The Role of Angels

One of my favorite phrases that I keep near to me, and it's actually a bookmarker that I have in my office, comes from a movie called Shadowlands. It's the story of C.S. Lewis, and there's a famous line that comes out of that movie that has always moved me and brought me to Remembrance, and I'd like to share it with you today.

It is short, and it is sweet, but it is powerful, and it is the good news that I would like to bring to you on this Sabbath day. And it is simply this. We read to know that we are not alone. I could give you no better news as a Christian communicator to fellow saints than on this Sabbath day to let you know whoever you are and wherever you live, you are not alone.

Oftentimes, we'll get down on our knees and we'll pray after that model prayer that Jesus Christ gave us, and we come to that point where we say, Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So we pray in this gigantic macro sense with the eternal purpose of God that it might be visited here on earth. But the question I have for you in all of this is simply, how does it work at times? How is it that God's kingdom and God's will is done on this earth as it is done in heaven, and how that might affect you?

Would you please join me over in Psalms 91 for just a moment to give us an intro verse to move into a subject that I'd like to share with you that I hope will be encouraging to you on this Sabbath day? We find it over in Psalms 91, and let's pick up the thought if we could in verse 11.

Psalms 91 and verse 11, where it simply states, For He shall give His angels charge over you to keep you in all your ways. The subject that I would like to bring to you today, and it's not going to be all inclusive or all-ending, because it's really just the beginning of a study that I'd like to ask that you consider taking. But that is, today we're going to talk about angels. Don't know the last time that you heard a message about angels, but we're going to talk about angels.

Because angels have a great part in that aspect of God's will being done on this earth as it is in heaven. What does the Scripture mean when it says, And that He shall give His angels charge over us? We might ask, how and why? And those are some of the things that we are going to move in today.

Jesus Christ, once, when confronted by followers, mentioned that He said that, My Father works, and so do I. That was one of the first things that really caught my attention as a young lad coming to the Church of God community. And that was to understand that God is not only love, I had come to understand that in other churches, but the activity and the dynamism of what the kingdom experiences all about, and the variety that is within that kingdom. And thus, we come to understand in part why God gives us knowledge about angels and why He tells us about angels in the book to help us understand more so about that kingdom that we are approaching and that kingdom that we are experiencing right now.

So let's get right into the subject for a few minutes. Let's go to Colossians 1. I think that's a good place to begin. Colossians. And let's pick up the thought in chapter 1 and understand about angels. Colossians 1. And let's pick up the thought in verse 16. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven, and that are on earth, they're visible and invisible. We don't often think about that because, well, you and I are trapped in time and space. And so we only see those things that are in front of our eyes.

And it says, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body, the church who is the beginning, the first born from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence.

It speaks of those things that, in that sense, thrones and dominions, principalities and powers. When we understand the background that Paul came from, the Jewish mind had a seamless outlook, both of heaven and earth. They look at heaven being a kingdom and having dominions and having levels, as was the structure of humanity on earth. What we come to understand is that angels are created. Now, that's going to be very important for us to come to understand as we move along in this.

In fact, if you'll join me for a moment over in Ezekiel 28. Join me there. Let's look at the big book of Ezekiel, because this is talking about a great carob and one that later became a fallen angel. And this is germane to our discussion to understand who God is, who Christ is, what angels are, and where we are, shall we say, in the pecking order of creation when it comes to angels and ourselves.

Ezekiel 28. And let's pick up the thought in verse 13.

And here we find it mentioned, speaking of the one that was Lucifer later on became Satan. You were in Eden, the garden of God. Every precious stone was your covering. The sardius, the topaz, and the diamond, barrel, onyx, and jasper. Talks about other gems.

The workmanship of your timbrels and pipes was prepared for you on the day you were created. Now, what do we take away from these couple of verses? Simply this, angels, like you and me, are created. They are not like the one that's come to be known as God the Father or Jesus Christ. They alone are uncreated. They alone inhabit what we might call, as Isaiah refers to it, eternity. Thus we understand the realm or the plane that the young created are on.

And while angels are tremendous and dynamic spiritual beings, they have a beginning. Thus they're not like the Father, they're not like Christ, and ultimately are subject, one day or another, to the sovereignty of God. These angels are fascinating, and they're given for a reason. Join me if you would in Psalms 104 and verse 4. Psalms 104 verse 4, where it mentions here, and this is also later on quoted in the book of Hebrews 1 verse 7, but Psalms 104 verse 4, who makes his angels spirits and his ministers a flame of fire. The term in the Hebrew is malek, the term in the Greek is angeles. It means literally, they are his messengers. They're communicating something. And so what are they communicating?

Because what's really interesting about the angelic realm is simply this. They are neither the source of the communication, neither are they normally the direct object of the communication. They are conveyors. They are communicators. They are facilitators to bring forth the will of God and or to share what that will of God is and or to make sure that it happens. The angels set us. An incredible example. Join me if you would. I want you to look at this because sometimes we just think of angels as being well, spiritual first responders.

That's the big term today. Or spiritual firemen or spiritual policemen. But join me if you would in Psalms 103 for just a second. And let's notice verse 19. The Lord has established his throne in heaven and his kingdom rules over all. Bless the Lord, you his angels who excel in strength, who do his word, heeding the voice of his word. Bless the Lord, all you his hosts, you ministers of his who do his pleasures. Bless the Lord, all his works and all places of his dominion.

Perhaps we've just limited angels as far as being first responders. Spiritual robots with a smile and wings. But angels are also given to us as examples. Notice what it says right here, verse 20. Who do his word. Is that not the work of God in us to do his word? And notice what it also says here, who heed the voice of his word. If we as Christians just followed that one example of these spiritually created sons of God.

Because angels are also called sons of God in places. Not to be dismissed with where we are headed or what God has in store for us. But if we just heeded the word of God and did his word. The reason why God gives us angels is to remind us that he is not an absentee landlord. So often a day it's very gosh or very common to say, Well, I believe in God.

I believe in a first cause. Wow! They believe in first cause. That this just couldn't happen. That somehow, like a top, it had to be wound up and then off it goes. But angels are given to us to remind us that God is not just simply a first cause. He's not just simply an absentee cosmic landlord.

He is hands-on with his creation and also with his spiritual creation called the church. The new creation that is brought out in the New Testament. With that stated, here's what I want you to remember. Not only during this message, but tonight, tomorrow, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, we read to know that we are not alone.

We read to understand that God has active interest in the body of Christ and that he has means and ways to carry out his will. Here's one very important question. We say we're not alone. Well, then, who's around us? Join me, if you would, in Revelation 5 and verse 11. Revelation 5, 11. It begins to allow us to understand the magnitude of God's love and concern and to recognize what we are dealing with when it comes to the angelic realm. Revelation 5 and verse 11. Let's notice what it says here.

Then I looked and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, the elders, and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands. That's just a bunch of... that sounds like a lot of zeroes, doesn't it?

Almost like our national debt. But we won't go there right now. I told you this was going to be an encouraging message. But when you put all those numbers together, if you just kind of put that together and kind of do a little... what used to be known as fuzzy math and put it all together, we're looking at a hundred million.

Now, what's interesting is we're not going to limit it to a hundred million because... we'll just leave it there for a moment, but it's interesting how man comes down to this question. Well, how many angels can dance on the head of a needle? Isn't that interesting? Where God thinks one way and he wants to expand what he's doing with humanity in the macro-universal cosmic sense, humanity somehow takes it a totally different direction and minimizes and theorizes and does a hypothesis on how many angels can dance on the head of a pen.

Join me in Hebrews 12 and verse 22. If ever there is a scripture to remind us that we are not alone in La Mesa and in Spring Valley and in Mira Mesa and in Coronado and in Temecula and all places in between, we find this in Hebrews. Here was a people that were under siege, the Jewish Christians, the Hebrews, the Roman Syrian forces were beginning to marshal and beginning to organize to come down towards Jerusalem in the mid-60s AD, towards the late 60s AD.

And that's the context of Hebrews. There were people that were saying, you know what, I came out of my community, I came out of my town, everybody there thought alike, everybody believed alike. Now I've been following this man. My parents followed this man. Maybe I'm a second generation Christian, maybe I'm a third generation Christian, maybe I just started a year or two and now I don't know where to go. I feel like I'm alone. And here comes Hebrews 12 and verse 22 when it says, But you have come to Mount Zion into the city of the living God.

You just haven't come to a house church in Jerusalem or in Nazareth or in Bethlehem, but you have come, notice, to Mount Zion to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to an innumerable company of angels. Inumerable. You can't count them. You can't begin to understand what God has in store to make sure that His will on earth and His will for us is accomplished.

To the General Assembly and the church of the firstborn who are registered in heaven, to the God, the judge of all, to the spirits of just men, made perfect.

Inumerable. Show me if you would in Job 25 verse 2. Job 25.

Notice what's mentioned here in the book of Job. Let's pick up the thought if we could in verse 2.

Is there any number to His armies, upon whom does His light not rise? How then can a man be righteous before God? Those armies are speaking of the angels of God, the host of heaven. There just simply is no number. Now, sheer numbers of and by themselves are encouraging. But what I'd like to now do is not only envelop you with the understanding that God can more than facilitate His will on this earth and in your life and in the life of your families, but there's another reason why God gives us angels to encourage us.

And that is, it allows us to understand the diversity of His heavenly kingdom. Sometimes people don't want to become a Christian or they don't want to move towards that eternal reward because they think, well, we're just all going to be like a blob, we're just an amorphous, we're all just going to be called Bob, we're just going to be Jane. That's it. We're just going to march into the beatific light. And it's so wonderful. Kind of like a bug's life, you know, where the little bug's going towards the light.

It's so wonderful. I don't have to go see a movie, just come up to Sun City. We see that every night on the summer. No, God gives us angels to understand the tremendous creativity and diversity of His kingdom. It is so neat. It is so exciting. I want to share with you for a few minutes. Join me if you would in Isaiah 6.

Isaiah 6. Let's notice what's written here. In Isaiah 6, this speaks of a level of angel that is called the seraphim. Seraph comes from the Hebrew term, which is like burning. And there's a reason why this is mentioned. In Isaiah 6 and verse 1, let us pick up verse 2. Well, verse 1. In that year a king who's I had died, and I saw the Lord sitting on a throne high and lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple.

Above it stood seraphim. Now we're introduced to these spiritually created beings. Seraphim. Now notice this. Each one had six wings. With two he covered his face. With two he covered his feet. And with two he flew. And one cried to another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And the post of the door was shaken by the voice of him who cried out, and the house was filled with smoke.

So I said, woe is me. I'd be saying the same thing. Woe is me, for I'm undone. Because I'm a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. For my eyes have seen the king, the Lord of hosts. Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having his hand a live coal, which he had taken the tongs from the altar.

And he touched my mouth with it and said, Behold, this has touched your lips. Your iniquity is taken away, and your sin purged. And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? And I said, Send me. Now what do we learn from this brief encounter with the seraphim, and what might we be able to take away? I would suggest that this is not a picture of Cupid, that we become so familiar with in the stained glass windows of Europe.

Here we have a couple of thoughts. We come to understand that God has this level of angelic being. They're called seraphs, or in the plural, seraphim. Their purpose is to do this. Number one is to promote and to preserve the holiness of God. Sometimes people say, this holy business sounds kind of like just for widows and old people. And folks that come in one way or the other can't make it anymore. When you understand what holiness is, you go to Isaiah 6, and it says that everything was shaking.

Holiness is not boring. This is why God opens the windows of heaven, as it were, through the Bible, being the scissors, to allow us to see what the throne room of God is like. And here are these seraph, and they have these wings. They cover their eyes. They cover their feet. They're giving God respect. They're giving God the humility. And here they are great beings right in the throne room of God.

And yet they never get tired of God's holiness. Their part is to say, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of His glory. And to express the reconciliation. Remember, they are facilitators. They don't start the message. They are not the direct object of the message, but they bring the message. And they brought the message to Isaiah and said he could be redeemed.

He could be reconciled. And he could be used of God. The seraphim, these great beings with these wings, they cover their head. They cover their feet. And the earth is shaking around them. And they are posted, perhaps always by that throne, to promote and to preserve the holiness of God forever. How important is the holiness of God? He wants it promoted. He wants it preserved. And it is to remind the angelic realm.

And it is also to remind we that are below. How holy is the God that we worship? He alone has that holy omnipotence. God created another form of being. It's called a carabem. And I'd like to share a few thoughts about that for a moment.

Join me if you would in Psalms 18 and verse 10. Psalms 18 verse 10. It speaks of the carabem. In Psalms 18 and verse 10, notice what it mentions. Speaking of God, and he rode upon a carob and flew. He flew upon the wings of the wind. Carabs. And in that spiritual sense, which I can't convey because I'm not on that side of the spiritual mountain.

We can only gain so much out of this. God gives us enough to consider. One day when we're spiritual there, we'll totally comprehend. But carabs were created for you and me to understand that God is not locked into one spot, one place. He's not isolated.

Carabs remind us that we worship and we have surrendered our life to a God who is on the move. God is not only omnipotent, but he's omnipresent. He's everywhere. Join me if you would in the book of Ezekiel because the book of Ezekiel spells out more about these angels that God rides the wind upon. It's very important to understand why Ezekiel is written and why we have this encounter that maybe some of you are familiar with, but allow me to spell it out anyway. And that is simply the book of Ezekiel opens up with his vision of the heavens. And God, the ancient of the days, riding upon these incredible beings, we'll talk about that for a moment.

Why does Ezekiel open up this way with this presentation of the angelic realm and God riding on the carabs? It is to remind through Ezekiel, to remind Israel of the holiness that they rejected, of the kingdom that they walked away from, of the God who called them out of Egypt. And they settled for these little pocket gods. Now, you and I today have these little things. I sometimes think they are pocket gods because we don't control them. We worship them. I found that sometimes when I'm talking to somebody and somebody has to grab this and start worshiping rather than talking to me.

Just a comment. Anyway, don't take it personally, but that one day, two thousand years from now, people are going to see all these little things and think, oh, these were little idols that they carried around in the 21st century. They must have meant something to these people. They have all these secret codes that must have been a mystical religion. And those beeps that go off must have been a part of the worship service.

All humor aside, that's even humor. Israel rejected the holiness of God. That's why chapter one opens up with this vision, this tapestry, this magnificent scene of the carob sweeping across the sky and the ancient of days upon them. Let's take just look for a moment. Verse four.

Then I looked, and behold, a whirlwind was coming out of the north, a great cloud of the raging fire engulfing itself, and brightness was all around it and radiating out of its midst like the color of amber and out of the midst of the fire. For those of you, maybe you saw that science fiction movie at one time or another called Independence Day, where you see the spaceship coming out of the...how many saw that movie? Anybody? Now I know what you're watching.

Okay, I saw it. I'm right about the fifth. He's the old scientist. But that really...I think they captured that scene out of here, the burning, churning flames and the fire. Well, that's what Ezekiel was seeing in vision. And all from it came the likeness of four living creatures, and this was their appearance. They had the likeness of a man. Each one had four faces, and each one had four wings.

Their legs were straight, and the soles of their feet were like the soles of cow's feet, and they sparkled like the color of burnished bronze, and it goes on and on and on. Folks, this is not a yellow pencil.

At least it's not in my crayon box. There is a diversity, and there is a complexity that is within the spiritual realm above. And we come down here then, verse 26, And above the firmen over their heads was the likeness of a throne, In appearance like a sapphire stone, on the likeness of the throne was a likeness, With the appearance of a man high above it. And also from appearance of his waist, and upward I saw, as if it were, the color of an amber, With the appearance of fire all around within it, And from the appearance of his waist, and downward I saw, as it were, The appearance of fire with a brightness all around.

Like the appearance of a rainbow, and a cloud on a rainy day, So was the appearance of the brightness all around it. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of God, Riding on the winds on a carob. Carobs were created to remind us of the omnipresence, The every-ware-ness of God, That he is not just sitting alone, sleeping, snoring, on some heavenly throne, That he is not a localized God, like the Canaanites had, When you see the idols that they worship.

Sometimes you see them in a book, and you think they're ten feet tall, But what the Canaanites did, they had these little gods of fertility, Whether it be man or whether it be woman. They didn't make real, real big gods, but they had a god that was in their pocket. They carried it. They buried it in their tent, or they carried it with them, Or they put it in their satchel, or the camel had to carry it.

It wasn't like one of these 500-foot Buddhas over in Asia. They had God in their pocket. Angels are created to remind us that none of us have God in our pocket, And that God chooses whom and where and when he desires to appear, And he is indeed everywhere.

Let me take you to a different thought here, Revelation 4. Join me if you're there. Revelation 4, because there are more realms of angels that are mentioned in the Bible. These angels that I'm about to mention are very similar, as it were, to the caribs. There are a lot of joint features. But the point I want to share is this, which is interesting. Revelation 4, verse 6. Now, if you are falling asleep during this message, this is bound to wake you up.

So get ready. Because it talks about Revelation 4. Let's pick up the thought in verse 6. Before the throne there was a sea of glass, like crystal, and in the midst of the throne and around the throne were what is called the four living creatures. I want you to notice what they look like, because you're not going to forget it.

And it says, full of eyes, in front and in back. Now, I don't know about you, and I'm still in this human form of time and space. I have difficulty enough just focusing on two eyes at a time, with the eyes that are in front of me. Can you imagine a spiritual being that has eyes up and down in front? That'll wake you up. And eyes and back. I remember when our girls were growing up and they'd do something, and they didn't think I saw it as their pops.

And I'd often say, I saw it. Remember, I've got eyes in the back of my head. Well, I was proverbially blind, unfortunately. God does not lie. Up there, they've got eyes all over. It's like the old thing, the eyes have it. Now, why? What does this... We're having some fun with this, but what does this communicate to us? It communicates to us that God sees everything that's happening down here below, and nothing is missed. And His angels, who are given charge over us, see all of this and bring to our Father and our Lord's attention up above what you and I are going through down below.

This is incredible. Now, what's interesting about all of this is to understand that those eyes see a lot.

And what I'm about to share with you is to recognize that for 6,000 years, those eyes of these four living creatures have seen things that they don't want to see that are happening down here on Earth. That saddened them, that perhaps created tears in their eyes, if angels have tears, if not tears in God's eye. But the one thing I want to share with you is what we now find in verse 9. Because it talks about these four living creatures, and no matter what they see, no matter sometimes how bad it looks down here, either with humanity apart from God, or even the stumbles and the bumbles of the body of Christ down here below.

They never get discouraged. They know God's purpose is true. They know that God has willed it. They know that God says, I will do my pleasure and my purpose shall be had. Notice what happens. Whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne and who lives forever and ever, with all of these eyes, with all that they saw during the time of Babylon and Persia and Greece and Rome and the Byzantine Empire and Europe during the Dark Ages and the horrors of World War II and the things that are going on in this Earth today, they never lose their focus. They give God thanks. Now, notice what happens. There's a contagion that occurs in Heaven. Maybe you've never seen that before. There's a contagion that occurs. I remember when I was growing up in Lamesa, and across the Gulch was a turkey farm. Have you ever heard a bunch of turkeys gobble together? Or am I the only one? What happens is you start a gobble, they all gobble. It is just a riot to see 10,000 turkeys gobble. Just one starts it. Not two, just one. And the whole flock gobbles. Now, let me tell you, that makes a noise. There were times when I could hear those turkeys gobbling from two miles away. I was in Lamesa, they were over in Spring Valley on the other side of 94, and boy, could they make a noise in August. For some reason, it got real quiet by the end of October.

But they got so excited that they get the whole flock excited. This is what happens up in Heaven above us right now. That the angels get excited about God's purpose and God's will, and they give thanks to God. And it goes from one level of spiritual being to another. Notice what it says. That whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne, who lives forever and ever, then the 24 elders fall down before Him who sits on the throne, and worship, who lives forever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for You created all things, and by Your will they exist, and they were created.

I want to share something with you today. The angels in Heaven had the same enthusiasm as our first speaker had today about what God is doing down here below with you and with me, the saints of God, whoever, wherever they are. Did you ever think that the angels are fascinated about what's happening within the body of Christ?

I'm going to wind up with that scripture. We're not going to get there quite yet. I'm just giving you a teaser right now. They're fascinated. But beyond their fascination, God has the resolve to make things happen. Let's talk for a moment about Gabriel. Gabriel, that great archangel, he appears to be God's chief angelic spokesman. There are things that God has striven to communicate with us that are in time and space, that are too wonderful to understand of and by ourselves.

They're complicated because they move beyond one plus one equals two. And so at times, with love, God has sent this very, very special angel to send some of the greatest communication that will ever be. His name is Gabriel. He's a beautiful angel.

He's one of God's servants who heeds his word, who does his bidding. We think of over the course of time how Gabriel would come and explain the 70-weeks prophecies, one of the grand prophecies of the Old Testament, that Gabriel was commissioned to come down and help Daniel get a sense and get a feel for what that was all about. We think later on about when Gabriel would appear before Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, this man in the priesthood that was old, and his wife was old and then was told that he was going to have this very special one that would come along.

Later on, Gabriel would also be used to convey the grandest news of all, that to this woman of the line of David, that the Savior, that the Messiah, Emmanuel, would come. Can I share something with you? Gabriel must be very special, and he must be very honored of God because he's been gable to give just beautiful, beautiful things.

To God's people. Things too hard to be understood by our minds because we're locked in time and space, and our world, everything must be one plus one equals two. But remember that the Scripture says that God gives us something that is better than facts on the ground. And sometimes, sometimes, he uses angels to communicate that. Join me just for a moment in Daniel 9. In Daniel 9, let's pick up this one thought. Sometimes, you know, we can think that we're praying and that our prayers are not going above the ceiling. Our prayers are like the radar of a bat.

They're just bouncing back right at us. They bounce on the ceiling, they come back, and perhaps we don't think our prayers are going anywhere, and perhaps God doesn't even know what we're going through. That's why God gives us this wonderful example in the book of Daniel, Daniel 9. Daniel, here he was over in Babylon, and he's praying to God.

And we pick up the thought in Daniel 9, and let's pick up the story in verse 21. Daniel then praying up a storm, and he wasn't getting, he thought, answers. And then we pick up this thought in Daniel 9, 21. Yes, while I was speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly, swiftly reached me about the time of the evening offering. And he informed me and talked with me and said, Oh, Daniel, I have now come forth to give you skill to understand. At the beginning of your supplications, the command went out, and I have come to tell you, for you are greatly beloved.

Therefore, consider the matter. Understand the vision. Let's understand something. Angels also have feelings. And they're giving, here's Gabriel giving a curtain. Notice the different things. Sometimes we don't think God is listening. God doesn't have favorites, it's not just Daniel. Sometimes we wonder if God is listening. And so we go back and we pray and we pray. And God is already on the way. Help is on the way. God is sending either by His Spirit, which is now within us, and or perhaps an angel to bring a message. And it says here that I came, your supplications were heard.

You are greatly beloved. Angels are given to encourage us to understand that we are in relationship with God. And they give us things to consider. And they give us understanding.

Angels are neat. And we read to know that we are not alone. I'd like to talk about one more angel for a moment, because Gabriel is the grand communicator of God's ways. God also gives us another angel. His name is Michael. I'd like to talk about just Michael for a moment. Michael is what we might say the defender of the faith.

He is that archangel that down through millennia have watched the covenant people, whether they be Israel of old or whether they be the Israel of God today from all nations and all backgrounds. Michael has tremendous privilege. Notice Revelation 21 and verse 12. Revelation 21 and verse 12.

And she had a great and a high wall with twelve gates and twelve angels at the gates and names written on them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel. Maybe that's not where I wanted to go. It reads well, but that's not what I wanted.

I'll pick up another verse here. Let's go to Jude 9. That's fine. I'd like Jude 9 too. Jude 9 tells us a little about why God trusts Michael. No, there's an old historical maxim that says power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Under the Father and under Christ, Michael has the power of the kingdom underneath him to exact the Father's will. It's a lot of power. Lucifer was given a lot of authority and a lot of power. And pride went to his head and he was corrupted. Not so our friend above, Michael. Notice what it says in Jude 9. Verse 9, Yet Michael, the archangel, in contending with the devil, when he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a reviling accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke you.

Jude, excuse me, Michael, this created spiritual being with all of this power to defend the people of God, to exercise the power of God, not his power. The power comes from God. He understood that. He didn't make the mistake that Moses made back in the wilderness, thinking it was his power as Moses struck the rock to bring out the juice, to bring out the water.

What I'm trying to share with you today is that God has tremendous confidence in these created messengers, these ministers of his will, that his will might be done on earth as it is in heaven. He has tremendous confidence in Gabriel. He has tremendous confidence in Michael, this defender of the faith.

One thing I'd like to share with you as we begin to conclude is simply this. We also need to, though, recognize that while we have all of this happening for us and around us, it's to recognize that while angels do oftentimes deliver, they don't always deliver us physically. And sometimes we don't always understand that for one reason or another. But we need to come to a very basic point, or I would be remiss as a Christian communicator, join me if you would in Hebrews 1, verse 14. Hebrews 1, verse 14.

Because ultimately, the angels are not just physical first responders, even though we pray for our children, we pray for our loved ones, we pray for ourselves. And I hope we are all sharing what we call our angel stories of protection. I'm going to share with you one in a moment. But you notice what it says in Hebrews 1, verse 14.

Are they not, speaking of angels, ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation? Sometimes in the Church of God, we make physical deliverance. Synonymous with spiritual salvation.

There is physical deliverance at times along the way to spiritual salvation. But physical deliverance of and by itself is not spiritual salvation. God is, at the end of the day, desiring us to be in His spiritual kingdom. They give us spiritual blessings. And we have to come to understand that in this earth there are going to be things that are going to happen at times with loved ones, that we're not going to have all the explanations. We had such a tragic situation up in Los Angeles just several weeks ago that the congregation had to go through. We don't always understand the here and the why in the now. But like Job, we have to come to understand that God operates at a higher plane and for a reason, and that we must wait to come to understand. I ask why is that when you go to Acts 12 that you find two incredible apostles. One is named James, the other is named Peter. And yet what happens to James, he is beheaded, but within that same chapter, Peter has the opportunity to be a part of an angelic jailbreak. The angel comes and rescues Peter. Was Peter somehow better than James? Was James a naughty boy? No, James had issues and lessons that he had to learn at that time, and God allowed him to be the first martyr amongst the apostles. Peter had another purpose and another reason to go. We will not always understand God's reasons for the moment.

Ultimately, angels are here to proclaim and preserve us towards God's spiritual purpose, spiritual salvation. That doesn't mean that God doesn't deliver. I remember one time I'd like to share an angel story. I'm sure we have many that my mother-in-law was in a spot where she wasn't quite sure whether or not she should be there or not. She'd never quite done anything like that before. And she was at a spot where she was a little nervous and a little worried. It was beyond concern. She just didn't know if she ought to be there at that time doing what she was doing at the time. It was not a bad thing, please understand. But it was just something that was not her norm. And she stumbled at the top of some stairs. Just stumbled. Sometimes God can take our stumbles and direct it towards His glory. Now, that stumble landed her about 18 feet away, about eight stairs down.

Ten feet. 18 feet away, about ten stairs down. She landed on all twos.

We're going to road test that after church. We're going to have that lesson before we can try.

God was letting her know that it was all right. Took her stumble. Made it His miracle to His glory.

Now, there are times when God will be with us. There are times when, as Paul was on that boat, headed for Rome for the sake of the Gospel. The angel came and visited them. And the angel said, Paul, by the way, God has given you the ship and all that are on the ship!

But the ship didn't turn around and go back to Jerusalem. The ship was still headed for Rome. But God sent that angel to that man of God to remember what he had read in Scripture all of his life. We read to know that we are not alone. Allow me to share one last verse with you. Join me if you would in Ephesians. Angels are very important to us. And I want to share something with you as the saints of God, members of the body of Christ. And that is simply, we have something that the angels are desirous of. You say, Who me? Who me? Yes! That's why Ephesians is written. Ephesians chapter 3. Excuse me. Ephesians chapter 2.

I hope you'll remember what I said in the beginning, that angels are created. They are not omniscient. They are not all-knowing. 1 Peter 1, 10 through 12, tells us that there were things that the prophets wondered about and wanted to know, and that there are even things that the angels are itching to know, that they don't know. Look at what it says here in Ephesians 2 verse 8. To me, whom lest in the least of all these saints the grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles, unsearchable riches of Christ, unfathomable, incalculable. And to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in Christ, who created all things through Jesus Christ. To the intent that now that manifold wisdom, that multi-colored tapestry, which is called the body of Christ, might be made known by the church to the principalities and the powers in the heavenly places, according to the eternal purpose which he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.

When the angels in heaven, Michael, Gabriel, the four living creatures, the seraphim, the carobim, the host angels, the angels that look over little babies, all of the different realms of angels, and they look down, they see within this fabric called the body of Christ, the will of God being performed.

See, God created what we call this creation around us, which we may call this universal creation, this old creation that we physically might come to understand God and give him glory. Now what God is doing, and this mounts to your message today, Doug, with what's happening here in San Diego, as a church, as members of the body of Christ, loving and working and living together, supplicating God, moving through these hurdles of salvation with Christ as our champion. The angels look down and they say, oh, I see Doug, oh, I see Richard, oh, I see Chris, oh, I see Saul, oh, I see James. This is what God ordained from the beginning that was hidden wisdom, this fellowship of the Spirit, this entwined with Christ and God and Christ and man and man to man, a love which doesn't make sense humanly, a love which is given, a love called agape, in which there was really no Greek word that was used that often. They had to almost invent it because it wasn't understood in the first century. And the angels look down and they say, this, then, is the eternal purpose of God being worked out here below. Let's go down and watch them a little bit more and take care of them, because God the Father and Jesus Christ are doing something really, really neat. I hope you'll remember this message on angels. I hope that you'll remember that when we read the Bible, we simply read to know that, what shall I say? We read to know that we are not alone, that God gives us angels to remind us that when we pray, that His will be done on earth as it is in heaven, and it's as good as angels that He sends along the way.