Seen Of Angels / Part Two

Series – June 2014 – Grace & Truth Magazine

Seen Of Angels / Part Two

Our Lord Jesus – Greater Than All Angels
The epistle to the Hebrews was written to demonstrate Christ’s superiority to everything that Jewish believers treasured in their heritage as Jews. The opening chapter begins by showing how throughout the Old Testament God had spoken to the fathers by the prophets. But now in these last days He had spoken by His Son – or in Son . The chapter then sums up who Christ is and what He has done, concluding with seating Himself at the right hand of the Majesty on high after having purged our sins (Heb. 1:3). It points out that this is something no angel could or would do and with citation after citation from the Old Testament shows Christ to be far superior to any angel. The Lord Jesus is God’s Son in a unique reciprocal relationship. All God’s angels are to worship Him. They are ministering spirits. His throne – He is God – is forever and ever. He has loved righteousness and hated iniquity, therefore God has anointed Him with gladness more than His companions. He is the Creator and Sustainer of earth and heaven. In contrast to angels (ministering spirits), God has invited Him to sit at His right hand and will make His enemies His footstool.

In chapter 2 we see God’s purpose in setting man lower than the angels but crowning him with glory and honor. The Holy Spirit applies these quotations from the Old Testament to Jesus and we see why He took that place. He became true man so that He would be able to die (Heb. 2:6-9). As God He could not die. Nor can angels die, for they are spirits. But man is a tripartite being: spirit, soul and body. What a thought to realize that the Creator would enter His creation as a Man so that He would be able to die for those who would abuse and mistreat Him and do all they could do to put Him to death! And then He would call such persons, who have trusted in Him, “His brethren” and “His children” and bring them to glory where He is as Man (Heb. 2:10-13)! And while we are on the way to this glorious moment, He is our merciful and faithful High Priest giving us the aid we need to see us though (Heb. 2:16-18). No angel can in any way do these things or compete with them. All things have been put in subjection to Him. What a Savior, what a glorious salvation is ours!

Angels And The Birth Of Our Lord Jesus
Our Lord Jesus is God, “the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see, to whom be honor and everlasting power” (1 Tim. 6:14-16 NKJV). The seraphim worship before Him, covering their faces with two of their six wings as they cry out, “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory!” (Isa. 6:1-3). This had doubtless been going on for countless ages before “the fullness of time” arrived when God sent forth His Son, born of a woman (Gal. 4:4), into this world of men dead in trespasses and sins. Angels, God’s messengers, were associated in various ways with the birth of the Savior. They would not only proclaim His birth, but in time they would also witness His sufferings and the glories that would follow, “things which angels desire to look into” (1 Pet. 1:12). Scripture presents to us the momentous fact that God manifest in flesh, our Lord Jesus Himself, was seen by angels (1 Tim. 3:16)!

During the reign of the wicked King Herod in Judea, God sent the angel Gabriel to the temple at Jerusalem to announce to Zacharias, a righteous priest who was on duty burning incense while the people were outside praying, that he and his barren wife Elizabeth would have a son whom they were to call John (Lk. 1:11-22). In the sixth month after this the angel Gabriel was sent to the city of Nazareth in Galilee to a young virgin, Mary, who was engaged to a carpenter, Joseph. Both Mary and Joseph were descendants of David the king. We see this encounter in Luke 1:26-38.

The angel greeted Mary, “Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!” When Mary was troubled at this saying, Gabriel told her not to fear for she had found favor with God. She would conceive and bring forth a son whom she was to call Jesus. Furthermore, “He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest, and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. And He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end.” Unlike Zacharias six months earlier, Mary was not skeptical, but being a chaste virgin she asked, “How can this be?” The angel explained that the Holy Spirit would come upon her and the power of the Highest would overshadow her. That Holy One who would be born of her would be called “the Son of God.” He also explained about her relative Elizabeth’s pregnancy, ending with the affirmation that with God nothing would be impossible. Mary’s response was the beautiful “be it to me according to your word.” At this the angel left her.

We see that though Gabriel’s explanation to her was unique, something entirely unheard of, Mary accepted it and committed herself to obedience to God’s will without regard to how difficult the pathway would be. The first difficulty Scripture relates to us was one that Joseph, her fiancé – Scripture refers to him as her husband – had. According to Jewish custom at the time, an engagement was just as legally binding as a marriage. What must he have thought of Mary’s explanation of her pregnancy! In his kindness he considered quietly breaking the engagement rather than making a public example of her (Mt. 1:18-19).

Here again we find angelic interposition. An angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream telling him not to be afraid to take Mary his wife to him, for that which was conceived in her was of the Holy Spirit. Mary would bear a Son, and Joseph was to call His name Jesus, for He would save His people from their sins. All this was to be done in fulfillment of the prophecy given by the Lord through the prophet Isaiah (Isa. 7:14). This is no doubt one of the things the apostle Peter refers to in 1 Peter 1:10-12 when he says that angels desire to look into the prophecies relating to Christ’s sufferings and the glories that would follow. Joseph did as the angel had instructed him to do (Mt. 1:20-25).

Some months passed which were probably not easy for this dear couple who, being only betrothed, were together but not yet living together in the intimacy of husband and wife. Caesar Augustus had issued a decree commanding all in his empire to go to their ancestral cities to be registered for tax purposes. Complying with this decree, Joseph and Mary went to Bethlehem, the city of David, and in God’s providence the place where the prophet Micah had prophesied Messiah would be born (Mic. 5:2). Mary was in the last stages of pregnancy. While at Bethlehem she gave birth to her firstborn Son. She wrapped Him in swaddling clothes and laid Him in a manger, for there was no room for them in the inn (Lk. 2:1-7).

In the fields near the city shepherds were keeping watch over their flocks that night. Suddenly “an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid. Then the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people. For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord’” (Lk. 2:8-11). The angel went on to tell them the sign by which they would find and recognize the Babe. “And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men [or good pleasure in men]’” (Lk. 2:12-14)! Finally, after many centuries of looking down to see if there were any who understood, who sought God, and finding none (Ps. 14:2-3; 53:2-3), God found One in whom His heart could delight. Coming into the world, this One had said, “Behold, I have come – in the volume of the book it is written of Me – to do Your will, O God” (Heb. 10:7). What a delight to the Father’s heart. What reason for the angels to rejoice, seeing God manifested in flesh in the Person of this Babe, Jesus Christ, Immanuel, God with us! Having shared this good news with these shepherds the angels went back to heaven while the shepherds hastened to Bethlehem to see this thing which the Lord had made known to them. “Now when they had seen Him, they made widely known the saying which was told them concerning this Child” (Lk. 2:15-17).

Angels And The Life On Earth Of Our Lord Jesus
Several events in the early life of our Lord Jesus here on earth took place in simple accordance with the law God had given His earthly people Israel. But some time later we find an event in His early childhood that is associated with the ministry of angels. We see how angels were interested in every detail of the life of Jesus here upon earth. This event is one generally misunderstood in professing Christianity, for Matthew’s Gospel presents the visit of the Magi as coming definitely later than the events related in Luke 2:1-40 where, after having done all that the law required of them following the birth of their Child, Joseph and Mary take Him back to Nazareth with them.

Perhaps a year or more later we find a group of wise men coming to Jerusalem from the East and inquiring where the King of the Jews had been born. They wanted to worship Him. They were told to go to Bethlehem and search carefully for the young Child and bring back word to King Herod. Guided by the star they had seen in the East, they went to Bethlehem and found the young Child with Mary His mother in a house. They worshiped the Child and presented gifts to Him. Warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they returned to their country by a different way (Mt. 2:1-12).

When they were gone, for the second time an angel appeared to Joseph in a dream instructing him to “Arise, take the young Child and His mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I bring you word; for Herod will seek the young Child to destroy Him.” Again Joseph obeyed, and the little family lived safely in Egypt until after the death of wicked Herod who, as we know, had every boy two years old and under in Bethlehem and its vicinity put to death. Herod based his vicious slaughter of these little boys on the time he had determined from the wise men (Mt. 2:13-16).

After Herod’s death an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream for a third time. There in Egypt he was instructed to take the young Child and His mother back to the land of Israel as those who sought the Child’s life were dead. Again Joseph obeyed. When he heard that Herod’s son Archelaus was reigning in Judea, he was afraid to go there. This time God warned him in a dream directly, and he turned and went to Galilee and brought up his family at Nazareth. Every stage of this family’s movements was directed by God in such a way as to fulfill the prophecies of Scripture (Mt. 2:19-23).

We do not read of any further activity of our Lord Jesus involving angels as He was growing up. Other than His being found in the temple at age 12 occupied in His Father’s business we are only given two wonderful summaries of His boyhood and young manhood years. Luke 2:40 tells us, “The Child grew and became strong in spirit, filled with wisdom; and the grace of God was upon Him.” Verses 51 and 52 of that same chapter make plain that after the episode where He remained behind in the temple, “He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was subject to them, but His mother kept all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men.” While God the Father rejoiced in all He said and did and while men were pleased with all they could observe, without any doubt, angels also watched Him with unabated wonder and delight. If they are to learn the manifold wisdom of God in the Church today (Eph. 3:10), how much more would they have seen it displayed in the life of Jesus as He grew up in a city about which a godly Israelite exclaimed, astounded, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” (Jn. 1:46). In Nazareth He was known as the carpenter’s Son (Mt. 13:55) and as the Carpenter (Mk. 6:3). While intrinsically unmatched, He did not appear outwardly different from His contemporaries. He was not given an education or privileges beyond that which boys then ordinarily received. Contrary to fables in apocryphal so-called “gospels,” He did no miraculous works there while growing up. His one custom specifically noted was to go to the synagogue on the Sabbath day (Lk. 4:16). But from the purely human standpoint this One who grew up before God “as a tender plant, and as a root out of dry ground” had “no form or comeliness,” but rather grew up to be “despised and rejected by men” (Isa. 53:1-3). What must all this have meant to angels who observed Him!

Matthew, Mark and Luke mention angels next in connection with our Lord when after His baptism He was led (Mt. 4:1), or “driven” (Mk. 1:12), by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the Devil. The Holy One of God did not seek out the Devil and his temptations of His own volition [desire] – nor should we. But this Beloved Son in whom the Father was well pleased, and upon whom the Holy Spirit could descend like a dove, must face the temptation of the Wicked One at the onset of His ministry. Unlike our first parents in the lovely Garden of Eden who fell at the very first temptation they were confronted with, Jesus faced the devil’s temptations for forty days and forty nights in the wilderness with the wild beasts while He ate nothing (Mk. 1:13; Lk. 4:2). The temptations Matthew and Luke describe for us seem to have been the final temptations He faced. They illustrate the types of temptations we also face again and again in our lives in this world for Satan still appeals to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life (1 Jn. 2:16). Our Lord met each temptation with the appropriate answer from God’s Word, completely frustrating the tempter, who then “departed from Him until an opportune time” (Lk. 4:13). Upon this, we find that “angels came and ministered to Him” (Mt. 4:11). An angel had ministered to Elijah when he was running away exhausted, fleeing for his life (1 Ki. 19:5-7). What a joy it must have been for angels – how many we are not told – to minister to the Lord whom they had seen in most adverse circumstances stand victorious against every temptation of the enemy!

Throughout the years of His public ministry the Lord never availed Himself of angels to do His mighty works. These He did Himself in dependence upon the Father who had sent Him and in the power of the Spirit of God. But repeatedly we hear Him saying that His hour was not yet come (Jn. 2:4, 7:6). He knew fully why He had come into the world and what lay before Him. And the time came when He went up to Jerusalem to accomplish the great work of our salvation. He spent the evening before His crucifixion with His disciples – precious hours during which He washed their feet, celebrated the Passover with them, instituted the Lord’s Supper, and set many most important truths before them in what is often referred to as the “Upper Room ministry” (Jn. 13-14). Later that evening He and the eleven true disciples left the upper room and proceeded to the Mount of Olives as He continued teaching them and praying to His Father (Jn. 15:1-18:1).

Once there He left His disciples, telling them to pray that they might not enter into temptation. He went about a stone’s throw farther into the garden, knelt down and prayed, “Father if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done.” Luke, in his gospel, goes on to tell us, “Then an angel appeared to Him from heaven, strengthening Him. And being in agony, He prayed more earnestly. Then His sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground” (Lk. 22:39-44).

We know that each gospel presents the Lord Jesus from a different aspect. Luke emphasizes His being the holy Son of Man, the Man Christ Jesus. He had entered the world to do the will of God, thus to carry out the work of our redemption. This was the counsel of the Godhead from before the foundation of the world, the counsel and purpose He was fully a part of, being a member of the Godhead. Yet being holy, sin was absolutely repugnant to Him. Contemplating what lay before Him, the awfulness that He would be made sin – that God as God would forsake Him, would treat Him with all abhorrence as though He were sin itself – this was what was so dreadful for Him to consider. This was what brought forth the praying more earnestly, the sweat-drops like blood, the agony and the great aloneness. In anticipation of this the psalmist David had been inspired to write, “I looked for someone to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none” (Ps. 69:20).

Our Lord Jesus cried out to the Father in His agony, and an angel was sent from heaven to strengthen Him. What a tremendous task was committed to this angel! He was not commissioned to be “comforting Him,” but to be “strengthening Him.” Each time Jesus returned to His disciples He found them asleep (Mt. 26:40-46). What must it have been for Him, the Holy One of God, to be strengthened by a single angel. He would endure the cross – would endure all that it meant. There was no other way to accomplish our salvation. He was fully and perfectly willing to do the Father’s will. This is the final angelic activity during the lifetime of our Lord Jesus that God’s Word brings to our attention. It emphasizes to us the depth to which our Savior stooped as He humbled Himself.

By Eugene P. Vedder, Jr.

Look for part three of this series next month.