What Is an Angel?

What do you think about when I say angel?  A cute little cupid shooting people with love arrows; a majestic creature with a halo and huge wings; a guardian who watches over people.  In popular culture there are many ideas about angels.  The three examples given above are both truthful and erroneous. They do help people to love one another (just not with arrows), they are majestic (when see can see them) and they watch over us (if we will let them).

                An angel is a created, spiritual being who does what God commands and helps and assists those who honor God.  Angels can be whatever they need to be to fulfill their duties.  Each part of this definition is important – created, spirit, and obedient.

                Angels are spiritual beings who can take physical form to perform their duties. The word angel comes from the Greek word angelos which means messenger. When you think about angel stories, they frequently brought messages to people from God – Gabriel brings a message to Mary, an angel announces the resurrection, an angel encourages Gideon.  Angels perform more duties than messenger.  They attend God and do whatever he says. They praise and worship God and assist, encourage and protect people. Avenging angels wreak havoc on a country as several rulers have learned.  God commands: angels do.

                The Creation story doesn’t mention angels, but the Bible states that God created everything – including angels.  According to Revelation, Satan and the other fallen angels don’t die, but live eternally in Hell.  From this one can infer that the holy angels will live eternally in heaven. Theologians believe that all angels have been created and there will be no more — no cute baby angels.

                Angels and people are created but, they are not alike. God made man a little lower than the angels, but in the future man will judge angels.  While we are confined to planet Earth, man is less powerful and less intelligent than angels.  Just by not having physical bodies, angels avoid many of the problems of man – pain, hunger, sickness, and death.  Because angels live in heaven, they have an overview of history.  However, humans were made in the image of God and are loved by God. Angels long to understand this bond between God and people.  A complex relationship exists between God, man and angels. A relationship we will examine in this blog.

May Angels Walk Before You!