He is not here, but He has risen” (Luke 24:5,6)
Have you ever encountered the unexplainable? Have you seen something that if you hadn’t seen it with your own eyes, you wouldn’t have believed it? Have you been told a story by someone who ‘crossed their heart and hoped to die’ that it was true, but it sure didn’t sound like it? I think we all have. For example, I was once canoeing on the Buffalo River when, right in front of our canoe, a snake shot out of the water like a missile, completely vertical, with a frog in its mouth. It must have gone 3 feet out of the water! I have never heard of a snake doing that and, quite honestly, if you told me it happened to you, I would have had a hard time believing you. But I saw the unbelievable!
We are fixated on them. We have studied them, written about them, discussed them and some even worship them! And yet, what do we really know about angels?
...The average person thinks angels are those who have already died
Imagine what it was like for the disciples to be sitting around Sunday morning talking about what to do now that Jesus had been crucified when, all of sudden, Mary Magdelene and the other women come barging in saying that Jesus’ tomb was empty, that angels were there, and they were there saying, “Why do seek the living One among the dead? He is not here, but He has risen” (Luke 24:5,6). Now, of course, Jesus had told the 12 ahead of time what would happen, yet apparently, they still didn’t believe. “But these words appeared to them as nonsense, and they were not believing them” (Luke 24:11).
Here’s a question: What was it that caused them to doubt? What sounded like nonsense to them? Was it that Jesus had risen from the dead or was it that angels had spoken to the women? I ask that because human beings have long been fascinated by angels. A check of Amazon this week showed over 60,000 different items, from books to coffee mugs to t-shirts, that were about or displayed angels. We are fixated on them. We have studied them, written about them, discussed them and some even worship them! And yet, what do we really know about angels?
Well, the answer is…not much! Because the average person thinks angels are those who have already died (much like a caterpillar turns into a butterfly, these think people turn into angels when they die), that angels are women or children with wings, who float on clouds all day playing the harp. Yet none of those descriptions of angels is found in the Bible! Are they guarding “their” human? Are they bringing Scriptural revelation to men? Are they performing miracles?
This Sunday morning we’ll talk about angels, and while we may not know the answer to every question, one thing we do know if this: If we had a view of the world from the empty tomb of Jesus that resurrection Sunday, one of the first things we would have seen would be angels!
Church Quiz
Please complete all questions. Mark the best answer from the choices given.
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