God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble; therefore we will not fear, though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling. Father, thank you for granting us the privilege to be in Your house today, and we do praise You for the Word of God, for the grace of God, and let Your servant have clarity of thought, Lord, in order to bring out these considerations this morning on this subject and help us, Lord, to see that we do not need to be afraid. A lot of trouble in the world, but there’s always been lots of trouble in the world; we have been insulated to some extent here in America, and we are encountering some things that other people around the world deal with every day of their lives. So we know that You’re a present help in trouble, but help me today to bring out the specific focus that is on my heart this morning, and we will thank You for it in Christ’s name. Amen.

Now, as I said, I’m using this text as a springboard to share how Christ our Lord and Savior is with us in our times of need; He doesn’t merely send others, which is true; He comes Himself specifically in and through the presence of the Holy Spirit. Now I’m drawing today’s subject from a question that was raised in our Wednesday evening crowd about the angel of the Lord.

Since we took a break from Revelation for the summer, I thought, “okay what can I talk about?” And this question came up Wednesday, and I thought, “okay let’s plow that field.” Now I want everybody to understand that I am not talking about angels in general. It might surprise us in our culture where there is such a shallowness regarding the Word of God; it might surprise us how little the Bible says about angels. And you can say, “What do you mean, Pastor?”

I am not saying that angels are not part of God’s plans, that they don’t work, that they aren’t real—that’s not what I’m saying. Don’t go out of here and say I said that; I do want you to see that there’s an overemphasis sometimes on things and the focus shifts unintentionally to things other than the Lord.

For example in Hebrews 11:4 it does say the question is asked, “Are they the angels not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation?” Please notice the distinction between serving us and serving Christ for our sake; there’s a big difference. Many people portray angelic interventions as though they’re serving us, and you can find people actually teaching that “send your angels out to do such and such a thing.” This is not what the Bible says or teaches; many of the things that angels are said to do cannot be substantiated scripturally. That is either by inference or anecdotal stories.

Many people have undertaken to write books about angels, and almost all of those books are somebody saw an angel, someone’s experienced an angel—that’s anecdotal; there’s no scriptural basis for some of those things. Oh also you can go to the book of Hebrews very well-known passage, Hebrews 13:2, that says, “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers.” The next part of the verse goes off in a whole different direction for some have entertained angels unaware; this becomes the focus. The focus of the verse is hospitality—how you should treat strangers—and in treating strangers some people have unknowingly entertained angels. The focus is not on expecting angelic visitors; it is on practicing hospitality for strangers. That is the focus of the text.

When we get off balance with respect to angels, we shift automatically. I want to have an experience with an angel. Even this subject is somehow clouded because if you have a reference Bible almost all of those reference Bibles will refer you back to Genesis 18 and 19 where Abraham and Lot encountered angels. But the problem is in those passages Abraham and Lot knew they were angels; it wasn’t like they didn’t know that these were angels—they knew them. It’s not like somebody came into their life and went out and then they didn’t know—that would be entertaining unawares. Abraham and Lot knew that these men were not typical men if you read the story. The focus again is not on the angels but on hospitality, on serving the Lord faithfully.

And here’s where the shift happens—the shift goes from the majesty of God to these angels that certainly declare and portray His majesty, but that can be shifted very easily. Now you might ask, “Where do I get the idea? The Bible doesn’t really give us much information about the activity of angels?” Angels—this is not always the best way to go, but this is a way I’m going today: by citing the number of times that a word appears so the word angel or angels appears 300 times in the Bible.

Angel or angel; there are a few other passages where it says men when it was talking about angels. If you note this study, they went into the tomb and saw a man sitting at the end of the place where Jesus was laid; we know it was an angel. It looks like a man; they called a man. So there are a few passages like that but overall the word angel or angels only appears 300 times in the entire Bible—185 in the New Testament, 82 times in Revelation.

Why is that significant? Because in our culture people think of angels as nice, lovely, helpful—you know kind of thing—angel on my shoulder. But in Revelation there are 82 references to angel; most of those have to do with judgment. The first angel blew His trumpet and there was this judgment; the second angel blew His trumpet and there was this judgment. The river Euphrates was dried up so the three angels in the river could come out and do judgment, and that’s not what the world thinks when they think about angels—they don’t think about the judgment of God, and yet this is a big part of what you find in Revelation.

When it mentions the largest reference to angels in the book of Revelation—in the seven letters to the churches—we examined. And some weeks ago, ten times it mentioned an angel; but it has nothing to do with what angels do in the lives of humans. This is the point I want you to see this morning and you’ll—I hope you’ll understand it better as we go.

The words angel or angels appear 72 times in the Gospels and the Book of Acts, but many of these are redundant. In Mary’s encounter with Gabriel the word angel appears five times. So you have all these words, angel, angels, but they’re not really telling us what angels do in day‑to‑day interaction with humans; they’re just acknowledging the presence of these beings and their nature.

The New Testament has 185 references, meaning there’s only 115 in the Old Testament where the word or angels appears. More than half of these do not refer to angels in general but to a character called “the Angel of the Lord.” The Angel of the Lord more than half of these 115 appearances in the Old Testament refer to a character called the Angel of the Lord, not the Lord’s angel which may or may not have the same connotation depending on the verse. To the Angel of the Lord.

For example in Genesis there are 15 appearances of the word angel; nine of those are the Angel of the Lord. In Numbers eleven times the word angel appears, ten is referring to the Angel of the Lord. And in Judges eighteen references to an angel—fifteen refer to the Angel of the Lord.

In the Christian community as broadly across the landscape of the Christian community this person is believed to be the Lord Jesus in His pre‑incarnate form—that is before He became a man. He appeared as a man in these select individual situations and this is what we take Him to be. He is accommodating Himself by appearing in human guise. Not in every reference does it say He looked like a man, but this is what we see in many of them.

When this person shows up, they call Him the Angel of the Lord, and this person has characteristics that cannot belong to a typical plain angel. For example he speaks with divine first‑person authority; He doesn’t say “The Lord says” about something—He says “I say this about something.” This is consideration. Then he is referred to or…

Let me see if I can help us with this, and I apologize for those of you who are used to the slideshow and the outlines; the last two messages really haven’t laid out good for that so we go first to Exodus, not to the book of Genesis or Numbers or Judges but to Exodus where we have a clear unquestioned connotation and claim about this Angel of the Lord. And I’m going somewhere with this so please be patient with me.

Exodus chapter 3—this is edited for space as always. Moses was keeping the flock of his father‑in‑law Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock and came to Horeb, the mountain of God, and the Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush; and Moses looked, and behold the bush was burning yet it was not consumed. And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight: why is the bush not burned?” And when the Lord saw that he turned aside, God called to him out of the bush; God called to him out of the bush. But who was in the bush? The Angel of the Lord, and this is one of those passages that we say this person—this Angel of the Lord character—who shows up again and again is not typically your typical angel, and he said God called to him out of the bush.

Moses Moses and he said here I am then he said the classic and well‑known passage do not come any nearer.
Take your sandals off your feet for the place on which you’re standing is holy ground.
And then he says this: I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.
Moses hit his face for he was afraid to look at God.
Now you see this person described as the Angel of the Lord, but this person claims to be the covenant God of Israel and demands the worship belonging to God.

Then we go to Genesis 16 and this is a lengthy passage again and it’s about Hagar.
It’s interesting and I wish I had time to unpack all the nuances but it’s interesting.
The first example in the Bible of God appearing like this to someone is not a Jew, not one of the covenant people; it’s a Gentile, an Egyptian that he appears to now listen to what he says.

The Angel of the Lord found Hagar by a spring of water in the wilderness and he said Hagar servant of Sarah where have you come from and where are you going she said I am fleeing from my mistress Sarah and the Angel of the Lord said to her return to your mistress and submit to her.

Now listen the Angel of the Lord is saying this: I will surely multiply your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for multitude; behold you are pregnant and shall bear a son, you should call his name Ishmael because the Lord has listened to your affliction.
She called the name of the Lord who spoke to her. She said truly here I have seen Him who looks after me. Notice this; she’s describing an encounter, an experience of some sort with the Angel of the Lord but the Angel of the Lord takes the authority to promise her.
I know you picked up on it using the same language: he says to Abraham I’m going to bless you, I’m going to multiply your seed. He names the child he did and by the way I had to leave those parts out; he describes the destiny of this child Ishmael but it is not an angel doing this. It is the Angel of Lord whom we believe to be the incarnate or the pre‑incarnate figure of Christ.

Now we go to Genesis 22 here Abraham was sacrificing Isaac.
Abraham raised the knife, he’s got him tied down, he raises the knife and God calls from heaven: “Let us not do that” and then “do not kill him.”

We read this in Genesis 22:15‑18; the Angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven and said by myself I have sworn declares the Lord.
I will surely bless you and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of Heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore; in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.

Please notice the Angel doesn’t say now God says he’s going to do this. The Angel of the Lord says I am going to do this and this is where we have this concept that this person is not just your average angel but a very real personal appearance of God for the benefit of His people.
Now no I am not suggesting this happens today that’s where I’m trying to get to this morning but it did happen.

If we are going to accept the testimony of Scripture they had encounters with this person that they called the Angel of the Lord who was not your typical angel.

All the numbers and appearances of this word or words angel or angel in the Book of Numbers they’re all in Chapter 22 dealing with Balaam and if you know Balaam’s story he’s in rebellion against God but let me read again: This is edited for space; God’s anger was kindled against Balaam.
Chapter 22 of Numbers, God’s anger was kindled and the Angel of the Lord took his stand in the way as his adversary.

Balaam was riding on the donkey and the donkey saw the Angel of the Lord standing in the road with a drawn sword in his hand; the donkey turned aside and went into a field and Balaam struck the donkey to turn her into the road, then the Angel of the Lord stood in a narrow path between the vineyards with a wall on either side.
When the donkey saw the Angel of the Lord she pushed against the wall and pressed Balaam’s foot against the wall so he struck her again.

Then the Angel of the Lord went ahead and stood in a narrow place where there was no way to turn either to the right or to the left and when the donkey saw the Angel of the Lord she lay down under Balaam, and Balaam’s anger was kindled and he struck the donkey with his staff.

We go on I have to go down further. No to intend to dismiss anything in the text then the Lord opened the eyes of Balaam and he saw the Angel of the Lord standing in the way with his drawn sword in his hand and he bowed down and fell on his face.
That is a worship movement in the Old Testament; this is not just something you do, “Oh I’m scared of this person they got a sword please don’t kill me.” It is an act of worship.

He recognizes this person is not another typical angel and the Angel of the Lord said: now get this again I’m trying to connect this. This is not your average angel; this is the Lord in His pre‑incarnate form coming down to work.
Behold I have come out to oppose you because your way is perverse before me.

He doesn’t say “your way is perverse before the Lord”; he says “your way is perverse before me” meaning what he’s claiming the prerogatives of divinity here. Now listen to what he says: the donkey saw me and if she had not turned aside surely I would have killed you and let her live.

Balaam said to the Angel of the Lord: I have sinned; I did not know that it was you who stood in the road against me, now therefore if it is evil in your sight I will turn back in this instance.

Now you have Balaam confessing sin. You can’t confess sin to an angel; you can only confess sins to God and this is what we believe then that this is God in His pre‑incarnate Christ in the pre‑incarnate form coming down interacting with His creation.

The Angel of the Lord reappears twice in the Book of Judges with respect to Gideon.
We see the same kinds of things and you have to give me a moment to jump over there to read this. We see the same kinds of things with Gideon when he is when he encounters this person of Genesis.

By the way, here again a commentary: some commentaries say that this is an example of entertaining angels unaware but Gideon is fully aware that there’s a divine person visiting him; there’s never any question about that.
The Angel of the Lord came and sat under the terebinth at Ophrah which belonged to Joash while his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the wine press to hide it from the Midianites, and the Angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him: The Lord is with you, Almighty Man of Valor.

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 he said, and the Lord turned to him and the Lord turned to him and the Lord turned to him.

He’s talking to this person Angel Lord and it’s the Lord who turns to him; it is God in His pre‑incarnate form go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian.
Do not I send you and he said to him please Lord how can I save Israel? Behold my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father’s house.

The Lord said to him: I will be with you and you shall strike the Midian nights as one man.
He said to him if now I have found favor in your eyes then show me a sign that it is you who speak with me please do not depart from here until I come to you and bring out my present and set it before you and he said I will stay till you return.

So Gideon went into his house and prepared a young goat and unleavened cow cakes from an ephod of flour; the meat he put in a basket, the broth he put in a pot and brought them to him under the terebinth and presented them.

Now here’s where it gets interesting because Judges 6:20 doesn’t say Angel of the Lord; it says the Angel of God but notice this: the Angel of God said to him take the meat and the unleavened cakes, put them on this rock, pour the broth over them, and he did so.

This is an offering; by the way you don’t give offerings to angels you give offerings to God.
And then the Angel of the Lord back to the Angel Lord reached out the tip of his staff was in his hand touched the meat and the other unleavened cakes and fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes, and the Angel of the Lord vanished from his sight.

Gideon perceived that he was the Angel of the Lord and Gideon said: Alas! Oh Lord God for now I have seen the Angel of Lord face to face.
The Lord said to him: Peace be to you, do not fear; you shall not die.

In the Old Testament when you saw God people expected to drop dead and Gideon is acting out that belief because he has seen the presence of God in a pre‑incarnate form and it wasn’t just your typical angel.

Samson’s story is a little bit harder because of some of the things that happened but there’s enough overlap in the stories.
I think to offset the difficulties, you have a birth announcement and destiny described. The Angel of the Lord says to Samson’s mother: you’re going to have a baby; this is what he’s going to be like, this is what he’s going to do.

It’s the same kind of birth announcement, you have the same bringing of an offering, and at the end of the story there is the expectation of death from seeing God. They say we’re going to die, we’ve seen God; so it isn’t just an angel. People were scared when they saw angels.

A typical good indication of whether some really saw an angel was whether they were scared or not; if they weren’t scared they probably didn’t see an angel because an angel is an other‑worldly being that strikes fear and that’s why the first words out of their mouths typically are “Do not be afraid.” Because the natural instinct is to fear, this is something more though they’re afraid, they’re going to die because they’ve seen God.

Now there are other incidents in the life of the Israelites which involve visitations that are not described as the Angel of the Lord but which parallel these accounts. For example, a well‑known example is Jacob wrestling with the Angel at the river before he crosses over, and at the end of the story you have wrestled with God and prevailed—not just an angelic being. Though in the story you have to look at the whole of it, here’s one that most of us are familiar with: Joshua 5:13–15. When Joshua was by Jericho he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold a man was standing before him with this sword drawn in his hand. Joshua went to him and said to him, “Are you for us or for our adversaries?” He said, “No, but I am the Commander of the Army of the Lord.” Joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshiped and said to him, “It’s not a man; I mean it looks like a man, but it’s not a man because he falls down to worship this man.” And you don’t worship men—you don’t worship angels—you only worship God. Joshua has a sense of this, and it happens before: What is this thing? He says to this man—he fell on the earth and worshiped—and said, “What does My Lord say to His servant?”

That’s about a week and a half of preaching in this one passage. What do you want me to do? How am I going to win this battle? The first thing you’re going to do is get on your knees and worship God. Let it begin with worship—don’t start counting your eggs before the chickens hatch; don’t start laying out plans. Put your focus on worshiping the Lord, because of who He is—that’s where your victory lies. Your victory lies not in political power or economic power but in the power of God in our lives. What does My Lord say to His servant? Commander of the Lord’s army said to Joshua, “Take off your sandals from your feet; the place where you are standing is holy, and it is holy because God is there.”

Very interesting, Pastor. Thank you for that biblical history. How do you connect it to the title Present Help in the Time of Trouble? Well, here’s how I do it as a reminder: there are times as an outworking of His great love for His people that God doesn’t merely send someone else but He Himself comes to call to comfort and encourage. He comes down to Hagar; he comes down to Gideon; he comes down to Moses; he comes down to Abraham, and He says here He has an encounter with them that’s meant to encourage and lift them up. There’s a passage over in the book of Isaiah that I will find because this one’s easy—I know where this one’s at. Now if I can’t find it, I’m going to look like a complete idiot, aren’t I?

The Wilderness: Isaiah 35. The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom like the crocus. It shall blossom and rejoice with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon—they shall see the glory of the Lord, the majesty of our God. Strengthen the weak hands, make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who have an anxious heart: Be strong; fear not, for why? Because Your God will come; He will come. And when you go to the story of Jesus in the Gospels, what is He doing? He’s healing people—lame people are walking, blind people are seeing. He’s come; God has come to take care and address our needs.

And in our moment, in our moment of time, since Christ came and left, He did what He gave us—the Comforter, the Helper, the Advocate, the Counselor—and the different renderings. Listen to what He says in John 14: “If you love me you will keep my commandments, and I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper to be with you forever—even the Spirit of Truth—to be with you forever.” Note that, please, in the Old Testament the spirit came and went on the prophets; he came and they prophesied, and the spirit went. He came on Saul or came on Samson, then he went. Jesus says, “I’m going to give you a Somebody’s going to stay with you; He’s going to come and He’s going to stay; He’s going to be another Helper.” We dealt with this tonight; I think another alos is the Greek word—another one like me—not heteros, someone different from me. Alas, someone just like me. God in the Spirit comes to dwell within His people. The world can’t receive this. He says it neither sees Him nor knows Him. For He dwells with you and will be in you that day when the spirit is dwelling in us.

You will know that I am in My Father, and you and me and I and you—whoever has My commandments and keeps them—it is He who loves me, and He who loves me will be loved by My Father; I will love Him and manifest myself to Him. If anyone loves Me, He will keep My word, and My Father will love Him, and we will come to Him—or her—and make our home with them. We’ll come and make a home. I’m not going to send an angel; I’m going to come and take residence in your heart yourself. Wow—The Old Testament people had angels coming down; we have something better than that. I am not diminishing that Angels work—that’s not my point—but I’ll come then to the second consideration, without diminishing ongoing Angelic aid which we no doubt are working in some way.

But let me give you a little bit of insight quickly: They are not working, and I just—I’m not trying to be facetious. There are people who teach this kind of nonsense; they’re not working to make sure you have the best parking spot at Walmart—they’re working to further your salvation, to secure your salvation, they’re working for your eternal good and not your temporary comforts. Without diminishing ongoing Angelic aid, listen now we have God within through the indwelling of His Holy Spirit—doing what no Angel can do. Working inner transformation—I don’t care how much the Angel does on the outside; I got problems on the inside, I need cleansing, I need changing, I need transformation, and the Angels can’t do that—only the Holy Spirit can do that—and this is why I say He is a Present Help. Angels may be able under certain circumstances to change externals. I’m one of those people who’ve had a thousand experiences where we said boy that’s a God thing.

And the Angel can’t do that for you no matter what; there’s twenty of them in this room and they’re all saying they’re all pulling for Billy—let’s go, boy. What I need is change of heart, and that change of heart comes through the work of the Holy Spirit. And this is why I say to you a very Present Help in time of trouble: He is all of that and he can work through Angelic ministrations, but what we need… Come on now—what Angel is going to deliver you from temptation?

The Lord’s Prayer. Jesus doesn’t say “seek an Angel to help you overcome your temptation.” Christ says, “pray to me for the strength to endure and overcome—to stand the test.” I don’t care how many Angels stand around cheering me on; I’ve got to have a change of heart. I’ve got to have a grip; something happened inside. And so I hope you will understand and receive this in the way it is offered—not against Angels, but we are not careful—we shift the focus and the Angels become our source rather than the Lord, and our real problem is one of the heart. Only God can fix that. Amen. Father, thank you.