The Top Ten Truths About Angels

I was at a dinner to raise money for an annual Christmas event to help the homeless. The leader of the outreach, Susie Jennings, flashed a photo of a man with kind eyes on the screen. She said, “This man showed up at one of the homeless shelters one day. I had never seen him before and never saw him again. I believe he could have been an angel.”

I am convinced Susie was correct. The photo of the man still remains imprinted on my brain and I haven’t stop thinking about God’s holy angels. What is the truth about angels? Are they anything like we imagine, with fluffy white wings and a harp in hand? Do we each have a guardian angel? Today, we begin a three-part series on the Top Ten Truths about Angels as found in the Bible.

#10 Angels eat like humans do. This may sound trivial but I stumbled onto this little known fact while doing research. When the Israelites complained about being hungry while wandering in the wilderness, God provided them with manna from Heaven to eat. Psalm 78:25 says, “Human beings ate the bread of angels; he sent them all the food they could eat.” Manna was the original Angel Food Cake! When three angels visited Abraham in Genesis 18, they chowed down on beef, curds and milk before they delivered the shocking news that Sarah would bear a child in old age. Now I’m wondering if angels snack between meals. I can’t find that anywhere in the Bible.

#9 Angels are immortal. Angels do not marry and they will never die. According to John Wesley, “Angels are made of a finer substance, resembling fire or flame,” however, they have been given “understanding and a will.” Angels often take on human form in the Bible but that is not their natural state. The great evangelist Billy Graham believes angels exceed humankind in their knowledge. He cites 2 Samuel 14:20 where a woman, describing King David, called him wise, “according to the wisdom of an angel of God, to know all things that are in the earth.” But there is one thing angels do not comprehend and that is separation from God since they were created near the beginning of time. So they don’t really understand why there needed to be a sacrifice of God’s son for humankind and why salvation is necessary. When Peter was speaking to believers in exile, he explained  how prophets predicted the sufferings of the Messiah and the glories that followed. At that point he said, “Even angels long to look into these things.”

#8 Angels have a hierarchy. Think of it as the angel corporation. There are levels of angels. Archangels, regular angels, seraphim, cherubim, principalities, authorities, powers, thrones, might and dominion. Theologian John Calvin believed that because angels are so ordered, it indicates God’s government is exercised and administered by angels. An example of an archangel would be Michael. He is a warrior involved in fighting and protecting. A well known example of a regular angel would be Gabriel, whose name means “Mighty one of God.” Gabriel is God’s messenger who told the Priest Zechariah that he and his wife would bear a son, John the Baptist. He also appeared to Mary to announce she would give birth to the Son of God, Jesus. Seraphim are the angels closest to God, physically and are called “flames of fire.” The Seraphim are described by the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 6: “I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphs, each with six wings. With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying” (Isaiah 6:2).

After Adam and Eve sinned, Cherubim were the angels placed at the gates of the Garden of Eden. They carried a flaming sword and guarded the entrance so they could not enter back in.

The prophet Ezekiel described the Cherubim in Ezekiel 1:4-18: “In appearance their form was that of a man, but each of them had four faces and four wings. Their legs were straight; their feet were like those of a calf and gleamed like burnished bronze. Under their wings on their four sides they had the hands of a man. All four of them had faces and wings, and their wings touched one another. Each one went straight ahead; they did not turn as they moved. Their faces looked like this: Each of the four had the face of a man, and on the right side each had the face of a lion, and on the left the face of an ox, each also had the face of an eagle. Their wings were spread out upward, each had two wings, one touching the wing of another creature on either side and two wings covering its body.”

After witnessing God’s Cherubim, no wonder Isaiah cried out, “Woe to me! I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips…” It had to have been an unfathomable sight.

So, do you want to know more about angels? Do we each have a personal guardian angel?

Stay tuned. Part two is Saturday.