Angel Evangelism (Part 1)

Welcome to No Compromise Radio Ministry

Welcome to No Compromise Radio Ministry. I just did a Darth Vader breath. Well, I'm glad you tuned in today to No Compromise Radio Ministry. The old discernment ministry is long gone, and now we'd like to talk about the Lord Jesus.

I think if you summarize the ministry here, it would probably be this. We talk about Jesus for pardon, Jesus for power, that's duplex gratia, our double benefit, as Elivianus would say. We talk about law gospel.

We talk about three covenants of redemption, of works, of grace. We talk about assurance. We talk about monergistic sanctification. You know, some of those might be good American gospel shows. I'm trying to turn the law gospel sanctification shows into a book, but I only have so much time.

Let's see what else. I guess I could elicit prayers. It might be good on my behalf and the family's behalf. You know, I have this nasal thing that you know about. I've got weird outbreaks on my arms. I've got earlobe cysts.

I've got bone pain. And every year, for the last, I think, three, four years, I go to Dana-Farber Cancer Hospital because my whites are high, my white count in the blood. And so it's like a pre-CLL, it's pre-chronic leukemia.

I forgot the second lymphosymptic, lymphocytic, something like that. And they're just like, yeah, just come back next year. You're fine. Act like you never had it. I think it's MBL technically. So I knew there's a bunch of stuff going on with me this year, tired and all these other things.

And so I went in this year, they said, oh, your whites are extra high. And so you do have chronic leukemia. And now we better do something about it. So I'm going to be in a clinical trial. I start either two different pills per day for a year.

If it's gone after a year, then stop. If it's not, then two years. And I have to go in for a CAT scan, bone biopsy. Ooh, Iliac crest. Ouch. But at least I know. So I think it's going to solve the bone pain, the sinus deal, the arms, the earlobes.

And I don't know if it'll solve the tiredness problem or not. They said, well, maybe if you rode the bicycle less, you'd be less tired. So after they tell you you have prostate cancer as they did in 2015, this one's not as shocking.

And of course you can live a long time with chronic leukemia. It's no fun to have lymph node, blood bone cancer. But anyway, that's the story. Don't want to make it a pity party about me. But I want to do what first Peter chapter five talks about humbling myself under the mighty hand of God.

So in due time, he might exalt me casting my cares upon the Lord because he cares for me. So if you think about praying for Mike Avendroth, you can pray that all the leukemia would be gone. And that I wouldn't get the third cancer.

Oh, brother. Speaking of brothers, my brother is putting a conference together. He's put it together. It's called the, well, it's the Pactum Conference, P-A-C-T-U-M. That's from the Covenant of Redemption, Pactum Salutas, Covenant of Peace.

And it's 2023. And it is coming up this October 6th and 7th. And it's on prophecy, all things new, but it's not going to be a normal prophecy conference. D .G. Hart's going to be there. Pat will speak.

Who else is going to speak? Two-aged soldier nearby. I forgot the guy's name. He's a nice guy, but I forgot his name already. And another guy too, Mike Avendroth. I'm going to speak on myth of final justification.

Okay. So that guy's name, I think is Mike, Mike, Mike Landon, Mike two-aged soldier, Michael Beck. Of course, how could I forget? I know you were shouting that into the thing. I blame it on my leukemia.

They can't think. Although that is mentally stressful. I'll tell you that. Even if you're thinking about things rightly, then it's just like, oh, it's just in the back of your mind. I just want to get this thing going.

Let's just give me the pills. Let's go. Anyway, here's the thing. It costs to get in. It's in Omaha, October 6th and 7th. And on today's episode on No Compromise Radio, I'm giving away two tickets, compliments of Pat Avendroth and the Pactam, giving away two tickets for the All Things New conference.

And you can go to Pactam, the Pactam .org, T-H-E-P-A-C-T-U-M .org. If you want more information there, if you want free admission for two people, there goes a motorcycle. All you have to do is write me, Mike at nocompromiseradio .com.

And the first person that sends me the email, I'd like the two tickets and I'm going to go. You can't buy the tickets and sell them to someone else or raffle them off or anything like that. The first person that emails me gets the two tickets and I'll give you the information, Mike at nocompromiseradio .com.

Give me the names and I'll pass them on to Pat. And I will see you in Omaha, Nebraska, Lord willing. Last time I was supposed to go to Omaha, Nebraska, I never made it because I was in the hospital for COVID.

And then who knows now with treatments and stuff, I sure hope I can make it. One side, one part of the clinical trial, you have to have infusions and go in. The other one, I think it's maybe just medicine at home.

So we'll see. What else do we have to talk about on No Compromise Radio Ministry? If you don't follow us on Twitter at NoCoRadio, you might want to do that. Now, Facebook, we have a No Compromise Radio site, but I don't post that many things.

Twitter, I've tried to not post many negative things. I think what gets me riled up on Twitter, maybe more than other things, is maybe neonomism. What else? People that scold, pastors that scold, people that charge to go speak at conferences.

Matter of fact, I need to send Pat the email and tell him what my demands are for the backroom. Omaha. All right, here's what I want to do today. I want to talk to you about angels. Really? I want to talk to you about angel evangelism.

I know what you're thinking. I know you're saying to yourself, is this something like Muslims dreaming about Jesus getting saved? There's a direct revelation. By the way, when I get asked about that, okay, if Muslims already know about Jesus and have the data, the biblical data about Jesus, enough to know about salvation, that is who Jesus is and what he's done and how to receive his benefits, then they want to have those things occur in a dream and their subconscious brings it up.

Fine, but God isn't giving new revelation through dreams. He could do whatever he wants, obviously, but that's certainly not the pattern or the way things go. That's why we're supposed to go proclaim the gospel.

So dream evangelism is not the way we want to go. But what about angel evangelism? Well, the fun part about angel evangelism is angel and evangelism kind of have the same root words, right? Messenger, a messenger of good news, angelos, euangelion.

It sounds the same, angel, good news. And therefore, I'm thinking a lot about angels showing up and what that looks like. Remember an angel, Gabriel, showed up to talk to Zechariah in Luke 1. He was afraid.

No glory around him, no glory of God around, no Shekinah glory, no weighty kavod, dox. Every time I say dox, I think of indoxation and Meredith Klein, Michael Beckwith. Michael Beckwith is here. He used to be here, Simon Beckwith.

And what else? I think of an angel showing up to Mary, right? Both of them are frightened, but still no glory. And then there's a passage later on, Luke chapter 2. In the same region, there were shepherds out in the field keeping watch over their flock by night.

Okay, so remember, Jesus has been born. He's wrapped in swaddling cloths. You just wrap them up really tightly, like you'd put a blanket around them tightly, right? Baby's in the womb for a long time, and they're nice and secure, and you want to just kind of give them that comfort.

And certainly some type of diaper under there. Can you imagine Jesus, the Lord of the universe, wearing a diaper and swaddling clothes? I mean, did you talk about humanity of Jesus? Does Jesus have to be truly man in order to be a savior?

The answer is yes. Categorically, yes. The Son of Man comes to seek and save the lost, and he enters in as a baby. Can you imagine? I mean, I just said that a second ago, but that is fascinating. And of course, it's all planned out by God, and therefore, there's a decree behind the decree.

And even though Caesar Augustus has a decree because he wants more taxation, and you know, what's the old slogan? No taxation without representation. That's what we would say here in New England. But for them, it's no taxation without registration.

So, they needed to be registered. You bring Joseph and Mary all the way down from Nazareth, 70-ish miles away, and you bring them down to, on a map, up to altitude speaking, altitude-wise, Bethlehem.

Because without Jesus being born in Bethlehem, Mike 5 -2 prophesied it, then all of us would be without a savior. We'd be going to hell because prophecy would not be fulfilled. And you see, of course, the condescension of the Lord Jesus as he's born in, not really an inn, and we can talk about that more, but some type of, if you just think about a rectangle, this is probably the right way to think about it, a rectangular building.

The center is the dwelling of the people. On one side, on the left side, you'd put your guests, and then on the other side, you'd put some animals. And so, the guest rooms are taken because there's a census, right?

And there's military people involved coming to town to take the census, and therefore, there's no room for Jesus, and he's put in a little manger. Luther writes, therefore, whenever you are concerned to think and act about your salvation, you must run directly to the manger and the mother's womb.

Embrace this infant and virgin's child in your arms and look at him, born, being nursed, growing up, going about in human society, teaching, dying, rising again, ascending above all the heavens, and having authority over all things.

And here we have certainly the true humanity of Jesus. We have the true humiliation of Jesus. Heidelberg Catechism, I know Clark used to listen, I don't know if he listens anymore, but Scott Clark, if you dare to listen to No Compromise Radio, here's a Heidelberg Catechism, question 16, in your honor.

Why must Jesus be a true and righteous man? Answer, Jesus must be a true man because the justice of God requires that the same human nature which had sinned should pay for sin, right? Remember, Adam, our federal head, he sinned, human nature, and so the same human nature which sinned should pay for sin.

He must, Jesus must be a righteous man because one who himself is a sinner cannot pay for others, and certainly that's true. If Jesus had sinned, then he'd have to pay for his own sins. You're not going to be able to pay for anyone else's sins.

That's why the resurrection is so wonderful, and it proclaims many things. Here's one of the proclamations that Jesus didn't sin, because if he did sin, he'd never rise. It makes other proclamations as well.

The Father is pleased with the Son's work, and so he's raised from the dead, and this is a Trinitarian resurrection. The Father raises the Son, the Spirit raises the Son, and of course, John 10, the Son, he doesn't have anybody else control him.

He lays down his life and takes it up again as he sees fit. Now these angels, speaking of angel evangelism, they show up to people, and they're going to make some announcements. They meaning, first of all, just this one angel, and it's probably Gabriel, right?

The angel of the Lord appeared to some people, and that is in chapter 2 verse 9. And again, probably Gabriel, and there's going to be more angels here in a moment. What do you think of this? Luke 2 .8, and in the same region were the priests ministering daily in the temple.

Oh, I guess that's not in the Bible. And in the same region, there were scribes refilling the ink for their parchments. Well, that's not who the angels showed up to, to evangelize, announce good news.

And in the same region, there were some Sadducees coming up with schemes to deny life after death. Okay, I made that one up. That's not who the angels appeared to. In the same region, there were some Levites who were buddies of Zechariah.

It's not there. In the same region, there were some Pharisees spying on people, making sure the Sabbath was honored. I know I'm not supposed to sit here and laugh by myself, but I'm imagining that you're in here in the studio with me.

That's what I'm imagining. Of course, this is no compromising radio, and we have to do this for certain reasons, and we just can have fun. Can we not? Can we not have fun? I see dead people. Of course.

Of course you see dead people, because that's just the way life goes. To whom do the angels show up? In the same region, there was Herod. Same region, there's a king. All right, let's read the real verse.

Angel evangelism. And in the same region, there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. Angel evangelism showing up for the shepherds. As we say on No Compromise Radio, what in the world?

I think Uncle Pat says that. Pat Abedroth says the same thing. Don't forget, you want two free tickets for the Pactom Conference. Michael Beck, D .G. Hart, Pat Abedroth, Mike Abedroth. Oh, here's a funny one.

So the first part's not funny, but I'll get to the funny part. Luke, my son, is 26. He's attending Westminster Seminary in Escondido. This is his first semester. He's loving it. And he said he loves all the classes.

He said Clark's class maybe isn't the best, but he's attending the class anyway just because Scott and I are friends. Just kidding. He said Scott's class is great. He said, I think, Dr. Clark, because now he's a student.

And he said Horton's class was really awesome. Anyway, Luke, my son, married a godly young lady named Hannah. And Hannah and Luke, I think, met at Christian surfers, became friends, and then they got married.

And I got to be there at the wedding. How about that? I was not shunned. And they got married, and they lived happily ever after. Well, they are living happily. And Hannah and Luke both love to surf. And it's kind of funny to me because Hannah's a much better surfer than Luke, and Luke is a great surfer.

So that tells you how good Hannah is. I think in the old days, maybe she got sponsored. And so Hannah's a dear young, now daughter to me, of course. And you talk about waves and surf culture and stuff like that.

And so what do you do if you are named Hannah Rose, and then now your last name has to be Abendron? I guess it could be worse. So I think her Instagram is something like Abenfroth, because there's froth of the waves and froth in the ocean.

And there's a lot of... I have a t-shirt. I think it's a welcome shirt. It says the froth of July that I wear. It's red, white, blue for 4th of July. So Hannah Abenfroth. These angels show up to shepherds.

These shepherds are watching over their flock, and they're guarding their flock. It's nighttime. And certainly they're not ruling class. Certainly they're not, as some people call them, mucky mucks. They're not leaders.

They're just regular people, a hoi polloi, the people. Actually, you know what? They're considered worse than that, because they've got to watch their flocks the whole time. So how are you going to not work on Saturday, the Sabbath, if you've got to watch your flocks, not just by night, but by day?

And therefore the Pharisees and others thought that they were super unclean because they didn't keep the Sabbath. The only people on the totem pole back in those days that were thought of less than the shepherds were lepers.

Now, shepherding wasn't always thought of poorly. And do you think of David back in 1 Samuel 16? But now, hey, these shepherds, they don't keep the Sabbath. They wander around all over, sometimes on other people's land, and they're unclean.

They're ceremonially unclean. We can't trust them. They're vagabonds. This isn't working out. These people, I mean, they don't even observe Bible laws. Come on. Ken Hughes says, according to the Mishnah, shepherds were under a ban.

They were regarded as thieves. James Boyce, they were considered unreliable and therefore were not even allowed to give testimony in the law courts. And now the angels show up to evangelize out of all people, shepherds.

How despicable these shepherds were. How could this be? Now, something fascinating is it wouldn't be farfetched to think that some of these sheep that the shepherds at night are guarding will be used for Passover slaughter one day.

Maybe in a few months, the Passover lambs are going to be slaughtered. By the way, you can ask yourself the question, so why did Jesus come to people like this? Regularly, you see in Scripture something like that's occurring later in Luke, Luke 4, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to Jesus.

He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.

This is why Jesus was born. This is why he's come. And these shepherds receive the message. That's amazing. This is just the way God works. This is how God is. This is how God made foolish the wisdom of the world, right?

The foolishness of God is wiser than men and the weakness of God is stronger than men. That's 1 Corinthians chapter 1. That's just how God does things. And of course, we are recipients of the way God does things, are we not?

1 Corinthians 1 goes on, for consider your calling, brothers. Not many of you are wise according to worldly standards. Not many were powerful. Not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish, yeah, showing up to shepherds no less, in the world to shame the wise.

God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong. God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human might boast in the presence of God.

And because of him, you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, that is, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, so that as it is written, let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.

And of course, 1 Corinthians goes on to say in chapter 2, so all this is happening, so your faith is not resting in the wisdom of men. And we look at this and we say these people are outcasts and they're just, you know, come on, isn't grace for good people?

Isn't grace for righteous people? And the answer is no and no, right? So, we say to ourselves grace is for sinners, grace is for outcasts, grace is for unrighteous people. Oh, I just should be good, therefore I'm going to receive God's blessings.

That's not the way we should think of it. And I think the Lord's sending an angel, probably Gabriel, to these shepherds, helps reinforce all this. This is how God works around the Messiah's birth. The shepherds were the ones to receive the good news from the angels and to hear about Jesus's birth and recognize ultimately that the good shepherd, the great shepherd, the chief shepherd was born in Bethlehem.

And that prophecy of Micah chapter 5 verse 2, and he shall stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord. The ultimate shepherd born in the stable is told, the news of him is first told to shepherds out in the middle of the fields.

I like that, don't you? I think that's encouraging. I think that is just the way God does something. That's the way our God works, is doing something just like this. Well, my name is Mike Abendroth, this is No Compromise Radio Ministry.

Don't forget, packed them, two tickets, all things new, Omaha, Nebraska, only have to do two things. You have to say you'll go and then go, short of some accident or something. Number two, you email me, mike at nocompromiseradio .com.

I talked about the other day and he said, people are coming all over the country for this. India even, that's not our country, some other countries. And I heard it's sweeping the nation. I think my friend, Renee, he'll be there.

I think Luke, my son will be there. I heard a bunch of people, maybe from Tri-City. Johnstead, are you going to come to this? Are you coming? I think maybe you are. Well, I've had a lot to say here on No Compromise Radio.

I want to talk a little bit more about what happens, but I don't know how far I want to get into the show because my next question is going to be when an angel shows up to these shepherds, what do they do?

How do they respond? And I think you're going to find out that it's going to be mega fear. They're going to respond with mega fear. All right. I think this is a good time to wrap up the show. My name is Mike Normal, but that's okay because we want consistency and continuity.

And you can say to yourself, oh yeah, that's what we're going to do. We are going to promote angel evangelism. I wonder what they do say when they evangelize. We'll find out next time on No Compromise Radio Ministry.