Now, does everybody have the handout? Biblical truth about angels. We started this last Wednesday night. We didn't get too far along. I want to read, if you want to turn with me to the scripture. Does anybody need the handout? Jackie caught everybody, way to go. You're familiar with this, but it'll be probably a while before I turn back to this again. So one more time, I'm going to read from Luke two, not the whole story, but we're going to pick up where we read about the shepherds. and the angels. Here it is, Luke 2 verse 8. And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And lo, the word lo is a word of attention, like the word behold. It's an attention getter. And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shown round about them, and they were sore afraid. Now that's the angel of the Lord. There's going to be more to come along, as you know. Verse 10. And the angel said unto them, Fear not, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy. which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you. You 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, goodwill toward men. It came to pass as the angels were gone away from them into heaven. The shepherd said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem and see this thing which has come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us. And they came with haste and found Mary and Joseph and the babe lying in a manger. And when they had seen it, they made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning this child. And all they that heard it wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds. But Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen as it was told unto them." This is the way God chose to do it. The shepherds find out because the angels announced it. First there was one angel, then a multitude of the heavenly host. What a name for that group. It tells us where they dwell in heaven. It tells us that they are many, a multitude. And the word host is the same word that we find that means army. So the angelic army, the troops, God's troops showed up to announce the Savior's birth. And then the shepherds followed the directions given and they found him, as they were told, lying in a manger. And then they began to promote the story and tell what they had heard and seen. And they brought in, no doubt, they brought in the angels as the ones that told them, because they relayed all of that, it says in verse 20, all the things that they had heard and seen as it was told unto them. So don't you know that they were just talking and sharing everywhere they went, and probably for days on end, that's what they were talking about. And you can't blame them. If we had been out there on the hillside that night, we would have been stunned by all of it as well. Well, last week we started, and I've just run through this, and we'll have a running start into our study where we'll pick up. Number one in the handout was spirit beings. Angels are spirit beings. And number two, created beings. Angels are created beings. One of the things we said is people do not become angels. That's sometimes said, and maybe that's a deep desire people have, like a departed loved one. And that loved one has gone to heaven. And sometimes it is said, I don't know if it's truly believed or not. It may or may not be. But we want to lay that myth to rest because it's not so. It's not true that dear so and so went to heaven and became an angel. Now there's another angel in heaven. That's false. There's not one shred of Bible about that. And so angels are angels, that's the point. And we shouldn't blur these distinctions. If God had wanted more people and no angels, he'd have done that. If God had wanted all angels and no people, he'd have done that. People are people, humans are humans, and angels are angels. So they're a different level of creation. We'll see just how it ranks here in just a minute. Number three, angels are personal beings, personal. And when we say personal, they're not things. They are beings with elements of personality and the elements of personality are generally considered as the ability to think they have intelligence. But they are not like God, they don't know everything. Only God knows everything. We know that people don't know everything. We know that pretty well don't we? We know that very well. But angels don't know everything either. So angels are to some extent like us and we don't have much on this. We do have one scripture if we have time I'll get to that. But angels it's safe to say based on this just this one scripture for sure are learning. They don't know everything, so they're curious, especially about one thing that we'll see in just a moment. But they have intelligence. And then they have emotions. There's joy that the Bible speaks of. And we will come back to that one, but I'll just go ahead and mention that one. And then they have a will. And the reason we say they have a will is because they have the capacity to obey. And if you don't have a will, then obedience is meaningless. Think of that. If you can't bring your will to obey God, then you don't have a will. If God tells us to obey, then we must have a will to be able to do that. And so this is one thing we find of the good angels, the holy angels, is they always, they always obey God. And they are prompt in their obedience. So they have a will, they have a mind, they have emotions, and they have a will. They're personal. Number four, and we just saw this, they're vast in number. The word used in Hebrews 12, 22 is the word innumerable. I had to slow down to say that one. That is beyond number. So there is a vast number of them. But that's the word the King James Bible uses. Apparently the population of angels, the number of angels was fixed at their creation. And their number is only known by God. So he doesn't give us an exact number, but it's a vast number, one beyond counting. Now there's an interesting scripture over in Revelation 12. You might want to turn to that one. Revelation 12. You probably have heard somewhere, because I'm looking around and you all are Bible attenders, you've been coming to church, most of you, probably all of you, all of your lives, and you've heard teaching and revelation. And even if you haven't heard teaching in Revelation, you've probably heard that some of the angels out of the original group of angels rebelled against God and fell, and it was a third of the angels. You ever heard that? A third of the angels. Well, it's not exactly stated exactly like that, but here is where that comes from, and it's a matter of interpretation. I will read it for you in Revelation 12 and verse 1. And there appeared a great wonder in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars. And she, being with child, cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered. And there appeared another wonder in heaven, and behold, a great red dragon having seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns upon his heads. And here it is. Here's the veiled reference to this fall from the angels, part of the angels. And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven and did cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered for to devour her child as soon as it was born. And she brought forth a man-child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron, and her child was caught up unto God and to his throne." And it's good that we read that too because this has to do with the coming of Christ, doesn't it? All of this in symbolic language, the dragon, the child, We're not told specifically this was Christ, but we know it's talking about the Lord Jesus Christ. And doesn't say anything about his earthly ministry, except that the devil was ready to devour the child. The dragon, that is, was ready to devour the child as soon as it was born. And that of course refers to Herod's attempt to to kill baby Jesus and all of those babies were murdered two years of age and under. You know that part of the story after Christ was born. But all it says here is he was to rule all nations with the rod of iron and then this child the Lord Jesus Christ who later grew up to be a man and died and was buried and rose again and all that. It bypasses all of those details. Her child was called up unto God and to his throne. So there was ultimate victory and he accomplished what he set out to do. So this is a. that's a broad brush kind of a painting here and symbols are used. But this reference to the tail of the dragon drawing the third part of the stars of heaven is usually interpreted as a third of the angels following him or being influenced by him in a rebellion. If you want to call it that's as good a word as I know to to describe that. So a third became rebellious and fell from their high estate. And they're known in the Bible as evil angels or demons. So two thirds remain faithful to God. And they're referred to throughout scripture as the elect angels or the holy angels. And so they're vast in number. A third of them fell in sin and rebellion with Satan. Two thirds, or twice the number of evil angels, remained holy angels. Vast number. Now number five, angels are immortal. They're not subject to physical death. Well, they're spiritual beings, so They could cease to exist, but we have no knowledge of that whatsoever. The evil angels will eventually be punished forever in the lake of fire as will Satan, but they will not be totally destroyed. That is, they'll still exist and they don't really die. They're just consigned to torment. Number six, angels are superior to humans. They are superior to humans. They were created before humans. They have greater power than humans. How do we know they're superior? Well, the language used, and you have the references there, Psalm 8, Hebrews 2, Referring to Christ as a man when Christ became incarnate or human, it says that he became a little lower than the angels. So that's significant. That describes his incarnation. So if he becoming a man became a little lower than the angels, that has to mean that the angels are a little higher than man. Doesn't it? If language means anything. Now what makes that remarkable, you don't make a whole lot of it, but it is significant in that there was no attempt on the part of Jesus Christ, the creator, to redeem the fallen angels, even though they were a higher order of being. But when man fell and sin, beginning with Adam and Eve in the garden, he became lower than the angels to redeem us. That is significant. It would have been a stoop way down for him to become an angel. You read about the angels, and we read this last Wednesday night, Hebrews 1, where he is much better than the angels, has a more excellent name than the angels. And that's where the book of Hebrews starts out. So he's way above the angels, but he went lower than angels to redeem us. So angels are superior, but then seven, making sure we understand this, angels are inferior to Christ. And we're, the word inferior is far inferior, we could say, because unlike Christ, angels are created beings. Jesus is God. And there is a vast difference between God and all created things, isn't there? And that's what we study. If you remember back several weeks back, we were dealing with the holiness of God. That's the idea of holiness, not just sinlessness, but he's in a different category. So much above and beyond is the creator to all creatures. So therefore, number eight, angels are not to be worshiped. And you have some references and you can look these up and you'll see that that's what's being taught in those references. We just don't have time since we're trying to squeeze this in in between our adventure club lessons. So they're not to be worshipped and angels know that. For Christ to receive worship is proper because he's divine. And it's one of the great proofs of his deity. Angels are powerful, but they're not all-powerful. Only God is all-powerful. One great example of that power is found in 2 Kings 19, verse 35. That's when one angel killed the whole Assyrian army. And if you've forgotten how big that army was, it was 185,000. soldiers killed by one angel. And that's the record of it. Second Kings 19 verse 35. Remember when Christ said that he could ask for 12 legions of angels to rescue him? Twelve legions would be 72,000. You can imagine the power. If one angel Just try to compute that. If one angel can kill 185,000 and he could have summoned 12 legions of angels, my. Number 10, this is interesting. Angels do not marry. They have no male or female gender. Although when they do appear in human form, they always do so as men. Don't ask me why, that's just what we find in the Bible. But they do not marry. And it's brought out in those scriptures. Now we already know this. This is the primary nature or role of angels. Number 11, angels are God's messengers. In fact, the word angel means messenger. That's what they do. They're sent on missions with a message. And so that's good to know but we have to be careful that we don't fall in with some people that want to make too much of angels and angel sightings and things like this. God uses angels as needed. And before the Bible was complete that was one of his ways of communicating his will to people. But now that we have the whole canon of scripture, the completed scriptures, we don't need for an angel to come and tell us things. God has told us what he wants us to know. So there's a danger in wanting to hear from an angel or communicate with an angel. Another thing that we need to remember here is If God had wanted to, he could have given angels the assignment of spreading the gospel. And they would have done a much better job than we've done. They would have done the job. It would have gotten around the world. And they would get it out better and clearer. But he didn't do that. He gave us that assignment. And so we can't depend on angels doing our work. This is our assignment and our privilege to get the gospel out. Number 12, angels are localized. They're not omnipresent. Now, they're not bound to one location. They are mobile. We know that. They're able to travel from heaven to earth and back to heaven. And you remember Jacob's ladder, the angels ascending and descending on that ladder? That was an interesting dream. Number 13, I'm going to click right along so we can get this in. I think we can do it. Got a few more minutes. Number 13, angels dwell in heaven. They are the heavenly host. They do leave from time to time on assignment. And apparently, when God gives them an assignment, they're eager to do it and prompt. And when you think about that, that in itself is amazing. Who would ever want to leave heaven? But apparently they don't quibble over it. They don't. There's none of that. They're prompt. They do his bidding. And there's a verse that is coming up before or through here that reminds us they're ready and waiting for their next order or assignment. So number 14, we've kind of hinted at this one. Angels may be visible or invisible. By nature, they're invisible, but they can appear in a visible form. They came, you remember, and visited Sodom. And Abraham interceded with one of the angels. A couple of them came to Lot and helped him escape when he lingered. And so they came in a visible form as men. And then you have the, sometimes they were invisible until God made them visible, like in the story of Balaam. Numbers 22, Elisha's servant. Elisha said, I pray, Lord, you'd open a servant's eyes. And the Lord did open his eyes and he saw the chariots of fire that surrounded him. So they knew that they had God and his defense with them. Sometimes they appear in white clothing. Sometimes they appear in glorious form, glorious creatures. So depending on what the need is, they have that capacity. Number 15, some angels rebelled against God. We've talked about that. Some angels rebelled. And he has some other scriptures there as well. And number 16, some angels remain faithful to God. They're known as the holy angels or the elect angels. And apparently there's no indication that they will ever sin and fall like the first group. They will remain and forever be good angels, elect angels, holy angels. Number 17, holy angels respect spiritual authority. Now, all angels, both the evil and the good, that is the demons and the holy angels, they are all subject to authority. But holy angels respect it. and love it. Whereas evil angels, like lost sinners that are never saved, unredeemed people, they will submit. They won't want to, but they will. Every knee will bow. Every tongue will confess. Well, this is true of the demons as well. We're told in James something interesting about this matter of authority. It says, you believe there's one God The devils also believe and tremble. The word devils means demons, because there's only one devil, but many demons. But King James says the devils believe, the demons believe. The demons believe there's one God and shudder. That's the word used. So they know God's authority, but they just do not submit to it. They do not respect it, rather, in a respectful way. They submit, but not in a respectful way. Then the holy angels are obedient. One verse that clears that up, it's very clear, is we're taught to pray in the model prayer, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Well, God's will is done in heaven and who's in heaven? The redeemed saints and the angels. It's always done. No question. Always. There's a reference that some people have taken to mean that there's a guardian angel. I just want to read that quickly. I know we're going over about four minutes, but we're going to finish this out. And you've heard that about guardian angels. And here is the scripture that they have made the case for that. Here's what it says, one verse, Matthew 18 verse 10. Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones for I say unto you that in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven. And so that's where the case is built for a guardian angel. Well, there's not really a case there for that. The angels behold the face of the father in heaven and they're referred to as their angels but it doesn't say anywhere there that there's a specific angel for a specific person or child. And then sometimes people go so far as to say that every child has a guardian angel but that's just for children. Well that doesn't make sense because when would you ever outgrow your need for your guardian angel if you had one. You'd always want that guardian angel, but it's more of a manufactured thing than really a definite case to be made for that. The angels spoken of there seem to be a group instead of just individual angels who have an assignment for one person or one child. That was 18, they're obedient, and then 19 and 20, very simple, holy angels rejoice, and then 20, holy angels worship God. They rejoice with God and they worship God. There's one verse that we didn't have time to turn to, but One of the differences from humans, if you'll notice those two lists, we will not have time to read through it, but there it is for you. The very last thing in the list, a difference between angels and human beings is that angels are not included in the plan of redemption. There is no statement that any of them will be recovered, restored, rescued, redeemed, forgiven, When they sinned, that was it. But here is what we do learn. I was gonna say, I think it's in these notes here. Where is that? It is, oh me, I looked at that and now my eye is gonna give you the reference for that. They, here it is, 1 Peter 1.12 is the reference, 1 Peter 1.12, where it says, pertaining to the salvation of God's people, that angels desire to look into that. And the language is they're curious. They want to delve in, they want to investigate. How is this that our creator has redeemed human beings? Why would he do that? And so there is a holy curiosity. And it's interesting, there's just that one verse. But you can well imagine how they would be struck by the fact they were passed over, the fallen angels, that is. And holy angels know that. But they know that God set a plan in motion with his own son to redeem us. And they are...