Today’s post is written by Tim Chester and is sponsored by Christian Focus Publications. Tim is a senior faculty member of Crosslands Training and the author of over 40 books, including  Angels: When Heaven Meets Earth. He has a PhD in theology, a PgDip in history and 25 years’ experience of pastoral ministry.

“My grandma’s house is full of angels.”
I must have looked a somewhat quizzical, so she clarified: “Statues and pictures.”
“Is she a Christian?” I asked.
“Oh no. It’s angels that she’s into.”
“Does she believe in God?”
“I guess so.”
“Jesus?”
“Not really.”
“But angels …?”
“Oh yes. She’s really into angels.”
Perhaps you’ve had conversations like this. Perhaps you’ve seen angelic figurines or angel prayer cards in a neighbour’s home. There’s every chance your local bookshop has a section for accounts of angelic encounters. People are interested in angels.
My own hunch is that, in the midst of a scary world, angels offer a sense of other-worldly protection. We’ve lived for the past two years in a time when death has stalked unseen through the air around us – in the form of the coronavirus. So perhaps its unsurprising that many people long for an unseen protector to linger in the air around them. The big attraction of angels – or so it seems to many people – is that they offer this protection without the demands that organised religion is perceived to make. People want protection without obedience, comfort without allegiance.
Whatever the reasons, people are interested in angels.
Many of us have assumed we are living in a post-religious era where superstition has been replaced by science. The people of our day, we assume, are rationalists who value rational enquiry and empirical evidence. And they are materialists who believe the world we can see and touch – the world that science can investigate – is all there is. And we’ve prepped apologetic ammo accordingly. We know what to say when people question miracles or point to suffering. We can explain how science need be no enemy of faith.
This version of our times is true. But it’s only half the picture. There is another side to modernity. It’s a side populated by superstition, tarot, spiritualism, horoscopes, mediums – and angels. The supernatural is alive and kicking over on this side of modernity’s fence. And the people who live in this terrain are asking different apologetic questions that require different answers.
They want to know about angels. So what will we tell them?
In the past I’ve tended to steer clear of angels. Not in life, of course – I’m not sure what one might do to avoid an angel! No, I’ve avoided angels in conversations with unbelievers. It’s felt like too much of a weird place to start. I’ve assumed I was talking to rationalists and so angels would get the conversation off on the wrong foot. I’d rather get on to safer ground – like creation (lots of overlap with science), or sin (plenty of empirical evidence for that), or resurrection (a bit trickier, but a clear and central claim). By contrast angels are a bit spooky. In a rationalist’s mind they’re in the same category as ghosts. If I start here, I’ve assumed, then I’ll lose people straight away.
But it turns out that angels are a good place to start with many people. Nearly eight in ten Americans believe in angels. Even among those who never attend church it’s four out of ten.[1] In the United Kingdom one in three people believe they have a guardian angel.[2] Every tenth person in your street or workplace thinks they may have seen or heard an angel in some way.
Even among die-hard rationalists and materialists angels are a route into a conversation about heaven, souls, spiritual realities and eternity. It’s a short step from there to a conversation about the God who entered our world from outside at the incarnation. Life beyond physical matter and life after death go hand in hand.
So let’s talk about angels. But of course let’s not stop at angels. Perhaps the longest sustained passage in the Bible on angels is Hebrews 1. Here the writer repeatedly compares angels to Jesus, and every time Jesus is shown to be superior. Angels point us to Jesus. That’s their job. Indeed the word “angel” is actually a job title – the word means “messenger”. Angels are God’s messengers. Most famously they were the messengers who heralded the news of Christ’s coming on the first Christmas day. They filled the skies with the sound of song when Jesus was born. What is their message? The angel who appeared to the shepherds said:
“Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.” (Luke 2:10-12)
Their message is Jesus: a Saviour, the Messiah, the Lord.
The angelic host then sing: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favour rests.” (Luke 1:14) “Peace on earth,” we often say, as if this was a lame exhortation to get on with one another. But this is peace from God coming to humanity. When we rejected God, we declared war on God. We made him our enemy. But now God has declared peace – peace through the mediation of the child in the manger who will became the Lord on the cross. The death and resurrection of Jesus are our only hope. This is want angels declare and this is what fills their songs.
So angels are a great starting point. But let’s makes sure the end point is Jesus.
Get your copy of Angels: When Heaven Meets Earth here.
[1] “Nearly 8 in 10 Americans Believe in Angels,” CBS News, 23 December 2011, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/poll-nearly-8-in-10-americans-believe-in-angels/; accessed September 8, 2021.
[2] The Bible Society, “A Third of All Brits Believe in Guardian Angels,” 13 December 2016, https://www.biblesociety.org.uk/latest/news/a-third-of-all-brits-believe-in-guardian-angels/; accessed August 30, 2021.

The Lord bless and keep you today.

Today’s Kindle deals include some good picks from Crossway.
Westminster Books has a new kids’ edition of Pilgrim’s Progress discounted.
The False Philosophy of Cancel Culture
This article from STR makes some interesting observations about cancel culture. “Cancel culture is based on the assumption that power—not truth—is the only way to drive cultural change. Change the group in power, and change the culture. On this view, everything is a power play. Ultimately, group power plays result in the loss of individual freedom and liberty—canceling, in other words.”
Satan’s Agenda for the Christian
Chopo Mwanza wants to ensure Christians don’t fall into two opposite traps when it comes to Satan’s influence in a life.
Why Should Your Local Church Be Geographically Proximate?
I appreciate much of what Stephen David says about attending a church that is close to home. “We’ve encouraged some believers from a distant section of Hyderabad to travel a long distance for the purpose of gathering with us as a church. They were clearly desperate to attend a Biblical church. Simultaneously, we trained a brother as a church planter and sent him out to plant a church in their locality.”
Secularism Proves Christianity’s Influence
Glen Scrivener considers whether Christianity’s influence has begun to wane in Western society. “It’s worth remembering that tides go out, but they also come in. There have been many ‘long, withdrawing roars’ in church history and equally many extraordinary surges. Tides don’t go out forever. But there’s another way to develop the ‘sea of faith’ analogy: the power of the water is in evidence no matter its current level.”
SBJT 25/2
If you’re interested in some theological reading, there’s a new issue of the Southern Baptist Journal of Theology free for the taking. The theme for this issue is angels.
Ten Words for a Broken Society
Bruce Ashford continues his series on the Ten Commandments by considering the fifth and its implications for children and, by implication, citizens. (Though on this note he may fall into the all-too-common trap of spending more time discussing what the commandment doesn’t mean than what it actually does.)
Flashback: Be a Parent Worthy of Honor
How can we who are parents live lives that are worthy of honor? How can we make it easy for our children to honor us now and in the future?

If men were able in the slightest degree to try to move in God’s direction, there would be no need for God to save them. —Martin Luther

We are blessed to have access to so many excellent books on parenting. From conception to empty nesting, from strong-willed toddlers to rebellious prodigals, from the joy of welcoming a child to the grief of losing one, there is a book to guide and help us. And for that, I am truly thankful.
And yet I believe that many parents fail to read the parenting book that could make the biggest difference to their lives and families. Many neglect to give their attention to the parenting book that God has set right before them. It’s the “book” that is being written in the lives of the people in their own local church.
When my children were younger, I loved to read a good book for parents. I read most of the major ones and many of the lesser-knowns. I learned how to shepherd and instruct a child’s heart, how the gospel powers our parenting, how to be purposeful and persistent parents, how to have “the talk” with our children, and on and on. I benefitted a lot from each of them. There was always something to learn and always an area of weakness to address.
Yet I could never shake this thought: I don’t actually know any of these authors. I don’t know anything more than what they have told me about themselves in their books. I don’t know how they have actually lived these things out in their homes. I don’t know how their children feel about them. I don’t know if they gained the hearts of their kids or lost them, if their techniques led to great success or total failure.
But I knew it is much harder to be hypocritical in a context in which you are seen and known. It is much harder to fake it, to have a great disparity between what you teach and how you live or between what you say is true of your family and what is actually true. The local church proves who you really are, what you really believe, and how you really live.
And so I decided it would be wise to commit to reading the “book” that I saw each Sunday, the one that was right before my eyes. Here I could see fathers who loved their children (and were loved by their children) and ask them for guidance. Here I could see parents whose children I would be proud to call my own and learn to imitate them. Here I could see the principles of Scripture really lived out. I understood that it would be foolish to spend time with a book when I could spend time with a family, to learn from a stranger when I could be mentored by a friend.
It would be foolish to spend time with a book when I could spend time with a family, to learn from a stranger when I could be mentored by a friend.Share
And my encouragement to young parents today is to do the same. Don’t neglect the “books” made up of human lives in favor of books made up of mere paper. Let the people in your life and church be the main thing and let the paperbacks be supplemental.
To that end, let me offer a few tips.
First, do not be easily impressed by people whose children are still young. Often the people who have the most obedient little children now will have the most rebellious older children then. It is easy to crush the spirits of little ones and force them to do your will. It is much harder to keep their spirits crushed as they grow older and have a greater ability to live their own lives. So seek out parents whose children are older and, ideally, grown and independent.
Second, look for people in your church whose older children are living the way you’d hope your children will someday live. Look for grown children of whom you’d say, “If this was my child, I’d be proud.” Then go to those parents and say something like this: “I want my children to someday be like your children. Can we spend some time together so you can teach me how?” If you’re feeling especially humble, you can say “If you see me parenting in a way you think is unbiblical or unwise, I would appreciate if you would speak to me about it.”
Third, be wary of people whose egos are tied closely to their children. There are many parents who are desperate to be known as good and successful parents—parents whose identity is found in their parenting. Such people can often be inadvertently hypocritical. It is better to look for people who do not obviously present themselves as authorities on parenting, but who are doing it well nonetheless.
Fourth, as you speak to exemplary parents, also speak to their exemplary children. Ask them what they believe their parents did so well. Ask them what they have learned from their mom and dad. Ask them for the ways in which they intend to imitate their parents.
Finally, don’t fall into the trap of thinking that just because older parents raised their children many years ago and in a different cultural context, their counsel is no longer valuable. You will naturally be drawn to people whose lives are similar to your own and whose children are the same age. But don’t confuse youthful confidence for experienced wisdom. Don’t think that apparent success in the early days necessarily predicts a good outcome in the later days. Job was not wrong when he observed “Wisdom is with the aged, and understanding in length of days.”
The local church proves who you really are, what you really believe, and how you really live.Share