Trending
During the Christmas season, we certainly have sung about angels. Both in the circumstances of Christ's advent to earth, and what he taught about God's angels, they are an inseparable part of Christianity.
The term, "angel" means "messenger," and is applied in numerous ways to human messengers as well as providential events. For example, after John's messengers left (Luke 7:24); And he sent messengers on ahead (Luke 9:52); See, I will send my messenger, who will prepare the way before me (Malachi 3:1).
"Angel" is mostly used in the Bible to represent those unseen agents that execute the will of God. He makes winds his messengers (Psalm 104:4); Lightning and hail, snow and clouds, stormy winds that do his bidding (Psalm 148:8).
Angels are not permitted to be the objects of our personal regard, or to receive the worship due only to God, their creator. Tremendous in strength, they are ready to catch the slightest nod of God's will and carry it out. Psalm 103 says he directs the angels to do his bidding and obey his word.
We are not told exactly how they minister to us, but as they ministered to Jesus in the days of his flesh, they minister to his heirs of salvation as Hebrews 1:13-14 explains.
As spiritual beings, angels are limitless in number. They appear before us as multitudes (see Luke 2:13). In his description of heaven encircling the throne of God, John mentions angels as being among the "ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands" (Rev. 5:11).
The treasured teaching of Jesus about angels shows their joy over the salvation of sinners. When sinners repent and turn to Jesus as their Savior, angels rejoice with the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit.
Jesus spoke often of the angels accompanying him when he comes in the glory of his Father. When he comes in all his glory to sit upon the magnificent throne, the angels will assist him in separating "them one from another" (Matt. 25:32). He alone is fit to be the judge of who will be to the right hand of honor or to the left hand of shame.
God will use angels when time turns into eternity, and he creates a new kind of life for every creature on earth. Time is running faster with global, medical, economic, and moral issues kindling to fires all over the world.
We thought modern technology would answer many of the problems of the world, and in many ways it has. Unfortunately, poverty, terrorism, war, injustice, greed, so many diseases continue to vex us.
Things will change one day. It is more than our minds can imagine, of course. And part of us does not want to believe "it" can really happen. Well, it will.
I enjoy a comment Billy Graham made many years ago when he visited the dining room of the United States Senate. One senator asked, "Billy, we are discussing pessimism and optimism.
Are you a pessimist or an optimist?" Bill smiled and said, "I'm an optimist." He asked, "Why?" Billy said, "I've read the last page of the Bible."
Would we live differently if we remembered we are being watched all the time by the heavenly host? Paul, in 1 Cor. 4:9 teaches that angels are watching us, that we are a "spectacle" to them.
Two precise times I have perceived angels at my brothers' last breaths. I know angels were there to usher them into the presence of God. I saw faces that were twisted in immense pain suddenly and quietly released to beautiful peace.
It is difficult these days to walk close with God and keep our love for him. Remember though, that in his darkest hours, Jesus found refuge in, and leaned upon, his heavenly Father. We live by faith in our ordinary lives. Our part is to trust in God and keep our faith in Jesus Christ, the author of our faith.
"Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy in this book...let him take the free gift of the water of life...Yes, I am coming soon...." (from Rev. 22).