The Angel Of The Lord = Who 2

I am just finishing up the Four Streams Bible Reading Plan, (the plan I selected to use when reading the bible this year) and I am now reading Revelation and Zechariah at the same time, and wow. Those two books together is worthy of a major study on its own. The point here is that it's been well over a year since I read Zechariah last (last years plan was chronological and I'm way behind on this years plan as it's quite demanding) and I've forgotten almost all of Zechariah.  

As I've mentioned before, the Angel of the Lord is a character that pops up in the Old Testament and if you don't pause to consider what is going on, you'll miss the incredible appearence of Jesus in the Old Testament. Now occurrences I've found in Zechariah show clearly who the Angel of the Lord truly is. As I read through Zechariah 3 last night I read it in the NIV, which put the passage in clearer terms for me than previous reads:

1 Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan standing at his right side to accuse him. 2 The Lord said to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you, Satan! The Lord, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebuke you! Is not this man a burning stick snatched from the fire?” 3 Now Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes as he stood before the angel. 4 The angel said to those who were standing before him, “Take off his filthy clothes.” Then he said to Joshua, “See, I have taken away your sin, and I will put fine garments on you.” 5 Then I said, “Put a clean turban on his head.” So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him, while the angel of the Lord stood by. (Zechariah 3:1-4)

I didn't catch this in the past readings because in verse 4 the NASB says "Inequity" while the NIV uses the word "Sin", I need to remember that inequity = sin as I'm reading, I'll get that right someday. Notice that in verse 4 the Angel of the Lord did not say "The Lord takes away your sins" the Angel of the Lord clearly says "See, I have taken away your sin" Here clearly the Angel of the Lord forgives Joshua of his sins, and in this case Joshua is representative of all Israel so the Angel of the Lord just forgave all of the sins of all of Israel. That's quite a span of sin. 

Who can forgive sin? Only God.

⁷ “Why does this man speak that way? He is blaspheming; who can forgive sins but God alone?” (Mark 2:7)

Being God, Jesus can forgive sin. The biblical accounts show us this over and over, but angels do not forgive sin. There's no scriptural account of angels forgiving anyone of anything, nor is there anything in scripture that says angels are allowed to do that. Sin is an offense against God, it's described as rebellion against God in Deuteronomy 9:7, so only God would have the power to forgive sin We would forgive a slight against us, and God forgives an offense against Him. Yet here the Angel of the Lord assumes divine prerogative and forgives the sin of an entire nation. Why would an angel even assume the divine ability to do so, unless this was more than just an angel. 

The answer is that this was God in a form we could see: Jesus.