My idea of Angels

I am no theologian and will never pretend to be.  However, ask anyone who has known me as at any age in my life and they will tell you I am imaginative, to say the least.  So I let my imagination run a little rampant today.  I started imagining angels. 

 

Personally, I have never much bought into the dress-wearing, harp-playing, kind-faced winged human.  But today, I really thought about what I envision them to be.  I don’t think the Bible supports a genteel version, for the sole fact that every time an angel is visible to a human, the very first thing they always have to say is, “Don’t be scared!”  Then they go on their merry way with their message of joy or hope or wrath or warning or celebration or whatever God sent them down to convey.  If I saw someone with a harp and a dress, even if they appeared out of nowhere, I probably wouldn’t be freaked-out afraid.  But every time…  “Fear Not!” Okay.  Deep, calming breath. 

 

As I said, I’m not a theologian.  I don’t pretend to know the Bible backwards and forwards.  But I do know the Bible mentions principalities and warfare in the heavenlies.  I remember the guardians of Eden after The Fall held swords.  But not just any swords – flaming swords!  So, there are angels warring on our behalf in the heavenlies.  They are messengers.  And at least some creatures of Heaven bear flaming swords.

 

I think angels still exist and are still active in our lives, our daily activities.  I don’t know why bad things happen to some and others are spared in unthinkable ways.  I don’t know the rules of heavenly warfare or to what extent angels and principalities of darkness are permitted to intervene in earthly matters.  But I do know the angels in my mind look like this:

 

They are dirty.  Not like a kid playing in mud but of a man coming out of a battle zone.  Gunpowder, sweat, grime, and blood stain their skin.  They are muscular and physical and determined.  Their eyes are locked on to their target, their jaws fiercely set for the task at hand.  They persist and fight until the battle is done.  I imagine someone appearing more like a Roman Gladiator than a fairy godmother.  Their toughness exudes from their every motion.

 

They catch a child falling from a balcony.  They hover around a vehicle to deflect the blow from hitting the person directly.  They make your mail fall out of your purse so you have to go back, delaying you those life-saving seconds.  They hold off the hands that seek to do harm for God’s kingdom to be further advanced, whether by hours or years.  They hold the person, alone in the dark, whether a child buried in rubble in Nepal, an employee trapped in an exploding tower, or a mother learning the child in her womb has died.

 

These fierce warriors with compassionate hands and hearts are what I believe we are repeatedly told to “Fear Not.”  And Fear them I would, if I saw them suddenly appear.  But whether I see them or not, they are very real and very active.  And I thank God for His protection, for sending His Son to die, for His overwhelming and unending love,  for the revelations through the Holy Spirit, and for the invisible band of warriors around us each and every day.