The Ministry Of Angels To The Lord

by SMITH, K. | Category: The Ministry Of Angels | Jun 2007

Angels were closely involved with the Lord Jesus' life of service on this earth, from before His birth to after His return into heaven. After they announced His coming (Mat.1:20-23; Luke 1:26-38; 2:9-15), they spoke twice more to Joseph (Mat.2:13,19) to make sure He was protected from the evil that Herod was plotting against Him. The family were warned to escape to Egypt and informed that they could safely come back to Nazareth once the king was dead.

The angels would have considered it a great honour to be involved in protecting their Lord. Satan quoted the promise of the ninety-first Psalm to provoke the Lord into displaying His power prematurely: �"'He will command his angels concerning you ... On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.'"� (Mat 4:6).

They would indeed have been delighted to rush to His aid rather than see their Creator come to any harm, but He had not come to promote His cause by a grand self-advertising gesture like this. That particular call for help never came.

At the end of His temptations in the desert, however, angels were allowed to help Him: �Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him� (v.11).

It is the nature of angels to serve. The writer to the Hebrews asks, �Are they not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation?� (Heb.1:14) Apart from Satan and his fallen angels, they do not consider it beneath their dignity even to serve us, so how glad they must have been to have an opportunity of serving their Lord? What they did to help Him is not spelled out. After forty days of fasting, He must have been extremely weak physically and perhaps they provided for these needs. How amazing that we too can have this angelic privilege of serving Him like Peter's mother-in-law (Mat.8:15) and the women who provided for Him practically (Luke 8:3)! In a future time those who cater for the hungry and thirsty, clothe the poor and visit the sick and imprisoned will be reckoned to have ministered to Him (Mat.25:44).

Luke's Gospel records another touching moment of angelic service in the Garden of Gethsemane: �And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him�. (Luke 22:43)

If ever He needed strength it was at this moment. He had been thinking of the horrors that awaited Him next day at the cross and it had had a strong physiological effect on Him, as mental suffering so often does. This was so intense that His sweat fell like great drops of blood (v.44). The word for strengthened is used in only one other place in the New Testament, when Saul, after the weakness of his conversion experience, took food and was strengthened (Acts 9:19). Perhaps the angels again provided the means of physical refreshment in this traumatic time. At any rate, they were there serving while even His closest disciples slept (v.45).

Later that night they were waiting to protect Him again. Imagine their anger as they watched evil men laying their hands on the Lord Jesus to take Him roughly away to a blasphemous, rigged trial and a shameful death. Peter�s sword was perhaps not the only one drawn; the armies of heaven must have been longing to intervene, poised to strike, just waiting for the word to unleash their fury at this outrageous injustice. He Himself asked: �"Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me twelve legions of angels? But how then should the Scriptures be fulfilled ...?"� (Mat.26:53-54).

Once again, the call never came. He had a purpose in going to the cross and nothing was going to prevent Him from fulfilling it. He was going to Calvary to die for your sins and mine and there was no way He was going to draw upon this special help, to which He was completely entitled. He did not have to die in our place: He entered into it willingly because of His great love for us. Praise God for the times He sent His angels to care for His Son, just as He sends them to care for our needs throughout our lives. But praise God even more for the time He did not send them, because that's when we see His care for us most clearly in action.

(Bible quotations are from the English Standard Version.)

SMITH, K. | Jun 2007
The Ministry Of Angels