Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayer for attention to Hebrews chapter 1 and verse
14. The last verse of Hebrews chapter
1. Are they not all ministering
spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of
salvation? Hebrews 1 verse 14. Our text
speaks of angels. In verse 13 we read, But to which
of the angels said he at any time, Sit on my right hand until
I make thine enemies thy footstool? Are they not all ministering
spirits? It is the angels that are spoken
of here as ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them
who shall be heirs of salvation. And upon my spirit this morning
is to speak of the ministry of angels, not in a great depth,
but to bring before us this aspect of a spirit world, the aspect
Sometimes we might completely overlook, though it runs right
through the scriptures, we deal with principality and powers,
spiritual wickedness in high places, but also spiritual hosts,
heavenly hosts, God's hosts, that minister to his people and
to the Lord Jesus Christ. There are several things to be
first attended to in the word that is before us as a text. The first thing is this, the
context that is set before us is that of Christ, our Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ, being more superior to angels. In the book of Hebrews, especially
dwells on this theme, how that Christ is superior to angels,
to men, to the high priest. He is the great high priest,
superior to the Old Testament high priest. His sacrifice, His
blood, superior to the blood of bulls and of goats, however
many thousands there were that were shed, He is superior. in every way, and this is the
aim of Hebrews. And here in the very first chapter
is speaking of our Lord being more superior than of angels. And so he says in verse four,
being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance
obtained a more excellent name than they. seen as so much higher than the
angels. He reminds us in verse 5 that
it was not to the angels but unto the Son of God that is set
forth in the Psalm, Psalm 2. Thou art my Son, this day have
I begotten thee. And again, I will be to him a
father and he shall be to me a son. or in the verse just before
our text, Psalm 110, verse 1. Sit on my right hand until I
make thine enemies thy footstool. The scriptures speak in prophecy
concerning our Lord. They don't speak in prophecy
concerning any angel or to that heavenly host. It speaks of them,
it speaks of them, as ministering spirits, as the heavenly host,
as being very real heavenly hosts, and ones that are very much a
part of God's creation and God's plan. That may we have as the
first thing to really consider here, that which does extol and
lift up our Lord, above that great and that heavenly host
and we think being brought to glory and seeing those angels
and yet there is the Lord above them. So many thousands and thousands
of angels but our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ extolled way above
that heavenly host so much then through This book, Our Lord and
Saviour, is being lifted up, is being extolled, is being worshipped,
and here He is as compared unto angels. May we ever have those
high views of Our Lord and Saviour, He who was made flesh and dwelt
among us, he who willingly made himself of no reputation and
who then was exalted and at the Father's right hand. We thank
God for that sacrifice that was offered at Calvary and the precious
blood that was shed there prophesied from the beginning of the world
that he should bruise the serpent's head, that great fallen angel,
and that he should bring about a deliverance from death and
the deliverance of his people and that he should bear their
sin in his own body and that he should pay the price and the
debt that they owed and that he should give them his righteousness
and fit them to be with this holy, holy angelic host in heaven. We are told without Holiness,
no man shall see the Lord, no man shall be part of that company,
that heavenly company that is not washed and cleansed and made
me to be part of him. And so the first thing is our
Lord and Saviour here that is lifted up. Now we would be mindful
as through the scriptures, the appearance of angels, sometimes
is not a created angel, but is actually our Lord and Savior,
Jesus Christ. We have the first instance of
this in Genesis 18, where there appeared unto Abraham, as he
sat in the tent door at the heat of the day, three men, and three
men stood by him. and we are told that they were
viewed by Abraham as men. There were three men. But then
we have, when Abraham is told that he shall have a son, and
at the time of life that the Lord would appear for them, and
the promised seed would be born, that is, Isaac. And then we read that the men
rose up from thence and looked towards Sodom. And Abraham went
with them to bring them on the way. And in verse 22 we read,
The men turned their faces from thence and went towards Sodom,
but Abraham stood before the Lord. Then we have, if we turn
to the 19th chapter in the first verse, And there came two angels
to Sodom at Even. And Sodom sat in the gate of
Sodom, And Lot, seeing them, rose up to meet them, and bowed
himself with his face toward the ground. And they appeared
again to those of Sodom as men. We read that they say in verse
5, And they called unto Lot, that is, the men of the city,
and said unto him, Where are the men which came in to thee
this night? So angels are appearing as men. Our Lord and Saviour is one of
His pre-incarnation appearances is also appearing as a man and
then remaining and speaking with Abraham. So there are those times
that in the Old Testament we have our Lord appearing. The word angel is used, but it
is the angel of the new covenant. We think of how it was with Jacob. There wrestled a man with him
unto the breaking of the day. And in the prophecies he is speaking
of, he wrestled with the angel. But the blessing that he had
was his name changed from Jacob to Israel, and the reason for
it was that he had wrestled with God and with man and had prevailed. That was another pre-incarnation
appearance of our Lord. So it was also with Gideon in
the book of Judges, and Manoah again in Judges, Manoah and his
wife, the parents of Samson, the angels that appeared to them,
how they acted, how they rose in the flame, the sacrifices
that were offered unto the Lord, and they were very mindful that
they had seen the Lord. That's why they felt that they
would die, but our Lord and Saviour may be viewed and not die. So we have those appearances. We have another appearance also
to Balaam where the angel met with Balaam. Know how that Moab,
the king of Moab, he called the soothsayer Balaam out of Moab
to come and to curse the children of Israel and the Lord forbade
him to go first, but then he wanted to go and the Lord gave
him permission, but then stood against him in the way with a
drawn sword in his hand and told him how he was angry with him
for going. But it was what he said, especially
the angels said to him, in Numbers 22 and verse 20 where we have,
And God came unto Balaam at night and said unto him, If the men
come to call thee, rise up and go with them. Yet the word that
I shall say unto thee, that shalt thou do. And so that was the
word of the Lord. And then when the He was on the
ass, we read that the Lord opened the eyes of Balaam, he saw the
angel of the Lord standing in his way, in the way, and his
sword drawn in his hand, and he bowed down his head and fell
flat on his face. And it is then the angel of the
Lord that is speaking to him, And so then in verse 35, we have
the angel of the Lord said unto Balaam, go with the men, but
only the word that I shall speak unto thee, that shalt thou speak. So Balaam went with the princes
of Balak. And so when we read that it is
the Lord that is to speak to him, It is the Lord's word that
he is to speak. We know that that is another
pre-incarnation appearance of our Lord upon the earth. And so we have those appearances
where it may appear at first that it is a created angel, but
then we realize from the context of what is said that it is our
Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And so in our text there is this
very clear distinction between a created angel and our Lord
Jesus Christ. He's not just another angel. He is very distinct. He is the eternal Son of God,
He is the second person in the Trinity, Father, Son and Holy
Spirit. He is equal with the Father and
with the Spirit, one God in three distinct persons. And so the
aim here first is to exalt our Lord above a created angel. He is the eternal God and the
angels were created by Him as well. The second thing to notice here
is those that are the heirs of salvation. Who shall be heirs
of salvation? In one sense, God's children,
those that were given by the Father to the Son to redeem,
those that are chosen in Him from the foundation of the world,
they are already the heirs of salvation. because they are a
chosen people. The way that the text is spoken
of here is not sent forth to minister for them who are the
heirs of salvation, but who shall be heirs of salvation. And in one sense it highlights
to us that God's dear children are known unto him before they
know him. In their unregeneracy, when they
are walking without God in the world, they're not asking for
his protection, for his care, and yet he gives it them. And
some of us, we can look back to our unregeneracy when we were
just the same and appeared just the same as any of the fallen
sons of Adam, and to see those specific times when the Lord
preserved our life, watched over us and kept us. And yet we may
say that those heirs of salvation, before they're called and after
they're called, they shall enter into that salvation in heaven. So in that respect it is a ministering
to those who one day will be in heaven above. One day they
shall be saved from hell and saved to heaven. And really we
could put it in this way, these ministering spirits, these angels,
are ministering to God's people. They're especially watching over
and ministering and helping them as they are in this world. They are not on their own, they
have those heavenly helpers. The important thing for us is
that we truly have that evidence that we are heirs of salvation. Just take it for granted. Don't
just think, well, it'll be all right for me. When I die, I will
go to heaven. I'm one of the Lord's people. Make sure that we have a real
scriptural warrant for that. The apostle says that our conversation
is in heaven or our citizenship is in heaven. And that gives
us when we have a citizenship of a country, many privileges,
and even though we might not be living, actually living in
that country of which we have a citizenship, we can exercise
those privileges of citizenship even in that country, even if
we were the other side of the world, then we can exercise that
citizenship. Those that are British citizens,
if they get into trouble in some other nation, then they may go
to the British embassy. They may seek help from their
country of which they are a citizen. Those that are the citizen of
Australia, even if they are living in England, they can exercise
their rights to many things in Australia. that someone who was
not a citizen or born there could not do. And so God's children,
though they are not in heaven, though they're not there yet,
yet as being citizens of that place, they have every benefit
of the protection of heaven, of those things that afford them
the hopes and expectations of being where they truly are. a citizen of. And so we may ask,
are we truly an heir of salvation? If we are, our Lord who is exalted
in this passage and compared here with angels, exalted above
angels, he will be exalted in our hearts and in our lives.
Unto you which believe He is precious. He is the one thing
needful, and that will be a real mark of our evidence of being
an heir of salvation, is what the Lord Jesus Christ is to us. One of the hymn writers says,
I could from all things parted be, but never, never, Lord, from
Thee. And the comparison here with
angels, we may compare our Lord then with anything upon this
earth. Is He more to us, more to us
than this earth, than our loved ones, than the pleasures of sin
for a season? Moses, it was said, chose rather
to suffer affliction with the people of God. and to enjoy the
pleasures of sin for a season. The third thing I notice here
is this provision of these angels. They are sent forth to minister
for them who shall be heirs of salvation. Sent forth by God. But always remember that every
blessing comes to us from above. Our Lord Jesus Christ was sent
from heaven to this earth. Every command of what happens
in this world, if we read in the Revelation and the opening
of the seals and all that is being done, and I speak with
reverence in this, the control centre is in heaven. There's
not a remote control that is going on here below that is governing
the affairs of this world and especially the lives and experiences
of God's children. It comes from heaven itself,
that which is a real work, I mean. Now, the Lord spoke of those
who laid claim to heaven and wanted the Lord to open to them
But he said, depart from me, I never knew you, all ye that
work iniquity. He didn't know about them. But the Lord, the kingdom of
God standeth sure, having this seal, the Lord knoweth them that
are his. And because he knows them, then
he sends forth from heaven those spirits, those angels, to help
them, to strengthen them, to be with them, and to be a blessing
to them. He sends every blessing from
heaven. We think of our Lord testifying
when He ascended into heaven, I will pray the Father and He
will give you another comforter which shall abide with you forever,
tarry at Jerusalem till you be endued with power from on high. And we get the real picture of
our Lord in heaven appearing in the presence of God for us
as an advocate with the Father. And when he speaks for his people,
he speaks with power and able to help us, able to do exceeding
and far above all that we can ask or think. Our Lord then is
exalted here, The airs of salvation are mentioned, are set forth
here, of which we need to make great diligence that we are part
and amongst them. And the blessings from heaven,
and especially conveyed in this way, through these ministering
spirits, is set forth before us. in this verse as well. Well I want to look then at some
of those times when are very marked in the scriptures where
the angels have been used. I want to notice first concerning
our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We would remember that it was
the angels that appeared to Joseph first when he found out that
his wife was with child, mindful to put her away. It was an angel
that appeared to him and said, fear not to take unto thee Mary
thy wife, that that which is conceived in her is of the Holy
Ghost. Thou shalt call his name Jesus,
for he shall save his people from their sins. It was an angel
then that appeared to Mary and told her that the Holy Spirit
should overshadow her and that she should bring forth our Lord
Jesus Christ. Before that, it was an angel
that appeared to Zacharias, John Baptist's father, as he ministered
in the temple, and gave the notice of John Baptist being born. Angels
was used in those most important times of the coming of our Lord
Jesus Christ. And when he came, it was the
angels that appeared to the shepherds and herald his birth in the heavens. The message of his coming was
given in that authoritative way In the gospel, according to Luke,
we have it in chapter two, and the shepherds viewed the heavenly
host must have been, in some ways, a terrifying sight because
the angel first said to them, fear not. And we read in verse
nine of chapter two, And though the angel of the Lord came upon
them, that is, the shepherds, and the glory of the Lord shone
round about them, and they were sore afraid. And the angel said
unto them, Fear not, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great
joy, which shall be to all people, that is, Jew and Gentile, every
nation. For unto you is born this day
in the city of David a Saviour which is Christ the Lord. And
this shall be a sign unto you, ye shall find the babe wrapped
in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there
was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising
God and saying, Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace,
good will towards men. And then we read, they came to
pass as the angels had gone away from them into heaven. And the
shepherd says, let us now go even unto Bethlehem and see this
thing which is come to pass. Those important events of the
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, it was angels that heralded them. The record of what they said
is in the Holy of God. I hope it will serve
to us in considering a few of these things, to be mindful of
that unseen world, a spirit world, a real world, a world where there
are the angels that are sent from heaven to minister to the
church, to men, here below. And so we have then with our
Lord Jesus Christ in his temptations, that which is set before us in
the Word. Perhaps if we first just look
at it in Luke 4 and verse 10, we have the temptation of Satan. and how he tempts our Lord. He brings him to Jerusalem, sets
him on a pinnacle of the temple, and said unto him, If thou be
the Son of God, cast thyself down from their hands, for it
is written, He shall give his angels charge over thee to keep
thee, and in their hands they shall bear thee up lest at any
time thou dashed thy foot against a stone." A quote from Psalm
91 and verse 11. And Satan is using that, not
questioning the angels, but using it as a temptation. We read,
Our Lord answered him, it is said, Thou shalt not tempt the
Lord thy God. And then Satan, he departed from
him for a season. That's how it is recorded in
Luke. But if we then see in Matthew,
Then we read of the ministering of angels to our Lord. Then in verse 11, then the devil
leaveth him and behold angels came and ministered unto him. Matthew 4, 11. And so there our
Lord himself was ministered unto by the angels while he was here
below. We read the same again in Luke
22 when it comes to the sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ and
especially when the sins of his people were laid upon him in
the Garden of Gethsemane. And in Luke 22 and verse 42,
he prayed saying, Father, if thou be willing, Remove this
cup from me, nevertheless not my will but thine be done.' And
there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening
him. And being in an agony, he prayed
more earnestly, and his sweat was, as it were, great drops
of blood falling down to the ground. The angels ministered
to him in that way. When Peter was bringing the sword,
and the Lord said to him, put up thy sword within its sheath,
the cup that my father hath given me to drink, shall I not drink
it? And then he refers to that heavenly
host again. Thinkest thou not that I could
not pray my father, and he would presently give me twelve legion
of angels? 72,000 angels could be had if the Lord
prayed His Father for them. Those helps were there, the strength
was there. And so we have a little glimpse
first of the angels heralding Christ's birth, ministering to
Him at His temptations, ministering to Him as His people's sins were
laid upon Him, and strengthening him, but not sparing him from
the cross, from the offering that he was to offer to put away
his people's sin. Then I'd like to notice the angels
as observers. As observers, they observed the
Church of God. They are witnesses of what is
going on. Now, in one sense, we need to
make a distinction here when we're thinking of the Church
of God. In the Revelation, and we have
the vision of the candlestick, and the Lord in the midst of
the candlesticks, and we have stars, and the stars are in the
hand of the Lord, And the interpretation was that the candlesticks, the
seven candlesticks, were the seven churches in Asia. And the stars were the angels
of those churches. And what is meant there is that
they were the pastors of the churches. But the pastors are
not those angelic angels. They are men. They are pastors. they're spoken of in that place
as ministering to the church, so over the church. But when we think then of the
Church of God in Hebrews, it speaks about instead of coming
to Mount Sinai as a mount that might be touched, that smoked
with fire and tempest, and so great was the sight that even
Moses feared and trembled But you come unto Mount Zion, the
heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels. Well, now we know that coming
into heaven, it is to an innumerable company of angels. But the context
there in Hebrews 12 is the church of God in a gospel state. And so, though they are not seen,
yet the angels are about the church of God, the people, of
God, a heavenly host. You might say, but we cannot
see them. But neither could Elisha's servant when the Assyrians were
round about the mount. And he said, alas, master, what
shall we do? And Elisha said, fear not, for
they that are with us are more than they with them. And he prayed,
Lord, open the young man's eyes. And he opened his eyes and round
about, them were chariots and horses of fire. He couldn't see
them until his eyes were open to see. Remember years ago, dear
sister in faith, now in glory, she lived in Australia and she'd
been bereaved twice and I spoke to her and she lived in quite
an isolated area And I said to her, are you not frightened to
live in this lonely place? You haven't got people anywhere
near you to help you if you had need. And she said, I was once. But then the Lord showed me that
portion of the chariots of fire and horses of fire round about
Elisha. And she said, I know that that
is the case with me, and I haven't been frightened or fearful since. And the angel of the Lord encampeth
round about them that feareth him and delivereth them. We cannot see that heavenly host,
but it is a protecting care. And we look at that in a moment. First I want to notice those
observers that are observing and looking. In Luke 15 we have
the parables, three of them, that speak concerning repentance
and how vital that is. Changing, repentance and remission
of sins are always joined together. Wherever our sins are forgiven
there will be repentance. There will be sorrow for those
sins. There will be a seeking to forsake those sins, to be
mourning over those sins. It is our attitude towards those
sins, even besetting sins. We have no power against them,
but to repent is to seek to forsake and to hate those sins. Well, we have the Lord saying
in one of those parables, how there is joy in heaven over,
or joy amongst the angels. In verse 10, likewise I say unto
you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one
sinner that repenteth. What an amazing thing to view
a sinner that is repenting as sorrowful their sins. and there
in the presence of the angels of God there is joy. They are joying because the Lord
has given that soul repentance and they have repented. It is
the work of God, it is the work of the Lord Jesus Christ and
they are viewing it and they are joyful in it. And may that
also be our joy as we see men, women, children repenting and
turning unto the Lord, and may it be as well an encouragement
and incentive to us. In our repentings there is joy
in heaven. We think also of how it is set
forth by the Apostle Paul to the Corinthians when he is teaching
about headship in the Church of God. is a subject really on
its own. How then the order in the Church
of God in 1 Corinthians 11 is the headship of God first, then
Christ, then the man, then the woman. And that is set forth
in the third verse of 1 Corinthians 11. And then the sign of that
headship in the Church of God is that the woman have her head
covered, a hat or a covering to cover her hair in worship. Every man praying or prophesying
having his head covered dishonoreth his head, but every woman that
prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoreth her
head, for that is even all one as if she were shaven. We have
in verse 10, for this cause ought the woman to have power on her
head because of the angels, or have a covering or a sign that
she is under the power of her husband because of the angels. And we would remember that the
angels were witnessed in the Garden of Eden where Satan came
and tempted Eve. Eve did not refer him to Adam,
her head, but made the decision herself, took the forbidden fruit,
gave to Adam. Angels were witness of that,
the rebellion of man against God's order, the taking up with
Satan's order. And they are witnesses too in
the Church of God. And when they see a woman that
is willingly and knowingly and by faith covering her hair, that
is in effect saying, I submit to the order of God. I do not
subscribe to the way of this world and the rebellion of Satan
against God's order, but I have power and I'm able to do this
and I do it as a sign. that this order of God first,
Christ, then the man, then the woman, is the right order. And this is why it is said here,
this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because
of the angels. The angels are watching, they
are noticing, they see every act of rebellion, they see every
act of submission to the will of God and walking in the ways
of the Lord. But then the angels, especially
used as protectors, and it's mentioned several. We think of
Daniel cast into the lion's den, and when Darius comes in the
morning, Then he cries, and has God been able to deliver him
from the power of the lions? And his testimony was that God
had sent his angel and had shut the lions' mouths. We have the
same with Hezekiah when the Assyrians attacked Judah. And they cried
unto the Lord that the Lord would deliver them, And the Lord sent
his angel and he slew 185,000 of the host of the Assyrians
and they were all dead men in the morning. It was through the
angels that he protected Hezekiah and Judah. Sometimes we can easily
overlook what an amazing thing. All those nations round about
Judah, that little overtaken by the Assyrian army
that swept through that whole nation, the nations of the earth.
And they were able to say, Rabchaki, Sennacherib's general, was able
to point out how many other nations and how many other nations' gods
weren't able to stand against them. And he made out that Judah
was just the same. The Lord made the difference
with Judah. And it was a wonderful miracle
of deliverance at that time and Judah then survived for another
130 years or so before taken away by Babylon and then of course
restored after that. But it was through angels that
the Lord brought about that deliverance. We have then the case of Peter
in the New Testament where James had been killed by Herod's sword
And he sought to take Peter. He shut him up in prison. And
yet that same night, when he was to be brought forth the next
day, the Lord sent an angel that then loosed Peter and loosed
his bonds, directed him to get up and to put his sandals on
and then to follow him through the gates and into the city. Interesting, when Peter was knocking
at the door of the house where the church was met for prayer,
that they could not hardly believe that it was actually Peter. They said it is his angel. They had some idea of protecting
angels, but it was Peter himself, the angel, had brought him up
out of out of the prison house. But then we have at the very
end of the world, if you and I are part of the true Church
of God, the elect of God, and are alive at the last day, then
it shall come to pass as described in Matthew 24, where we read
there, that he shall send his angels at that last great day
when there shall be the sign of the Son of Man in heaven and
then he shall send his angels with the great sound of a trumpet
and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds
from one end of heaven to the other. What a sight, what a sign
that must be. The Lord using his angels at
that great day of harvest, the end of the world, to gather his
elect people. They know where they are. They've
been watching over them. They've been ministering to them.
There's a minister, a ministering angel that came to Jacob after
he left Laban at Mahanaim. He was a ministering angel. that
gave the food and drink to Elijah when he fled from Jezebel and
went for 40 days into the wilderness. And it shall be these same angels
that minister at the end of the world. May we never think that
we go through this world and there's none observing us, none
watching us. God sees all things. We cannot
flee from his presence. but then we have as well this
great multitude, this heavenly host, this world that we have
little knowledge of, but yet they minister to the saints of
God, to those that are the heirs of salvation. There's a great
encouragement here, where we have those helps, where we have
the answers to prayer, where we know that we have the Lord
appearing for us and through His angels, His spirits not seen,
but those helps that are given. Each of those helps are tokens
that we are heirs of salvation. The Lord watching over, keeping
us, His presence with us. May we have a fresh sense of
this. I know I can't remember a time
that I've preached or spoken on the angels before and we read
over these passages in scripture and perhaps don't meditate upon
them or think of the significance, the reality for the Church of
God. In heaven we shall see them.
In heaven we shall see the Lord. But here they see us, though
we see them not, and they minister to us. Paul says in heaven, then
shall we know, even as we are known. And may it then be a very
sobering thought, an encouraging thought, that here we have set
before us the ministration of angels. Are they not all ministering
spirits? Send forth to minister for them
who shall be heirs of salvation. Amen.