Focal Point

Pastor Mike Fabarez: Angels are not fat and cute. They're powerful people who sit in the boardroom of heaven. And their imagery and symbolic representation in the visions that God gives these prophets in the Bible, he doesn't give them pictures of cute people floating around. These cute angels, they're not cute and fat.

Dave Drewy: Today on Focal Point, Pastor Mike Fabarez challenges our Hallmark card misconceptions about angels and reveals the staggering reality of God's heavenly workforce. As we'll see, these aren't floating babies with harps. They're authoritative, powerful beings who could reshape nations with a thought.

We're continuing our series on the supremacy of Christ by first understanding just how remarkable these spiritual messengers truly are. I'm Dave Drewy, and now here's Pastor Mike with part two of a message titled "Angels 101: Why Being Better than Angels is a Big Deal."

Pastor Mike Fabarez: In the book of Hebrews, Hebrews chapter one, he goes on to explain verses eight, even dipping into the second chapter. There is an incredible authority vested in angels. Jot that down: angels have incredible authority. Matter of fact, the whole kingdom of Persia was run by one angel. What? And what are we ruling over right now? 22 square feet of backyard? Whatever our little space is. I own two cars, and what are they overseeing? Tons of stuff.

What's the point? Hugely authorized. Matter of fact, the Old Testament Sabbath school graduate would sit back and say, "Yeah, I know all about the angels. The angels are running this place." When you came on the scene and said, "I know someone who's in charge of everything," they would go, "Wait a minute, angels are in charge of everything." They're the mediatorial leaders of the world. They run the place in the stead of God. They have the delegated authority of the Almighty God.

And people are going, "Wait a minute, there's this carpenter from Nazareth, and he's really the one in charge of the world." What? You've got to prove that to me. At least two chapters, you've got to prove that to me. And so the writer of Hebrews goes out to prove it. But what we need to stand back and say is, "Wow, those angels have incredible authority."

And what we're focused on as 21st-century evangelical Christians is Jesus Christ, King of Kings and Lord of Lords. We should totally be impressed with that. Matter of fact, we should understand it better, and we will in this series. But you do recognize that as we focus on the commandant of the Marine Corps—we're all a bunch of Marines, right?—we look at the ultimate authority in the Marine Corps, we should at least every now and then recognize the major general has a lot of authority, too.

And we're going, "Oh, I don't even know whatever. Major general, whatever." Well, don't just so quickly sweep those guys aside because you'd better listen to the major general if he's authorized. Matter of fact, look in chapter two of Hebrews where he says that. Don't you realize that you have to listen to the authorized leadership? And if the angels are going to speak on behalf of God, and so they did in the Old Covenant by giving the law of God to the people, the mediators of the law.

Look at verse number two of Hebrews two. Don't you know that if the message spoken by angels was binding, and every violation of what they said and every disobedience to what they commanded, it received a just punishment? Then you'd better listen to the Son. Well, that's after he's already established the Son is more authoritative. But the point is, those angels were authoritative, too. Yeah, they had an incredible authority. And some of us need to say, "Wow, okay, I recognize why this argument's important because the Bible teaches that angels have incredible authority."

And this passage, by the way, brings up another point. That there is a reaction. Some kind of binding word needs some kind of enforcement. And the enforcement doesn't come just by wearing a badge; it comes by carrying a gun, right? You can say you're in charge, you're authorized, but you can't enforce it unless you have power. Matter of fact, if the authorized spiritual leaders of the world are angels, then they're the ones who are also going to mediate and adjudicate things. They're going to be the ones with the power. They're going to run the armies of heaven, the hosts of heaven.

I know they have the commandant, but the generals and the sergeant majors, they've all got authority, too. And when they speak, people jump. And so we realize that in the next section, he goes on to talk about the power of the Son and why that's more powerful than even these authoritative and powerful angels. But we need to step back and say, "Wow, well, I guess we should admit in scripture, thirdly—third bullet point—angels have incredible power, incredible power."

Matter of fact, if they are called to do something to enforce God's rules, they can do it without even breaking a sweat. Jot this passage down: how about Second Kings chapter 19? They're having this battle with the Assyrians. And so here's God's people fighting the Assyrians. In the text, it says this: then an angel went out and put to death 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp in one night. And the next morning they all woke up and they looked around, and there were 185,000 men dead in the Assyrian camp. One angel, the text says, did that.

Now, how many people can you take on at once? There are angels, the Bible teaches, that if they were allowed, could take their incredible power and go, "Dead. What's next?" No breaking a sweat, no problem. "Oh, kill them all, God? You want to kill them all?" That's it. Hard for them? Not hard. Have you ever even thought of that? That the people who have the power to kill you—and I use the word people because we're going to look at this in a minute—they are people. They have intellect, emotion, and will. They are thinking people with names and jobs and positions of authority.

They could right now snuff you out completely. That's how powerful they are. And we don't even think about it. We think, "Oh, Jesus, he's the powerful one." He is the powerful one, and he has more power than angels. But that argument doesn't even make sense unless you recognize angels have a lot of power, incredible power. Incredible power to rule and to enforce. They have incredible power partly because they have incredible wisdom.

Here's a passage for you to jot down: Second Samuel chapter 14. Their power is partly derived because they totally know what's going on. And they know what's going on partly because they've been around so long. Angels have been around before the creation of the world. I'll prove that to you in a minute. And do you think they've ever seen the problems or challenges you're facing in your life right now? "Oh, I've seen that 816 million times now."

"Yeah, look at what he's dealing with. Look at the temptation he's facing. Oh, seen that. Yeah, remember once about 4,000 years ago I was dealing with a guy." They've been around a long time. They know the problems. They have incredible power because they know so much. That passage talks about the fact that when they figured out the ruse that was going on there about Joab, they said, "Wow, you've got incredible wisdom almost like an angel of God."

The point is, of course, we know angels know more than you'll ever know. So look at that list. You've got access to God long distance. Who's got access to God who can have a face-to-face with him this afternoon? The cabinet members, the angels. Oh, what about authority? What are you ruling over? I don't know, one-thirty-second of an acre? Okay, they're ruling entire pieces of the globe. Oh, what about power? How much power do you have? You're going to the gym and working out. What's it looking like? You don't have a lot of power.

What can they do? They could snuff out the entire nation this afternoon, one of them, if they just had half a reason to. Incredible power. Knowledge? They know way more than you'll ever know on this earth until you have the mind of Christ. They've got you totally outdone. And the first-century Sabbath school graduate sat back and said, "I know that, man. Whoa, angel incredible." Matter of fact, when it comes to some entity, some person that has interaction with God and us, I'm telling you, there ain't nothing better than angels.

Now, we're just trying to get a sense of it here. But it doesn't fill in all the gaps because there's a lot of knowledge about angels assumed. So what I thought I would do is point number two—I know it's terrible homiletics, don't tell your homiletics professor—but here, look at the second section of your outline and let's try and do a quick overall view of the parts that we may be missing. Particularly because we don't think about angels and we don't let the Bible define what angels are. We kind of let the Hallmark calendars define what angels are about. So we kind of have to dispel a few myths.

Before we go on to the punchline of this whole passage, let's just at least say, "Wow, what is it that we need to know about this? Let's try and understand and appreciate these incredible messengers of God." Number two on your outline, let's head it that way: appreciate God's impressive messengers. Let's try and do that by dispelling a few myths. Here's what you need to understand. Number one: angels aren't dead people. Let's just get that clear. They're not disembodied humans.

Because I know all the bad funeral theology notwithstanding, we've got to recognize and all the corny movie scripts, dead people are not angels. It's not like, "Oh, they earned their wings." No, they didn't earn their wings. We're not creating angels at funerals. Angels are a completely separate class. And angels are made in the image of God, but we're so materialistically bound we think image means something that we can see or a shape. It doesn't.

Image of God means that we can respond with the same kinds of characteristics of God, and that is that we have the basic components of personhood. And that means that we can think—we have an intellect—we are sentient—we feel, we have emotions—and we also have a volition, we have a will. Intellect, emotion, and will: components of personality. And when God created angels, he created a whole class of people just like himself. They reflected his character. They are people: intellect, emotion, and will.

And then he gets along to saying, "Well, I'm going to create some more people that now are going to be put into this new weird thing called material stuff. I'm going to create people who are spirit—intellect, emotion, and will—have the elements of personality, and we're going to stick them in a material world." Here's the reference to jot down: Job 38:4-7. This proves they're not disembodied people because God here—this scene in Job 38—he's creating the world and then he says, "And you know who was standing by kind of cheering me on? All the angels."

All the angels applauded when we made the world and laid the foundation of this planet and we spun it out there in space. They all go, "Oh, very good. Bravo." They'd never seen anything like that because they are people without bodies. Now, they're not humans; they're angelic. But they are people created before people who are in bodies were created here on earth, people who were destined and designed to fit in material bodies. I know that's a bit much for Sunday morning, but let's say it and move on.

Two: dispel another myth. Ready? Angels are not fat and cute. Jot that down. They're not fat and cute. Matter of fact, jot these references down: how about Revelation chapter four, which corresponds, by the way, to Ezekiel chapter one? One time I was given an assignment in a class I was taking to draw out what I saw there in the vision of Revelation chapter four. And I also used Ezekiel chapter one because the same beings—angelic beings—are being described. And guess what? You wouldn't want a calendar with 12 pictures of those things on it because they're bizarre.

They're weird. They're frightening. They are. They've got multiple faces and animals and weird things hanging out. It's just awful. You don't want a picture of it. It's bizarre. And as a matter of fact, when they show up in a way that God says, "Well, I'm going to make this angel manifest itself here to Daniel in Daniel chapter 10, and he's going to show up in kind of a human form," here comes this guy who just blows Daniel away. Daniel doesn't go, "Oh, how cute, an angel! Oh, I wanted to see an angel. It's good to have you. Well, have a seat here, Tubby. Let's just play me a song on your harp."

What does he do? What does Daniel—you've read the text. What does he do in Daniel chapter 10? He falls on the ground. His knees are knocking. And when the angel actually came over there in this manifestation and touched him, he said he trembled, he couldn't speak. Totally without energy, he said. Now, could an angel manifest himself in a fat, cute way? I suppose. But it wouldn't reflect their power, their access to God, or their authority.

Because they're powerful people who sit in the boardroom of heaven. And I don't think they have any need to show up in some contradictory form. Because these are powerful beings. And their imagery and symbolic representation in the visions that God gives these prophets, he doesn't give them pictures of cute people floating around. These cute angels, they're not cute and fat. Daniel chapter 10, Ezekiel chapter one, Revelation chapter four—a lot of passages there that might help.

How about this one? This one's going to throw you, but jot this one down. Are you ready? They don't have wings. Jot that down. They don't have wings. They don't have wings. Okay? They don't have wings. "Oh, wait a minute! I know exactly in the Bible where it says they have wings." Okay. You know in the Bible, the Bible talks about God having eyes, God having hands, God having wings? Did you know that? All those places in the Bible talk about that because they're trying to express something to us that we will connect with and understand.

But it's not that they're trying to say they inherently have those things because to have those things you'd have to be material. And God—John 4—is not material. He's spirit. And here's the thing: if you've got Hebrews open, look at verse number 14 of chapter one. It says they are ministering what? Spirits. And that means they don't have wings. Now, you know Exodus 25, I know, it says right there they're going to make this class of angels—two of them—on the top of the box of the promise, the ark of the covenant, and they're going to be depicted with wings touching.

Yeah, I understand that. And in that representation of angels, they have two wings. And in Ezekiel chapter one, some angels there have four wings. Yeah, and four faces—it's bizarre. And then in chapter six of Isaiah, they have six wings. How many wings do they have? I don't know. That's not the point, though. The point is these depictions and images and visions of angels are trying to communicate something to us about what they are and what they do. And they're swift, the Bible says, to carry out God's will.

And in the old, ancient world, the swiftest, fastest thing to get from point A to point B, it's the birds. It's the eagles. It's the things that fly around. And so they're depicted for people to understand their swift ability and readiness to serve God by having wings. Do they have wings? They don't have wings. And if they had wings, they wouldn't have eyes to see their wings. They don't have eyes. They don't have ears.

Now, God allows them to interface with humans throughout biblical history, and he allows them to manifest themselves in material ways—and that's bizarre because it's always different—in material ways so that people can actually have some interface with them here on earth. In other words, you'll have angels show up with Lot in the book of Genesis and actually move sound waves with vocal cords. But they don't have sound waves with vocal cords. They're temporarily on loan. God makes them there for them to interface with human beings.

And they don't have—you know why I know they don't have vocal cords? Because they have no need for them. Because when they communicate with each other, they don't have three bones in the inner ear of their ear canal to move little bones to send electrical pulses to a brain because they're not that. They're not material. They're spirit. And spirit doesn't have those things.

And if you don't believe that, jot this reference down. It's worth looking at because it's so important to define what spirit is. Let's turn there. Let's turn to the book of Luke. Luke chapter 24. This you should look at. We're going to look at verses 36 through 40 if you're taking notes. Luke 24:36-40. These depictions in the Bible: occasionally they have wings. Occasionally they show up and speak with a mouth and a tongue and teeth and a palate in the roof of their mouth.

But they, in their form as they exist now in our presence and in the presence of God, is without all that. Because we were the ones created to exist in material reality. They weren't. Luke chapter 24, verses 36 and following. This is when Jesus has been resurrected. And of course all the disciples saw him get murdered on a cross. And so they're sitting around talking about this rumor about Jesus being raised from the dead.

And it says in verse 36, while they were still talking, Jesus himself stood among them and said, "Shalom. Peace be with you." And they were going freak out. "What? You're dead!" They were startled and frightened. "We're seeing a ghost!" You should have a marginal note or at least write this: it's the word *pneuma* or spirit. They thought they were seeing a spirit. Same word used in Hebrews chapter 1, verse 14. Same word used in John chapter 4 to describe God. Spirit. They thought they were seeing a spirit, which is a bizarre manifestation of something that's not corporal, that's not material.

And he said to them, "Why are you troubled? Why do doubts rise in your mind? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself. Touch me and see. A spirit—a *pneuma*, a ghost as the NIV poorly translates—does not have flesh and bones that you see that I have." And when he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. "Look. See here? I'm not a spirit. If I were a spirit, I wouldn't have this stuff because spirit doesn't have this stuff."

Angels right now that exist in our presence—and they are around, they are localized to locales, the Bible says; they're not omnipresent. Spirit doesn't mean that you're omnipresent. They have focused presence. Their focused presence, if it's here, is not in a material way. That's why the medieval church talked about how many angels can you get to dance on the head of a needle? Have you heard that before? They had entire church councils to try and figure these things out.

And the point is: infinite number. Why? Because they don't take up space. And the church councils, by the way, pretty consistently throughout church history always came back to that. They don't have corporal material bodies. The evidence in scripture says they don't. They appear that way sometimes, and sometimes they're given those temporarily. But they don't have wings. They're depicted with wings, but they don't have any.

Fourth bullet point: Luke chapter 20, verse 36. Another thing I sometimes hear we need to clarify. Number four: they don't die. Angels don't die. And in that sense, they have existed from the time of Job 38, which was prior to the creation of a material world, prior to Genesis chapter one. They existed as a direct creation of God's—Psalm 148 says—a direct creation of God. God spoke and they were created. And they have been living ever since. They don't die.

And the text there, Luke chapter 20, verse 36, talking about our resurrected state, Jesus says we're going to be like the angels in that we can no longer die. That's the connection he makes. "Oh, you know the angels don't die, and just like that when you're resurrected you won't die. You will exist on." Does that make them eternal? What do you need to be eternal? You need both bookends taken off the shelf. Eternal means you existed from all time. I was, I am, I will be. They're not eternal because they had a starting point.

And we have a starting point, too. They were created in time. We were created in time. God sits outside of time; he's eternal. But they don't die. They were created, but they do not die. Fifth point: they're not all the same. I know one of the characterizations of angels is you just have all these angels that are just all look exactly the same. They're all cloned. They all—whatever they are—they're just like robots. Angel one is just like angel two and angel three. They're not.

As a matter of fact, in scripture, here's some passages for you. They're ranked and they're named. How about Isaiah chapter six? We talk about a whole class of seraphim. Wherever you see an "im" on an English transliteration of a Hebrew word, it's a plural. Seraphs, sometimes the translation says. But a seraph is a class of angels. What are they? I don't know, but they're not cherubim because there's another class of people called the cherubim, the cherubs.

Cherubs aren't seraphim and seraphim aren't cherubim. And I don't know how they get their jobs, and I don't know if they can change their jobs, but they have different jobs. And then there's the four living creatures. And then even in passages like Ephesians chapter 6, verse 12, he talks about other rankings of angels. And they have names. Gabriel had a name. Michael has a name, Daniel chapter 10. These are not nameless spirit robots. This is not a software program that God wrote. These are entities that have personalities and names. They get home at the end of the day—wherever that is because it's not material—and they talk to each other. "How was your day, Jim? How did work go?" They have jobs, they have names, they have assignments, they have delegated authority, they have power. Some are doing this and others are doing that. Don't think of them as some non-personality.