The Doe of the Dawn: A Christian World View. . .

THE SPIRITUAL (ANGELIC) UNIVERSE

See that you do not despise one of these little ones; for I tell you that in heaven their angels always behold the face of my Father who is in heaven. (Mt. 18:10)

In our incendiary world it says a great deal about one’s philosophy that he believes in angels. It is a world in which about one-third of its inhabitants are functionally illiterate. More than that number are starving or on the verge of starvation. Many of the nations live in distrust of each other, and the problems they all face, whether in terms of terrorism, drugs, overpopulation, or poverty, are staggering. And I talk about angels!

I am not referring to shining haloes, magic wands, or flapping wings, but to creatures of God, not altogether different from ourselves, spiritual beings, whose mission it is to watch after nonentities like you and me.

It is the nonentities, those considered unimportant, “the little ones,” that Jesus refers to when he says “in heaven their angels always behold the face of my Father who is in heaven.” These are not only little children, but all those in the church that may be ignored or looked down on because of their lowly estate. In showing how important these souls really are in the sight of God, Jesus reveals one of the most comforting truths of all of Scripture: we have angels watching after us.

It is a truth that challenges one’s values if he is inclined to take others for granted, whether the wearisome child, the paperboy, or the kid next door, and especially if he “thinks down on” those he considers beneath him, which is the idea of despise. Jesus is saying that that lowly black boy, unlearned and unkempt, has his own angel who stands in the presence of God himself, so you had better take care how you treat him.

We may seem to be outnumbered by the forces of evil in this complex and dangerous world, but once we see, as did Elisha, that “they that be with us are more than they that be with them” (2 Kgs. 6:16), we realize that we are on the side that cannot lose. It is a great line where Elijah prayed for the younger prophet filled with fear, the fear of overwhelming odds against him: “Lord, open his eyes that he may see.” It was when Elisha saw the mountain full of horses and chariots of fire, an angelic host, that he could say Fear not. He had more on his side than he realized.

Ah, if we could but open our eyes and see! It is a fitting prayer for any of us in a world smitten by depression. And when we see what the Scriptures teach us, that there are angels “sent forth as ministering spirits” (Heb. 1:14), we need not be overcome by fear. It was this assurance that sustained Jesus in the face of his enemies: “Do you not think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels” (Mt. 26:53).

That the angels are innumerable adds to the aura of this neglected subject. The “twelve legions” that Jesus could summon would itself be 60,000, if we take this literally, but he was probably saying “countless numbers.” It was “a multitude of the heavenly host” that sang praises to God at the birth of Christ (Lk. 2:13), and Dan. 7:10 counts the angels by the millions: “Thousands of thousands and ten thousand times ten thousand.” It is enough to say that the angelic host is well staffed, or as Heb. 12:22 puts it there are “innumerable angels in festal gathering.”

When Jesus referred to those twelve legions, he said they could be summoned “at once.” We may conclude that these heavenly beings have spiritual bodies of some kind (just as we shall have), but they are capable of transcending both space and time and can thus transport themselves here and there as quickly as the mind can think, faster even than Superman! It is evident that they sometimes assumed human bodies (or it so appeared) but even then neither bars nor cages could contain them, as in the case of Peter’s deliverance from prison. An angel passed through stone walls and iron doors to reach the apostle, who was asleep, chained to two soldiers. But he appeared to be a human being, nudging Peter on the side to awaken him and firing instructions to him. The apostle followed the angel out of prison, with iron gates opening before them as doors do in our supermarkets. It was only when it was all over that Peter realized that it was an angel that had pulled off the escape.

There is a happy blend of the natural and the supernatural in this story. Surely the angel could have swooped down, not unlike Superman, and bore Peter to freedom. But some elements are similar to any jail escape, such as the angel telling the apostle to get dressed and move quickly. Why, with an angel in charge? Throughout Scripture there is an economy or a conservatism in the miraculous. It took Jesus to raise Lazarus, but he tells those standing by to remove his burial clothes.

While the Bible does not refer to “guardian angels,” the text for this essay allows such a deduction: each little one has an angel in the presence of God. While it is a blessed thought, this does not have to mean that one particular angel and that angel only is set apart for each person. For whatever reason, one may need the ministry of many angels, or perhaps different ones at different times. But Jesus does suggest that each little one has an angel that has a special responsibility for that one person. This being the case, a lot of us must give our angel a hard time of it. Since they themselves are not beyond sin, I can see how they might grow weary of us --- and try to trade us off! And I suspect some of them could really be horse traders!

Speaking of the angelic proclivity to sin, it is evident from Scripture that some of them have transgressed just as man has. There are the fallen angels “that did not keep their own position but left their proper dwelling,” and it says of them that “they have been kept by him in eternal chains in the nether gloom until the judgment of the great day.” (Jude 6) This is the demonic world, or part of it, those angels, principalities, and powers that seek to separate the believer from the love of God (Rom. 8:38-39).

Satan himself is a fallen angel. Jesus says he saw him fall like lightning from heaven (Lk. 10:18), which means that his fall was quick, sudden, and final, not that Jesus saw him fall from heaven. Whatever this passage means, however poetic or symbolic, it speaks of the reality of Satan as a fallen spirit. Since Jesus spoke to Satan, now and again putting him down, we cannot conclude that all such references are but “picture-thinking” in an effort to describe the extent of evil in the universe, as some theologians suggest. They rather describe our enemy, a real and living reality, as in 1 Pet. 5:8: “Be sober, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking some one to devour.”

This passage names the devil, which means slanderer, as the adversary, which is the meaning of Satan. That describes our enemy: in the presence of God he is against us, continually making charges against us, accusing us, even of misdemeanors. Except for our advocate, who is the Christ, our situation is hopeless, for our accuser has the goods on us since we are sinners as charged. Our advocate concedes before the “court” that we are guilty as charged, but that he will take the penalty upon himself. It is the sacrifice of Jesus in our behalf that the Judge declares to us, even when we stand in the dock guilty, not guilty. Not guilty! This is the meaning of dikaiosune or righteousness, as it is usually translated.

So our accuser and adversary, the devil, named Satan, rules the spiritual (demonic) world, he himself having fallen from a high estate due to his hostile disposition and rebellion against God. His self-ordained mission is to oppose God’s work on earth by deceiving man and destroying faith, such as entering the heart of Judas (Lk. 22:3) and removing the word of God from men’s hearts (Mk. 4:15). He is sometimes credited for physical infirmities and deformities, as when Jesus describes a woman he was to heal, one bent over so that she could not straighten herself, as “bound by Satan for eighteen years” (Lk. 13:16), a doctrine that is dramatized in the book of Job.

But Satan’s power is limited by what God allows him to do, as in the case of Job, and by what man is willing for him to do, as indicated in those admonitions to beware of him, such as Eph. 6:11: “Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.”

This truth really comes alive in an exchange between Jesus and Peter. “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.” The apostle is sure he will stand firm, for he responds: “Lord, I am ready to go with you to prison and to death.” That is when Jesus predicts that Peter will deny him not once but thrice and that before the cock crows (Lk. 22:31-34).

This shows that it takes more than a host of good angels and even the prayers of Jesus to keep Satan off us. The believer must be resolute and defy Satan, drawing upon the resources available to him. Jesus prayed that Peter’s faith would not fail, but there was Peter’s part. Peter came through the ordeal bruised and battered by Satan, but he was victorious. Jesus knew that the apostle’s sifting by Satan would rough him up, but that it could also be used to help others. “When you have turned again, strengthen your brethren,” he told Peter.

If Satan asked for Job and demanded to sift Peter, is he not out to hurt the faith of us all and in the most subtle ways? He uses wiles and tricks to deceive us, so we must always be armed with the armor of righteousness and protected by the shield of faith.

If we are in a war it is important that we know who the enemy is. We are slow to learn that the enemy is not those of another church, but “the domain of darkness” that forever tempts us through the false values of this world to compromise our faith.

But we have a lot going for us, very much indeed. But even when heaven is on our side and Jesus is praying for us and angels are standing by, it is in our hands to make use of the grace God has bestowed and the resources of power that he has laid by for us.

It is said of angels: “Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to serve, for the sake of those who are to obtain salvation?” (Heb. 1:14)

They are sent forth to serve and protect us. It should be a weighty part of the Christian’s view of things. --- the Editor