebrew, means literally, “Face”. “Jonah rose up and ran from the face of the Lord.”)
Micah 1:1: “The Word of the Lord that came to Micah…which he saw concerning Samaria and Jerusalem…”
Nahum 1: 1: “The burden of Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum…”
Habakkuk 1:1, 2: 2: “The burden which Habakkuk the prophet did see…And the Lord answered me: ‘Write the vision, make it plainly written that he who reads may run with it.”
I love Habakkuk’s description of the Lord in 3:4:
“His brightness was as a bright light, and He had shafts of light coming from His hands, which is where His power was concentrated.”
The reason this is significant is the shafts of light coming from His hands, fits Deuteronomy 9:10 which says the 10 Commandments were etched in stone by the finger of God – the world’s first mention of what we would call laser beam – the shafts of light coming from His fingers, etching into stone the 10 Commandments.
Zechariah, the next to last book of the Old Testament starts in with in 1:1: “…came the Word of the Lord to Zechariah…” and in 2:1, “I lifted up my eyes again and saw a man…” and in 3:1, “And He showed me…”
What I’ve done is walk us down through the centuries where the Person who is called the Word of the Lord, appeared to the prophets. From the first revelation of the Word of the Lord who came and stood in the boy Samuel’s bedroom in about 1100BC, to Zechariah seeing the Word of the Lord around 500BC, our Lord appeared to the prophets as the Word of the Lord (Father).
And that is why John 1: 14 says simply: “And the Word was made flesh and lived among us.”
Can you imagine the awe when the disciples realized the Man Jesus was first the Son given, who appeared to all those prophets through the centuries, and now stood before them?! Amazing grace. Next week, how the transition from heaven to earth happened…until then, blessings,
John Fenn
www.cwowi.org and email me at cwowi@aol.com
