Why Does God Hide Himself?

[steve7150]

I cannot imagine what the purpose of this "visit" would be. Not only that, but I don't think any angel in the Bible ever appeared as a woman but always as a man.








Perhaps the purpose was to use up some of my time keeping me from some bad event? Maybe God wants to be politically correct and have female looking angels nowadays?

[dwight92070]

Jason, You said that this kid and his mother told you to stay where you were and you would be fine. Later in your post you said that you actually went looking for them. If you went looking for them while the doors were still locked, then you disobeyed them. If you went looking for them after the doors were unlocked, then obviously they could have left the building. So if this was an angel or two angels, you basically did not do what they told you to do, but you still came out okay. There seems to be some contradictions here. What would be the need for angels to appear to you and tell you to do something, and then you disobey and don't do it? If you weren't going to follow the angel's instructions, then how could they protect you? If they were going to protect you whether you obeyed or not, then why did they even appear to you?

Again, our standard is the Bible. No angel ever appeared as a woman or a child in the Bible. Obviously I'm glad that you were okay after that. It was terrible that you were badly beaten. I believe that God did protect you after that beating, in spite of your seeing a woman and her son.

[steve7150]

Again, our standard is the Bible. No angel ever appeared as a woman or a child in the Bible







Yes it's the standard but if God wished to make an angel appear as a women or child or animal or anything else is He limited by what the standard is in the bible?
IMHO if Jason encountered angels (if) then their job was to protect him and i'm thinking he didn't contemplate that they may have been angels until after the fact so he didn't even realize he may have disobeyed a messenger from above.

[dwight92070]

No, God is not limited. He can do whatever He wants. But I think He gives us the Scripture (among other reasons) to help us know whether something or someone is from Him or not. Many have claimed to actually speak with aliens from outer space. Are all of these claims false? Did they actually see a being and speak with it? I think that it is very likely that they did, but that they were speaking with demons. Also, many have claimed that they have seen and spoken to loved ones who have died, including male, female, adults, and children. I think that in most cases, they are seeing and speaking with demons. The Bible condemns necromancy, communicating with the dead.

Biblically, an angel from God appears as an adult male. looking just like an average man, as it happened when 2 angels rescued Lot and his family from Sodom. Also, in Matthew 28:3, an angel appeared as an adult male, but his appearance was like lightning, and his clothing was white as snow. Outside of beings in heaven (which might be angels) described both in the Old and New Testaments, we never see an angel appearing on earth with wings or any other animal-like features.

But even if we see an angel that appears to be an average man or a man that looks like lightning with white clothing, we are warned that "even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light" - 2 Corinthians 11:14 Our next test is the words this being speaks. Paul said it could happen that "an angel from heaven" could appear to you, but he is preaching a "gospel" to you contrary to the gospel that Paul preached. Let him be accursed. It is a demon. Joseph Smith may have seen such a demon. The same is true with Mohammed.

The truths set forth is Scripture are given for our benefit. So why would God allow us to see a true angel in a different form (here on earth) that what He describes them to look like in His word? That would only confuse us and set us up to be deceived by Satan. Remember Jesus said that "the Scripture cannot be broken", i.e. deprived of it's authority. We can trust the principles and standards set forth in the Bible.

[steve7150]

No, God is not limited. He can do whatever He wants. But I think He gives us the Scripture (among other reasons) to help us know whether something or someone is from Him or not.









Well this hopefully is my last comment on this as it seems pretty minor and impossible to have anything other then an opinion on. You say God is not limited and then you do exactly that. IMHO to know whether something is from God you look at the fruits of what occurred not whether it matched up with something that happened in scripture. In Jason's case he was saved from harm but in my case it was more obscure but I described what occurred and I can only leave it at that.

[dwight92070]

Each of us can look at the "fruits" of an incident, and come to totally different conclusions. But when we compare that incident by the true standard of God's word, the chances of that happening are greatly diminished.

No, I have not limited God. In a sense, He has "limited" Himself. For example, He could have made the Messiah a woman, but instead He "limited" Himself and had the Messiah come ONLY as a man. He could have had all the prophets foretell that a woman would come to save the world but He didn't.

He could have given us 2 ways to be saved but He didn't. He "limited" Himself and allowed us only 1 way to be saved.

He could have given the angels female names instead of Gabriel, Michael, and Lucifer. But He "limited" Himself and only gave them male names. He could have given us many examples or even one example of an angel appearing in a female form, but He "limited" Himself and we only see angels appear as adult males.

We can learn much from how God has "limited" Himself.

[steve7150]

He could have given us many examples or even one example of an angel appearing in a female form, but He "limited" Himself and we only see angels appear as adult males.






"Then I looked up and there were before me two women, with the wind in their wings. They had wings like those of a stork, and they lifted up the basket between
heaven and earth." Zechariah 5.9