Old Testament Christmas

As we prepare to celebrate the coming of our Lord in the flesh to save us from our sins, we are reminded that the first Christmas wasn’t the first time He revealed Himself to His people on earth. The Son of God comes to His people in tangible ways throughout the Old Testament to speak to them and to bring them deliverance. One such occasion is at the burning bush. The Malak Yahweh appears to Moses. Malak means “messenger.” So while this phrase is usually translated as “Angel of the Lord,” it does not refer in this case to any created angel but to the Lord Himself, the messenger of the Father. The Son of God comes down into the burning bush to announce how Israel will be delivered from their slavery to the Egyptians. This foreshadows the greater salvation to come when the Lord will join Himself permanently to our human nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin Mary. As the bush did not burn up at His presence, so the Lord Jesus did not come to destroy us but to save us and make us His own, like living branches of Him who is the vine.