Does Your Church Have An Angel?

Does your church have an angel?

Several times I've been told by members of one or the other congregation I served as pastor that they saw an angel standing next to me as I preached. How would you take that remark? True? Active imagination? Listen to John writing in the Revelation:

Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands, ... As for the mystery of the seven stars that you saw in my right hand, and the seven golden lampstands, the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches. - Rev 1:12, 20 ESV

What is this talk about the mystery? What is a mystery? In the Bible mysteries are generally secrets known only to the initiated. They refer to some hidden counsel or purpose of men or they hide the secret counsels of God, counsels the ungodly will never know. These mysteries are often within a saying of the Bible or seen in a vision or a dream. Listen:

And he (Jesus) answered them, "To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. - Mat 13:11 ESV

Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers: a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. - Rom 11:25 ESV

Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages - Rom 16:25 ESV 

Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, - 1Co 15:51 ESV 

But back to the angels of the seven churches. The word angel doesn't necessarily refer to those wondrous spirits who sang and shouted when the LORD laid the foundation of the earth (Job 38:4-7). The word can simply refer to a messenger. John the Baptist was the messenger / angel who prepared the way for Christ's coming:

As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, "Behold, I send my messenger before your face, who will prepare your way, - Mar 1:2 ESV 

Could it be that what is written in the next chapters about each individual church is actually addressed first to the pastors or overseers of those churches? That's the frequent application of this mystery. However, nowhere in the NT is the word angel ever used to point to an under-shepherd, a pastor. David A Huston agrees. He believes that the words of Rev. 2-3 are written directly to the members of the congregations, because the local assemblies founded by the apostles were led by teams of men called overseers, not by single pastors.

On the other hand, the word angel is used some 60 times in Revelation to speak about one of these great spirits. Sam Storms discusses a few other options, but finally takes the view that the LORD—through John—is addressing the guardian angels of these seven churches. He doesn't know why Jesus would do so, however, and ends up leaving the identity of these angels still a mystery.

There is a parallel in Daniel's prophecy about a strange man who comes to him to tell him of the angelic princes of Persia and Israel.

Then he said to me, "Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart to understand and humbled yourself before your God, your words have been heard, and I have come because of your words. The prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me twenty-one days, but Michael, one of the chief princes (Dan.13:1), came to help me, for I was left there with the kings of Persia, and came to make you understand what is to happen to your people in the latter days. For the vision is for days yet to come." - Dan 10:12-14 ESV

Later in the Revelation we will see and hear about seven angels with seven trumpets or seven plagues or seven bowls of the wrath of God (Rev. 8:2; 15:1; 16:1).  Are they the same seven spoken about here? We'll deal with that later. For now, back to the question of guardian angels of local churches. We hear that little children have angels (Matt. 18:10). Indeed the apostles had guardian angels. Peter's angel got him out of prison (Acts 12:5-15). So if individuals have angels, why not whole assemblies or churches of believers? This brings us back to the question about who is being addressed in the following chapters, the angels or the entire congregation? Certainly the members of the church are held responsible. Why then are the letters address to the various angels of the churches?

Perhaps we are back to viewing the angels as the supervisors, the pastors of the seven churches. To come to that conclusion consider the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the OT. The prophet Haggai is called the angel  or messenger of the LORD.

καὶ εἶπεν Αγγαιος ὁ ἄγγελος κυρίου τῷ λαῷ ἐγώ εἰμι μεθ᾽ ὑμῶν λέγει κύριος  - Hag 1:13 LXX = Then Haggai, the messenger (angel) of the LORD, spoke to the people with the LORD's message, "I am with you, declares the LORD." - Hag 1:13 ESV

Luther Poellot, in his 1962 commentary, says that in the Bible we read about God sending angels as messengers to men, but He never uses men to send messages to angels!

Conclusion: the letters are written to those holding the prophetic office, the shepherds of the seven congregations. They are the messengers who are to convey the messages to their congregants, messages containing both warnings (Law) and words of comfort (Gospel). These same messages can be applied to congregations of believers in our day. We'll talk about that as we open them up.

Anna, Prophetess

There are two seniors in Luke's account of Jesus' birth, one a man and the other a woman by the name of Anna. She was no ordinary woman, says Luke. She was a prophetess, a title seldom given to a woman in the Bible. Scripture speaks of six women as prophetess: five under the old covenant and Anna in the Luke's Gospel. In addition, Luke writes in Acts about the four daughters of Philip who prophesied.  That brings the number of prophetesses to ten. Conversely, Jezebel in the book of Revelations (Rev. 2:20) calls herself a prophetess but she was false.

Other women prophesied, but are not called prophetesses. These include: Rachel (Gen. 30:24), Hannah (1 Sam. 2:1-10), Abigail (1 Samuel 25:29-31), Elisabeth (Luke 1:41-45), and Mary, the mother of Jesus (Luke 1:46-55).

Here is Luke's account of Anna:

And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day. And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem. - Luke 2:36-38 ESV

I cannot fill in the details about Anna better than Helen Gwilliam. I refer you to her short story, a fictional account of what may have occurred. She concludes her story about Anna with these words.

Early one morning as she was preparing for the day, she heard the voice of Simeon in the temple. Simeon was well known as a devout and godly man in Jerusalem. Anna knew that he would not be in the temple unless the Holy Spirit had directed him. She stayed in the background, watching as Simeon stood with a young couple and began prophesying over their baby. "Could this really be?" thought Anna. Joy surged through her entire being. 

When Simeon noticed Anna, he motioned her forth. As the young mother passed her baby to the aged Anna their eyes locked. Though generations apart, a deep understanding seemed to pass between the two women as each knew that they had a special part to play in the birth of this baby. A fire burned in Anna's heart as she held the tiny infant. In some ways, He looked so ordinary, and yet He almost seemed to be speaking to her. "I am the Bread of Life, I am the Resurrection and the Life, I am the True Vine, I am the Way, the Truth and the Life". Anna knew that the babe was "Emmanuel—God with us."

Not too many weeks later, the Lord called Anna home to be with Him. Yet Anna lives on. Today, she is part of that great cloud of witnesses. Her spirit lives in the hearts of thousands of men and women who are again looking for the great Messiah to come not as a baby in swaddling clothes, but as a King clothed with great glory. “Look, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and all the peoples of the earth will mourn because of him." Rev 1:7 (NIV) "Even so, come Lord Jesus." Rev22:20 KJV

Let us give thanks to God for those prophetesses in the church who continue to teach and speak about the Lord Jesus. In my years of public ministry I have known many wonderful women like Anna, teachers of children and adults, prophetesses who speak forth the Word of God and urge us all to look for the return of our Lord Jesus. Even so, Amen. Come, Lord Jesus! —Rev. 22:20.

Newt Gingrich's Misuse Of The Bible

In several speeches I heard Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich misquote Proverbs 29:18, "Where there is no vision, the people perish."

“I’ll fine-tune my message to say: Without vision, the people perish,” he said, paraphrasing Proverbs 29:18 and casting its admonition as his central campaign theme. “You need a visionary leader with very big, very bold ideas. This is a very big, very bold country.” 

Gingrich does not ever directly say he is that visionary candidate, perhaps mindful of the biblical warning that comes just a few verses later: “A man’s pride shall bring him low.” But his point is clear as he outlines what he casts as “big ideas” and “big solutions.”

What exactly does the Bible mean by the word Gingrich used? What is this vision to which he mistakenly refers? Let's start with the full quote from the King James version:

Where [there is] no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy [is] he. - Prov. 29:18 KJV

The word, chazown in Hebrew, is variously translated in other versions:

• revelation, NKJV
• divine guidance, NLT
• prophetic vision, ESV
• prophecy, RSV

We encounter the word in 1 Samuel 13 when the future prophet Samuel hears the LORD speak to him during the night. The writer of Samuel comments that "the word of the LORD was rare in those days; there was no frequent vision (chazown)" I Sam.3:1—ESV. By this the writer implies that there had been a time when God spoke His word (dabar in Hebrew), but such times were infrequent in Samuel's day.

Earlier we read that the word (dabar) of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, promising that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars (Gen. 15:1-5). The word for Abram's vision (machazeh in Hebrew) is the same word for the oracle that the strange alien prophet Balaam received. In his vision Balaam could only praise and bless the Israelites coming out from the desert. As a result, Moab's ruler, Balak, screamed that he had commanded Balaam to curse, not bless Israel. Balaam replied,

'If Balak should give me his house full of silver and gold, I would not be able to go beyond the word of the LORD, to do either good or bad of my own will. What the LORD speaks, that will I speak'? - Num 24:13 ESV

Both chazown and machazeh are nouns that come from the verb chazah, to look, see, behold or prophesy. Some applications:

• Moses is commanded to "look (chazah) for able men from all the people, men who fear God, who are trustworthy and hate a bribe, and place such men over the people as chiefs of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens." - Exd 18:21 ESV

• David rejoices, "So I have looked (chazah) upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. - Psa 63:2 ESV

• The 70 elders who went with Moses, Aaron and his sons up on Mt. Sinai "beheld (chazah) God, and ate and drank. - Exd 24:11 ESV

• The king declared to Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar, "Are you able to make known to me the dream that I have seen (chazah) and its interpretation?" 

Daniel answered the king and said, "No wise men, enchanters, magicians, or astrologers can show to the king the mystery that the king has asked, but there is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries, and he has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will be in the latter days. Your dream and the visions of your head as you lay in bed are these . . ." - Dan 2:26-28 ESV

• And after the resurrection all saints will join Job to say, "After my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see (chazah) for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me! - Job 19:26-27 ESV

The point to be emphasized in all of this is that no one ought properly to speak about a vision unless he can also say that the LORD God has revealed His mysteries to him. Only then can he claim to be a spokesman, a prophet who speaks the word (dabar) of the LORD.

Further, if any prophet claims to speak a word that conflicts in any way with what the LORD has previously revealed to His true prophets and seers (1 Chron. 29:29), that false prophet must be rejected and denounced (Deut. 13:1-3).

And finally, in the coming resurrection of all God's saints, the LORD will grant them to see Him in all His majesty and glory.

Sorry Newt, but I don't think you qualify as a prophet, regardless of what vision and big, bold ideas YOU may have for America. Next time, please don't misuse Holy Scripture to support your political agenda.  

Who Dares To Be A Prophet?

As promised, we're taking a look at prophecy in the Bible. It's a huge topic, one that remains quite controversial and one that is often muddled and confused by assumptions and presumptions. Let's start with a few definitions.

What is a prophet? And who dares to lay claim to the title?

The most common Hebrew term for prophet in the Bible is Nabi'. A prophet was moved by God's Spirit both to proclaim God's Word and to predict future events. Speaking about the task, the LORD said, "If there is a prophet among you, I the LORD make myself known to him in a vision (Mar'ah); I speak with him in a dream (Chalowm) (Numbers 12:6).

There were, as now, false prophets. Moses warned about them, saying, "If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or wonder that he tells you comes to pass, and if he says, 'Let us go after other gods,' which you have not known, 'and let us serve them,' you shall not listen to that prophet or that dreamer of dreams. For the LORD your God is testing you to, to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul (Deut. 13:1-5 and Deut. 18:20-22).

Some critics dispute the term Nabi'. They say it refers to babbling and nonsense, crazy, ecstatic ravings. The prophet Jeremiah, for instance, was accused of being a "madman who prophecies" and who ought to be put in the stocks and neck irons (Jeremiah 29:26). False prophets did indeed rave and the verb that describes such ravings is indeed Naba. However, that verb is also used to describe true prophesying. It all depends on the context.

There is an interesting story in 1 Samuel about Israel's first king, Saul. At one point a harmful spirit from God rushed upon Saul and he raved around in his house while David was playing the lyre for him. This raving is described by the verb Naba. In his raving he tried to pin David to the wall with a spear (1 Samuel 18:10-11; 19:9-10). Then in the very same chapter we read that the Spirit of God came upon Saul. He stripped off his clothes and in some kind of apparent ecstasy prophesied (Naba again). Because of this the question was raised, "Is Saul also among the prophets?"

Over 100 times in the OT, mostly in the books of the Prophets, prophetic revelations are described as a Word that God gave them to be delivered to the people. So Ezekiel wrote about his visions as "the word of the LORD" (Ezekiel 1:3). Note especially in Ezekiel that this "word of the LORD" came through some very strange visions (Mar'ah), a noun that may also refer to a bronze mirrors (Exodus 38:8). In the Bible we read about Jacob-Israel's visions at both Bethel (Genesis 28:11-17) and Beersheba (Genesis 46:1-4).

We also read of the LORD revealing Himself through dreams (Chalowm). Notable are the dreams that Joseph had about himself and his brothers (Genesis 37:5-11) and later the dreams of Pharaoh that he was empowered by the Spirit of God to interpret (Genesis 41:1-38). Interesting enough, the verb for dreaming in Hebrew is Chalam, a word that refers to being fat, strong and robust (Job 39:4) and seems to imply that a robust person is better able to dream.

The prophet Samuel is called a Seer, an older term for prophet (1 Samuel 9:9-19). Isaiah, one of the Latter Prophets, mocks drunken prophets who have visions (Ro'eh) brought on by strong drink (Isaiah 28:7).

There are 17 books in the Old Testament that fit into the category of prophecy. That's a major part of the Bible. The Lord Jesus, like the Jews of His day, acknowledged them, dividing the OT as we have come to know it, into the Law (Torah) and the Prophets (Matthew 5:12). The Prophets' writings were divided into the Former and the Latter Prophets. The Former prophetic books (Joshua, Judges, 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings) were written as chronological history. The Latter Prophets (Isaiah through Malachi) feel more like sermons than history. Many times the messages have hidden meanings, written as they are, in poetry. Early Christians viewed all of these writings as God's Word, most especially since they foretold the coming of Christ, His life, ministry, manner of death and resurrection.

All through the Bible, from beginning to end, our knowledge of God—His creative acts and deeds in the history and life of His chosen people and promises of what yet is to come—comes by revelation. Without God revealing Himself to His prophets, we would have no knowledge of God, no theology. Everything depends upon God's revealed Word.

Today we are generally well advised to be very cautious about men or women who claim they have had visions and dreams in which the LORD spoke to them. We cannot deny that God has—and can—reveal Himself directly to His people. The New Testament speaks about men and women, prophets, receiving prophecies (Acts 11:27-30; 13:1; 15:32; 21:4-9).  The Church has a long history of men and women who received visions and dreams from God. The warning of Moses above (Deuteronomy 13:1-5) must, however, be taken to heart. We are best advised to wait for God to reveal Himself and His will through His written and recorded Word.

We'll take that matter up another time.

The Gift of Foresight

In English the Nordic gift of fore-seeing has been variously called seid, seidh, seidr, seidhr, seith, or seithr. However you spell it, the Norsemen believed that certain women had it. And note, they believed it to be a feminine gift. Any man claiming it was suspect. 


In her trance the Volva or Wicca or Witch would be told by her guardian spirit or goddess of things that were to come. She would find answers to the future and to the needs of those begging her guidance. 

Some cultures call such a person a shaman. Among the Hebrews it was usually  a man, but sometimes a woman had the gift. The Bible refers to these Seers or Prophets in numerous passages: 


Then Miriam the prophetess, Aaron's sister, took a tambourine in her hand, and all the women followed her, with tambourines and dancing - Exodus 15:20.


(Beforetime in Israel, when a man went to enquire of God, thus he spake, Come, and let us go to the seer: for [he that is] now [called] a Prophet was beforetime called a Seer) I Samuel 9. 


"And when David arose in the morning, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Gad, David’s seer . . ." 2 Samuel 24:11.


The gift of foreseeing the future is suspect among many Christians and most particularly Lutherans. We much prefer to say that the days of seeing into the future are past. Our task now is to prophesy, that is to proclaim, what has been earlier revealed. 


The world of entertainment, however, does not avoid such questions. We humans are inevitably driven by a desire to know what the future holds for us. The TV series Flash Forward takes hold of this deep curiosity with the premise that some perverse group has somehow given the entire population of the world a two and one-half minute glimpse into the future by putting them all into a trance at the same time. 


The Nazis also embraced this desire to know their destiny. And they believed that the ancient Nordic gods had it planned for them. This fact led to the creation of Hulda Schwarz, the Volva/Wicca of my upcoming novel Freya's Child.