What else could Paul be referring to when he speaks of invisible
powers? Despite the enormous interest in angels nowadays, few
people seem to take them seriously, or to grasp their significance.
They are often dismissed as childish nonsense, even by believers. In
contrast, a text from the early church father Origen indicates that
the first Christians not only revered angels, but had great confidence in their power as advocates with direct access to the divine:
When anyone prays, the angels that minister to God and watch
over humankind gather round about him and join with him in
his prayer. Nor is that all. Every Christian –each of the “little
ones” who are in the church – has an angel of his own, who
beholds the face of the Father and looks upon the Godhead of
the Creator. This angel prays with us and works with us, as far as
he can, to obtain the things for which we ask.
“The angel of the Lord,” so it is written, “encamps beside
those who fear the Lord and delivers them” (Ps. 33:8), while
Jacob speaks of “the angel who delivers me from all evils” (Gen.
48:16): and what he says is true not of himself only but of all
those who set their trust in God. It would seem, then, that when
a number of the faithful meet together genuinely for the glory
of Christ, since they all fear the Lord, each of them will have, encamped beside him, his own angel whom God has appointed to
guard him and care for him. So, when the saints are assembled,
there will be a double church, one of men and one of angels.
In my younger years, I did not give much thought to the presence
of angels, though I did not question their existence. I felt sure they
were a power to be reckoned with, and in our home they were
never talked about lightly. In recent years, however, I have often
pondered the words of Jesus: “If only one sinner repents, the angels in heaven will rejoice.” That is an amazing statement, and
ought to remind us how significant each of us is in God’s eyes. The
protection people experience each day – often without rational
explanation – also points to this.
In the Letter to the Hebrews we are told that angels may come to
us in human form. Gillian, an elementary school teacher, once told
me the following story:
Driving home one day, I approached a railroad crossing. There
was no barrier, no flashing lights. As my car straddled the rails, it
stalled. Then I heard a train coming. When I saw it, I was so terrified that my mind went blank: I could not remember how to restart the car.
Just then a man walked up to me and said simply, “Ma’am,
the train is coming.” I said, “I know. Thank you.” Instantly I knew
how to start the car.
I got off the tracks just in time and pulled to the side of the
road. Then I looked around to thank the man, but he was nowhere to be seen.
James, a volunteer with the Friends Ambulance Unit in China in
1945, had a similar experience.
I was assigned to a medical team in Tengchung, near the Burma
border, and was asked to go to Kunming, about five hundred
miles east, to get medical supplies and equipment. After negotiating a ride for the first two hundred miles (to the city of Bao
Shan) with the Chinese Army, I started off with Yang Yung Lo, a
Chinese volunteer who could not speak English.
On our return trip we were dropped off at Bao Shan, where
we hoped a U.S. Army convoy would pick us up and take us back
to Tengchung. After two days of waiting, we were informed that
a convoy was on its way, but that we would have to meet it on
the other side of the river where we were waiting.
Yang Yung Lo and I were desperate. The river was only
about fifty feet wide, but we had half a ton of medical supplies
with us, and the bridge, which had many boards missing, was
slippery and unsafe for trucks.
Just then a Chinese man (or so he seemed) appeared. He was
dressed in white. He asked us who we were and what we were
doing. I told him we were with the Red Cross and were trying to
transport medical supplies across the bridge. He understood immediately and said, “I will help you.” I don’t remember the details, but we made many trips across the bridge, and all went very
smoothly. Afterward I went to thank our helper. He had disappeared.
It wasn’t until later, when we were safely on our way with
the convoy, that I realized how our spirits had been lifted the
moment the stranger appeared on the scene, and that we had
understood each other without difficulty, despite the language
barrier. I have thought of the experience often since. I do not
understand it, but I am certain that God’s hand was in it.
Johann Christoph Blumhardt, a nineteenth-century pastor well
known in his native Germany, experienced the intervention of
angels on numerous occasions. Once a small child in his parish was
running down a village street when an ox-drawn farm wagon,
loaded with manure, rumbled toward him. Passersby shouted at the
driver, but it was too late. The boy was knocked down and a heavy
wheel ran right over his chest. Seconds later, to the amazement of
onlookers, the boy was on his feet again, unhurt. Asked if he was
all right, the boy looked at them in surprise. “Yes. Didn’t you see
the man lift the wheel?”
Another time, at a train station, Blumhardt was so intent on the
newspaper he was reading that he walked right off the end of the
platform. Instead of falling, though, he felt himself supported as if
by invisible arms and gently set on the ground. He did not speak
about this to anyone but his immediate family; he accepted it
quietly, like a child, and thanked God for protecting him. To the
modern mind, the incident seems uncanny. To the believer, it
simply fulfills the well-known promise in Psalm 91: “He will give his
angels charge of you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands
they will bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone.”
I sometimes wonder
how many more prayers would be answered
if we prayed more earnestly and with greater reverence for the
mysteries of the unseen angel world. I say “angel world” in the
sense that angels, as messengers of God, are invested with divine
authority, which I believe they carry with them when they come
down to us humans.
Ulrich and Ellen, close friends of mine over many decades (Ellen is
my secretary), experienced this in a very real way. They had eight
children, but lost their two youngest in the same year, 1977. The
first, Mark John, died at age three-and-a-half from cancer; I have
told his story at length in my book on children. Five months after
this death, Ellen herself almost died.
During the birth of their youngest child, Marie Johanna, Ellen
bled so heavily that she required full resuscitation and transfusion.
Sufficient blood was not available and members of her community
with the right type had to be awakened at night and asked to
donate. Within an hour, new blood was circulating through her
body. Yet still the outlook was bleak, and the attending physician
commented, “All that will help now is prayer.” Sensing the same,
those of us gathered at the hospital, including those who had just
donated their blood, interceded in earnest prayer. Ellen did survive,
with all her faculties intact, but Marie Johanna suffered brain
damage from lack of oxygen during the birth. Because the doctors
at the university hospital felt medicine had nothing more to offer,
the baby was brought home. She lived for nine more weeks.
My father, Ulrich and Ellen’s pastor at the time, said repeatedly
during those days, “Marie’s life is on a thread between heaven and
earth. Only prayer is keeping her alive.” Indeed, the baby’s doctors
said her survival was beyond reason – more than science could account for.
Then, on the day before Christmas, she died. Her mother remembers:
On Christmas Eve we were gathered around our baby. I was
holding her when suddenly Marie, who had never focused her
eyes on anything before, opened them wide – they were like
oceans: deep, dark blue, and bright – and she was looking at
something.
There was a movement, a breath of air. I felt Marie’s soul
lifted from my arms and pass in front of me, and firm, stiff wings
brushed my face. There was a scent, like the fragrance of a garden. Our children sensed that something had happened. I knew.
We looked down and could see that she was gone.
The presence of angels remains a mystery: completely real, but not
completely recognized or acknowledged. Yet precisely at the point
beyond which our minds cannot comprehend, we must allow our
hearts to believe. A mother recently related the following to me:
One afternoon my little daughter Jane and I were sitting by an
open window in our third-floor apartment. She was in her
highchair and I was feeding her cereal. I left the room for a
moment to get milk from the fridge, and when I returned my
heart skipped a beat: Jane was not only standing for the first
time in her life, but she had turned around and was leaning out
the window. I didn’t make a sound afraid that if I shouted she
would lose her balance and fall. I moved across the room and
grabbed her from behind. Relief flooded over me as I held her in
my arms. Then I looked down from the window and saw, some
thirty feet below, my neighbor Cynthia. She was standing there,
looking up, not saying a word, with her arms wide open, ready
to catch Jane. I thanked God silently, hugged Jane, and wept.
Later I went to thank Cynthia, but she had no memory of
the incident; in fact, she claimed she was never there.
Carole, a close friend who died not long ago after a three-year
battle with cancer, wrote to me regarding angels:
For some reason anything about angels goes straight to the
heart. We don’t know how many there are, what they look like,
all the people they must be protecting every day, or the comfort
they bring. It is hard to conceive of God being everywhere, listening to every heart at every moment, and it’s hard to imagine
him even wanting to hear us, so small, insignificant, and completely unworthy as we are. Somehow angels seem to be his fingers, his arms, his heart. To think of this makes it possible to let
the fear drop (or at least slowly go away) and to feel carried by
something far greater than it is ever possible to describe. In the
past I always shut out the whole idea of angels, but in this past
month they have suddenly become real to me. God sends his
messengers of comfort every day, every hour, to take the fear
and bleakness out of dying.
Twenty-five-year-old Rachel
was an energetic and enthusiastic
kindergarten teacher, when in the spring of 1995 she was suddenly
overcome by depressive thoughts and intense feelings of worthlessness. This progressed to delusional thoughts and bizarre behavior
and speech, as well as attempts at suicide. Rachel was counseled,
given both medical and spiritual support, and hospitalized. A few
weeks later, she was discharged, although it was almost a year
before she felt she was herself again. Significantly, throughout this
whole episode, she insisted, even when she was delusional, that she
was not going to be a mental patient. Her determination was
amazing. Eventually Rachel recovered completely; she was able to
discontinue all medications and resume a full-time job, and she has
had no relapse. In her own words:
I had always enjoyed working hard and being with children, but
I gradually became more and more exhausted. I couldn’t seem
to cope with my work, and at night I could not sleep.
I was admitted to the psych ward on my birthday. I was
desperate, and I remember thinking that this would be my last
birthday – I was so sure I was going to die. But then I began to
meet other patients, people who were suffering much more
than I was, and that helped me to get my mind off myself. I tried
to keep busy, no matter how rotten I felt. I made myself get up
and do things. I even practiced my flute.
I’ll never forget how abnormal I still felt when I came home.
I could not stick to anything for any length of time, because one
of the anti-depressants made me very restless. I cried a lot and
prayed a lot. I felt defeated one moment and angry the next, but
I knew I would be able to come off all my medications eventually
because I had never needed them before.
I can never be grateful enough that I was freed from the
demon of that depression. For it was more than determination
that pulled me through: I experienced a freeing. People were
praying for it and God was there too, though at times it seemed
like he was very far away. But I am also thankful that I went
through this difficult time. It might sound crazy, but it has given
me a new outlook on life. Now, when people are sick, I know
what they are going through, and I can relate to those who are
suffering. I know what people mean when they say, “You can’t
do anything in your own strength.”
Despite our culture’s reputation for tolerance, there is still a stigma
attached to suicide. Even as a topic of conversation, it largely
remains taboo. Most people are reluctant to speak about death,
and when it comes to suicide, they tend to avoid it altogether.
No death is more distressing than suicide, and it is frightening
when a person seriously contemplates such a step. The prophet
Jeremiah reminds us: “A man’s life is not his own; it is not for man to
direct his steps.” Christianity has condemned suicide for a similar
reason: because it negates the possibility of redemption. Suicide says,
“I’m beyond hope – my problems are too big even for God to
handle.” It denies that God’s grace is greater than our weakness.
While such a view may seem understandable, it is deceptive because
it leads a person to believe that death will end the inner pain, when
in reality it is pain’s ultimate infliction. C.S. Lewis wrote the following to a friend who had recently lost his wife and in his anguish
considered suicide so that they might be reunited again:
She was further on than you, and she can help you more where
she is now than she could have done on earth. You must go on.
That is one of the many reasons why suicide is out of the question. Another is the absence of any ground for believing that
death
by that route
would reunite you with her. Why should it?
You might be digging an eternally unbridgeable chasm.
Disobedience is not the way to get nearer to the obedient.