Back in Bible times, it wasn't uncommon for angels to intervene for mankind. Do you wonder why that doesn't seem to happen anymore? Today on Turning Point, Dr. David Jeremiah takes a closer look at what God's Word says about the role of these heavenly beings in the realm of Earth. From the series "Angels: Who They Are and How They Help," here's David to share the conclusion of Guardian Angels.
There is no more subject about angels over which we find controversy than the subject of guardian angels. I have read articles and books and heard speeches on the fact that every person has their own individual guardian angel, but the Bible doesn't support that. In fact, the Bible gives us a narrative that makes guardian angels totally impossible. That's what we're talking about during these days. We're discussing the angelic host today.
We'll finish up what we started yesterday as we talk about guardian angels. But before we go there. There, let me just remind you that the resource for the month of November is the book on angels. It's a 240-page book that will separate fact from fiction about angels. And we want you to have this.
This is yours for the asking when you send a gift of any size to Turning Point before the month of November is over.
So why not do it today? You can also get the study guide for this series. The study guide is available from. DavidJeremiah.org. That's our website, and a lot of other things there you might be interested in as well.
All right, let's finish up what we started yesterday. Let's discuss guardian angels. The other passage that teaches apparently that we have guardian angels is one to which we have already alluded in the book of Acts. And the record, as you know, is clear that when Peter was delivered from prison, the first thing he did was he headed for Mary's house because all of his friends were at Mary's house having a prayer meeting. And guess what they were praying?
Oh God, please deliver Peter from prison. I love this story. This is so real to how we function today. Peter comes to the door of Mary's house and he knocks on the door, and a servant by the name of Rhoda came to open the door. And the Bible says, when she saw Peter, she freaked out.
Now it doesn't say it exactly like that, but that's sort of what it says. She ran back in the house. She didn't believe it. And then finally, when Rhoda told all the people at the Christian prayer meeting that the answer to their prayer was knocking at the door. They didn't believe it either.
They said, "No, it's not Peter. It's his angel." Commenting on this passage, one of the commentaries that I read said this: Their statement reflects the belief that every person has a personal angel who ministers to them, and that if the angel reveals himself, he looks and sounds much like the person under his care. The Christians gathered for prayer at Mary's house were sure that Peter had been killed. And that his angel had come to tell them about his death, and so from this passage, a lot of people, along with Matthew eighteen ten, make the assumption that everyone has their angels or his angel, and that's where we get the doctrine of guardian angels.
Now, those are the only two passages that I'm aware of that even allude to the idea. Of guardian angels, and many of the church fathers who taught these truths back in the early days of the church, many of them believed that every individual is under the care of a particular angel who was assigned to them.
Some folks say, "Well, you know, there couldn't be that many angels. Look at all the people there are." Well, if you remember our earlier studies, how many angels are there? They're innumerable. And some people believe that there are so many angels that there's at least one angel for every one who's ever been created in the history of the world. You say, how could there be that many angels?
I don't know, but God is great and His ability is magnificent. And if God needed that many angels, could He do it? Yes, absolutely. Thomas Aquinas, who's written more about angels than any of the people that I've read, he believed that everybody got assigned an angel at their birth, and that when they were in the womb, they were under the protective care of the mother's guardian angel.
So nobody was ever without direct Provision by a guardian angel.
Now, having said all of that, let me give you a little bit of the other side of the story, because while there are many who would swear by the fact that everybody has a guardian angel, there are some who are not so convinced, and some very reputable people that I have read and studied who don't really believe that guardian angels are a part of biblical truth. One of these men is a very respected theologian by the name of John Calvin. And here's what he had to say about guardian angels. It's very interesting. He said, "Whether individual angels have been assigned to individual believers for their protection, I dare not affirm with confidence." Specific angels have been appointed as guardians over kingdoms and provinces.
But we ought to hold as a fact that the care of each one of us is not the task of one angel only, but all with one consent watch over our salvation. And if the fact that all the heavenly hosts are keeping watch for his safety will not satisfy a man, I do not see what benefit he could derive from knowing that one angel has been given to him as his specific guardian. Indeed, he said, those who can find one angel the care that God takes of each of us are doing a great Injustice, both to themselves and to all the members of the church. Did you hear what John Calvin said? He says, "No matter what you believe about this, you're a winner." That's what he's saying.
If you believe you've got a guardian angel, according to Matthew 18 and Acts chapter 12, great. Go ahead and believe it because there seems to be some evidence for it. But if you're not convinced you have one guardian angel, what you have to do is fall back on the promise that all the angels in God's creative world are responsible for you, and they're all going to take care of you.
So if you want one, and of course that's part of our materialistic culture, isn't it? We don't want to rent an angel. We don't want to lease one. We want an own one, right? We want one that's got our name on it.
Isn't that true?
So if that's where you are, you can have your guardian angel. But if you're not convinced of that, then let me tell you the rest of the story: is all the angels in the whole universe care about you, and if God wants to dispatch them all, He can do it.
Now I don't know which one I believe. I just think either one of them's great. Isn't that true?
That God's angels care about us, and they can intervene in our lives. As they are called to do. In fact, it's interesting as you read the scripture. There are many times when more than one angel was involved with one person. Do you remember when Elisha was holed up in the city of Dothan and the whole Syrian army was after him?
God didn't just send one angel to deliver him. He sent a whole host of angels. Looked like an entire army of them. And there is real good evidence in Luke chapter sixteen that it was several angels who carried Lazarus' soul to Abraham's bosom. And when Jesus was confronted in the garden, you remember what he said: "If I want to, I could call for twelve legions of angels, and they would immediately come to my defense." So maybe we shouldn't just confine ourselves to the fact that one angel cares about us.
Because the Bible certainly teaches that on some occasions many angels were involved. I need to tell you because some of you have asked me privately, and I'll just say it publicly: No, I have never seen an angel. And you know what? If I go to my grave and I never see an angel, I'll be all right. It's no problem.
If God wants to intervene in my life in such a majestic and marvelous way, so that I have a chance to see an angel, that'll be wonderful. But I'm not going to rest my hope of heaven and my security of salvation on whether I see an angel. But I've been thinking about this a lot. If you were to see an angel, what kind of a situation would you expect to see him? The angel doesn't really care about your financial success.
He's not going to come and give you a good feeling about yourself. That's not really the issues. But there are some incidents in the Bible, and I just want to go through them kind of as a little grocery list, real quickly, that give us some idea of the kinds of situations into which angels might normally interject themselves. For instance, I think there's evidence in the Bible that when we are in times of confusion. Angels might be sent to direct us.
Acts chapter eleven and verse thirteen, we read these words of Peter. He said and he told us how he had seen an angel standing in his house, who said to him, "Send men to Joppa and call for Simon, whose surname is Peter." In this situation, an angel was dispatched into a time of confusion to give direction. And I have been reminded. Over and over again, that when angels appear in the Bible, especially in the New Testament, they seem to be bent on giving instructions. Matthew one twenty, the angel says, "Fear not." Matthew two, he says, "Arise, take." Matthew eleven, he said, "Send." In Matthew twenty seven, the angel stood by Paul at night.
Here's some more of them. In Matthew two thirteen, the angel says, "Arise and flee." In Acts ten, the angel sends. In Acts chapter eight, "Arise and go." Angels seem to be in some special way, particularly geared to give instructions. And you know what? That's at the very core of who they are.
As individuals, because what does the word angel mean? The word angel, at its very basic core meaning, is the word messenger. An angel is the bearer of a message, and the interesting thing about the scripture, and this again separates biblical angelology from much of the craziness going on today. In the Bible, angels are never sensationalized; they are sent. They give their message, but the messenger is never more important than the one who sent him.
And the interesting thing is, they don't stay around for the applause. They come, they do their work, and after they've done what they've come to do, they disappear. They don't stay around to get laud and applause.
So different from the modern concept of angels that we read so much about today.
So sometimes, when we're in a time of crisis and we don't know what to do, God might send an angel to direct us. Secondly. In times of crisis, God might send an angel to strengthen us, and I have to appeal to the Lord Jesus in this regard. You remember when He was in the Garden of Gethsemane, and He went through that awful period of time. Which I'll tell you what I don't know any theologian who truly understands this.
What did Jesus mean totally when he said, "God, let this cup pass from me, but not my will, but thine be done"? We have some ideas of what that means, but we don't know the full impact of that, and we never will till we get to heaven. But one thing we do know: it was the most agonizing moment in the life of our Lord before the cross. The Bible says he sweat drops of blood at that moment, and when it was all over, when he was finished. Listen to this, Luke twenty two forty three.
Then an angel appeared to him from heaven, strengthening him. Isn't that a great truth? When we're in the midst of a crisis, when the involvement between good and bad, righteous and unrighteous is great, and the war is intense, God just might dispatch an angel to strengthen us. Here's the third thought. I don't know all that this means, but sometimes in sickness they assist us.
There's a passage in John chapter five that tells us that an angel went down at certain time into the pool and stirred up the water, and whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was made well of whatever disease he had. Have you ever understood that? I don't know what that's all about, except that God used an angel to bring healing into the lives of some people who got into the pool first. What that all means in terms of today's medicine and healing and all that, I don't know, but I do know this: that it's possible. That angels might intervene during times of sickness, and all the stories that I've heard about angels and that I've read, and I must have fifteen or twenty books on angels now.
Where do you suppose they most often show up? At the hospital, isn't that interesting? I would say if you took all the stories you could read and put together, the most often found place where angels appear seems to be at the hospital, where sickness is an issue. And then, when we're in times of despair, they encourage us. I want to tell you this little story real quickly because if I don't tell you the story, you won't get the point of it.
It's a story in the Old Testament about Abraham, and I'll tell it to you quickly. And some of you will remember it. You know, when Abraham was getting very old, and God had promised him a son, and he and Sarah were wondering where the son was going to come from and when it was going to come, and it was going to be quite an miracle because she was so old and so was Abraham, past the days of childbearing. Sarah got impatient, remember, and so she came to Abraham and she said, "Abraham, we're not ever going to have a son. The two of us.
Why don't you go into Hagar, who's a younger woman, and you give seed to her, and we'll have a son by Hagar." Abraham resisted, I think, but finally he did it, and started a family feud that hasn't been solved until this day. Do you know what I mean? Ishmael was born to Hagar. And then, in the providence of God, even though they had violated God's provision, God blessed Sarah by opening her womb, and she gave birth to Isaac, the promised son. And I've never quite understood the nuance of this because it's a very interesting fact.
It wasn't until after Isaac was born that Sarah got jealous. Isn't that interesting? You'd have thought she would have been jealous before Isaac was born, but when Isaac was born, the Bible tells us that Sarah got very jealous. And she couldn't look upon Hagar and Ishmael without being angry. And one day she just had it with both of them.
She told them to pack up their things, and she kicked them out of the house, and sent them packing. They had nowhere to go. And when we next meet Hagar, she's out in the wilderness. She's in the desert. She's all by herself, just her and her son.
They've got no future. They got no hope. They've got nothing to hold on to. It was the most desperate moment in her life. I can't imagine what she must have felt like.
And in Genesis 16 and verse 7, we read, "Now the angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur." And I thought to myself, "Isn't that like God?" He meets us in our most desperate moment, and sometimes, if we need an angelic intervention, God is able and willing to do that. And if you read the rest of that story in chapter 16 of Genesis, you will discover that Hagar was so overwhelmed by that angelic visit. That she renamed the place where she was, and she called it, "Thou God seest me." In fact, in literal language, what she called the place was, "I have seen Thou who seest all and who seest me." Hagar was so overwhelmed that God had seen her from heaven and had sent an angel to her at her weakest, most desperate moment to minister to her. And I'll tell you what: if you're looking for an angel, maybe that's the context in which he might normally appear when we're filled with despair. And finally, an angel of the Lord just might appear in a time of danger to protect us.
And that's what many of the stories about angels are about: times of danger when angels intervene. L. Nelson Bell relates an incident that happened while he was in Shanghai, China. It goes back to the year of nineteen forty-two. It was after the Japanese had won control of certain areas of China.
One morning, around nine o'clock, a Japanese truck stopped outside a bookroom where Nelson Bell had often visited. It was carrying five Japanese Marines. It was half filled with old books and new books as well. The Christian Chinese shop assistant, who was alone at the time, realized with dismay that they had come to his shop to seize all of his stock. Literally, to empty his shelves of all the Christian books that he had made available to the Chinese community.
Jumping from the truck, the Marines made for the shop door. But before they could enter, a neatly dressed Chinese gentleman entered the shop ahead of them. Though the shop assistant knew practically all of the Chinese customers who had ever traded there, he did not know this man. He was a complete stranger. For some unknown reason, the soldiers.
Weren't able to follow him inside. They loitered around outside, looking in the large windows, but not entering. And for two hours, they stood around until after eleven, and they never set foot inside the door. The stranger asked what the men wanted, and the Chinese shop assistant explained that the Japanese were seizing stocks from many of the bookshops of the city, and now this store's turn had come. The two men prayed together.
The stranger encouraging him, and the two hours passed. At last, the soldiers climbed into their truck, drove away, never did enter the store. The stranger also left without even making one purchase in the store or asking about any items that were in stock. Later that day, the shop owner, Mister Christopher Willis, returned, and the shop assistant said to him, "Do you believe in angels?" "I do," said Mister Willis. "So do I." Could the stranger have been one of God's protecting angels?
Dr. L. Nelson Bell, related to the Billy Graham family, always thought so. Angels sometimes come to protect us in times of danger. Guardian angels, one or many, but whatever you believe about this, my friends, there are two things you must not forget, and I want to end with these.
Number one, guardian angels are not for everybody. No, I know some of you are saying they're not for me. I'm a Christian. I don't believe in them. I don't want anything to do with them.
I'll just handle things myself. Don't need any guardian angels. That's all right. But when I say they're not for everybody, what I mean is there is not one shred of evidence in the Bible that guardian angels have anything to do with other than God's people. In fact, Hebrews one fourteen says, "Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation?" All of this gobbledygook you read in the papers and in the current magazines and all the other stuff about angels today.
The first question you have to decide is, when you look at the scene, is there any evidence that the people involved in this so-called angelic intervention are they born again believers? Because the Bible does not give any room for angelic inter. On behalf of those who don't belong to God, His angels are ministering spirits on behalf of those who are the heirs of salvation. That cuts a lot of stuff out, doesn't it? That makes it easy for you to have some discernment about what you read.
Angels are not for everybody, but here is the second thought, and please don't forget this: angels could be anybody. Did you know that? Remind yourself of that verse that we studied in Hebrews thirteen. Do not forget to entertain strangers. For so doing, some have unwittingly entertained angels.
Do you believe that? Do you believe that you may have had an angel in your house already? You don't even know it. You may have had an angel intervene in your life and you don't know it. The writer of Hebrews says, "Don't forget to entertain strangers, because someday you may do that and unwittingly entertain an angel." A good friend of mine by the name of Larry Libby has written a very colorful, picturesque book entitled "Somewhere Angels." And it doesn't have a lot of copy, and it has a lot of beautiful photography and pictures.
But he has a little imaginary story in there that captured my imagination about this very point. And I want you to listen to what he said. Just imagine yourself sitting along some clear, bubbling stream that comes chattering and singing out of the great heavenly hills of heaven. An angel walks up and sits beside you and calls you by name. In heaven, of course, that wouldn't scare you at all, but it might make you sit up a little straighter.
"Hello, sir," you would say. "I'm happy to meet you." Oh, the angel might laugh. We've met before. Really?
Well, then I'm happy for that too. But I can't remember when we met before. And the angel says, "Don't you remember the Monopoly game and the banana splits we had in your living room that November night back on old Earth? You were so kind to me. You welcomed me in the name of King Jesus.
Then you spilled your hot chocolate on my foot, but I didn't worry about it. I had two hotels on Boardwalk and took all your money." Monopoly, Boardwalk, bananas. What do you? Oh, now I remember. Do you mean you're Mr.
Mutombo, the African exchange student? Yes, I believe that's what you call me when you welcome me into your home. And now, my young friend, I get to welcome you into my home.
Well, that made it real for me. That we never know, do we? We might entertain angels unawares. God is not obligated. To reveal them to us as who they are, so let us be given to hospitality.
I conclude this discussion of guardian angels with this one more story to illustrate the point. This appeared in Guideposts magazine, written by Eufy Ellinardo, and this is what she wrote: "It had been reckless of me taking a before dawn stroll through the tangled streets behind the Los Angeles bus terminal." When I was a young woman arriving in the great city for the first time, my job interview was five hours away, and I couldn't wait to explore the city. It was my only chance.
Now I'd lost my way in the Skid Row neighborhood, and hearing a car pass, I turned, and in the flash of light, I saw three men lurking behind me, trying to keep out of the sight in shadows. Trembling with fright, I did what I always do when in need of help. I bowed my head, and I asked God to rescue me. But when I looked up, there was a fourth man striding toward me in the dark. Dear God, I'm surrounded.
I thought. I was so scared it took me a few seconds to realize that even in the blackness, I could see this man. He was dressed in an immaculate work shirt and denim pants. Carried a lunchbox. He was about thirty, well over six feet.
His face was stern but beautiful—the only word for it. I ran up to him and said, "I'm lost, and some men are following me. I took a walk from the bus depot, and I'm so scared." Come, he said, "I'll take you to safety." He was so strong; he made me feel safe. I don't know what would have happened if you hadn't come along. I said.
I do. He said. His voice was resonant and deep. I prayed for help just before you came. A smile touched his mouth and his eyes.
We were nearing the depot. You are safe now, he said, and he nodded. Goodbye, Euphy. Going into the lobby, it hit me, Euphy. He is my first name.
I whirled and burst back onto the sidewalk, but he had vanished. He was gone. Do you wonder that I thought the fourth man was God's angel sent into my life? And of course, so many experiences have been reported over the years. I don't question those experiences.
Nor do I say they couldn't be angels, but neither can I say they are, because it's not possible to prove that. The Bible gives us a broad perspective on angels that helps us every day, knowing that however He does it, God takes care of us. He's promised to do that, and if He wants to use an angel, He sure can do it, and we will be blessed because of it. Tomorrow we're going to talk about a subject that catches some people off guard because it's about an angel who's not a good angel. The subject tomorrow and Friday is the fallen angel, and we often mistake who that angel is.
But I'm going to explain it very carefully tomorrow here on Turning Point. In the meantime, don't forget to get your copy of the book Angels when you send your gift to Turning Point and ask for the book on Angels, and it'll be on its way. We'll see you next time. I'm David Jeremiah. Today's message originated from Shadow Mountain Community Church and Senior Pastor Dr.
David Jeremiah. Drop us a note to let us know how God is using this ministry in your life. Write to Turning Point, P. O. Box 3838, San Diego, California 92163.
Visiting our website at davidjeremiah.org/radio, or calling 800-947-1993. Ask for your copy of David's book, Angels: Who They Are and How They Help. It's yours for a gift of any amount. You can also view over 1,200 of Dr. Jeremiah's sermons on any screen, anytime you like, on our Turning Point Plus streaming service for a monthly gift of any amount.
Visit TurningPointPlus.org for details. This is David Michael Jeremiah. Join us tomorrow as we continue the series "Angels: Who They Are and How They Help" here on Turning Point.
