Ministry of Angels

Isaiah 6 and the Seraphim’s Worship of God

As the handouts are going around, I wanna invite you to open up your Bibles with me to Isaiah chapter six. We have been looking now for several weeks at the subject of angels, and we are looking at the elect angels.

As I had mentioned in weeks previous, we will move from the elect angels to the fallen angels, possibly next week or the week after, depending on how far I get tonight. The problem with tonight is we have come to one of, if not my favorite, Old Testament passage.

Certainly one of my favorite Old Testament passages, and so I'm going to have to resist the temptation to stay here all night because there's a lot that I would like to say on the subject of elect angels.

And just to give you, for those who have not been with us, I wanna give you the answers. I know it's sometimes a little flabbergasting to have a sheet full of empty holes in front of you, and my problem is I'm not smart enough to make three sheets.

I just make one sheet and we use it for three or four weeks at a time. So let me give you those answers and you'll have them. The first was two weeks ago, we looked at the existence of angels. The Bible assumes their existence.

It doesn't try to prove it, it simply assumes they exist. The Bible describes their creation. They are not, and we mentioned this, they are not eternal, neither are they glorified human beings. They are created of a different order than human beings.

And the Bible is silent regarding when they were created. We do not know when angels were created, and we've talked in the past few weeks about the differing positions on that. I don't want to reiterate all of that.

The nature of angels, angels are personal beings, meaning, how do we define personality? Intellect, emotion, and will. That is how we define something that is personal rather than something that would simply be an object or thing.

It has intellect, emotion, and will, it's personal. The angels are spirit beings. They do not exist in the same way as material things exist. And we said, what was the distinction that we made? Does anybody remember the difference between the natural and the supernatural, or the visible and invisible?

That's the way the Bible describes it. It says that God created all things, or Christ, rather, in Colossians, says he created all things visible and invisible. And in that, he's referring not just to the fact, I know we can't see cells, we can't see molecules, but we can with a strong enough microscope.

We can look at the cells, we can look at those things if we have enough of amplification for our eyes, but we can't see God, no matter how big the microscope. I remember a few years ago, there was a scientist, astronaut, I believe he was a cosmonaut, I think he was Russian, but I could be wrong, and I'm willing to be corrected.

He said that he didn't believe in God because he had been to space and God wasn't there, as if getting closer to space somehow made God more visible than he is here. And so such a silly thought, but at the same time, that was his reasoning.

I went as far as I could, I looked as far as I could, and I didn't see him, so he must not be there. The Bible describes God as being outside of the realm of what we can see. That's the definition of invisible, not just too small to see or too far away to see, but actually on a different plane of existence.

He makes himself known to us, he does appear, but those appearances are rare, and certainly more rare than the health and wealth people would make you think, the people who tell you all the time that they've seen God or that he's appeared to them or whatnot.

The last thing we looked at last week is that angels are organized and ranked. That's not him, I know we're waiting on my son's phone call, that wasn't it. Angels are organized and ranked. We talked about the fact that the Bible describes archangels, Michael is described as an archangel.

We talked about the fact that in Daniel chapter 10, there are chief princes, which we believe to be describing angels, and so there are certain ranks among angels, and we don't understand how that operates completely, but the Bible describes it and so we believe it.

And where we ended last week is I said there was two types of angels that the Bible describes that we didn't get to because I didn't wanna rush this. This is where we're gonna begin tonight in Isaiah chapter six.

In Isaiah chapter six, we get a glimpse of the first of the two types of angels we're going to look at in our lesson. The first being what are known as the seraphs or the seraphim, and that word simply means the burning ones, seraph means burn, the seraphim means the burning ones, and so let us, or fiery ones, if you will.

We're gonna look at Isaiah six. In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim, each had six wings.

With two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of his glory. And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke, and I said, woe is me, for I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.

Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar, and he touched my mouth and said, behold, this has touched your lips, your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.

All right, we'll end the reading of God's word at that verse. Several years ago, I was introduced to the teaching of Dr. R .C. Sproul. By several years, I mean going on now 15 or so years. It was very early in my ministry, and I had the opportunity to go and listen to him in person at some pastors' conferences, where we literally were sitting right across from one another, getting a chance to talk.

Less than 100 ministers were invited, and I had an opportunity to go and be right there with him. We even talked about the Jaguars at one point. He was a big football fan. When he found out I was from Jacksonville, he said, I heard you had a football team, and I said, well, yeah.

By that time, Maurice Jones Drew was something, so it did give you an idea how long ago it was. But R .C. Sproul has had a tremendous influence on me. Went to the Lord not long ago, but his influence on me really reached what I would say the most powerful and most influential when I read his book, The Holiness of God.

I actually have purchased a box of those books, and when people join the church, that's one of the things I give them, is give them a copy of The Holiness of God. R .C. Sproul gives a sermon on this text that I have, in a sense, duplicated at times, but never truly replicated.

It is simply a mastery of exposition, and the way that he explains this is far better than I ever could. So I'm simply telling you this to say, if you've never read The Holiness of God, go and read it, and if you've never heard his sermon on Isaiah 6, go and find it.

It's on YouTube. It's available for free, and I would encourage you to listen to what he has to say about this text. As I said, I can't preach it quite like he did, but I am gonna point to a few things that are very important from this text.

Since we are talking about angels, this is the only place in the Bible where we see the seraphim. Now, cherubim, which we'll talk about in a moment, are seen in the garden. They're seen as being modeled over the Ark of the Covenant.

They are seen as being woven into the fabrics of ancient Israel, and in a lot of their works, was cherubim related, but seraphim find their place only in this text, and we find them to be the worshiping angels, the fiery ones.

They are the fire of God's worship. They are his holy burning angels, and they surround his throne. Uzziah had died the king, and this was a time of despondency for Israel. Their great king had died, and Isaiah is there, and he's in the temple, and he sees a vision of what I believe is the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now, we can argue that another day. I talked about that when I talked to Jesus being fully man and fully God. When we went back to John chapter, I believe it's chapter 12, says that Isaiah saw his glory.

Talked about the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, and it says he saw the Lord, and the train of his robe filled the temple. That just reflects his majesty. The longer the robe, the longer the train of the robe of a king was expressing his power in those ancient days, and so the fact that his robe filled the whole temple was just an expression of his majesty, of his sovereignty, of his authority.

This is the Lord, not a lord or a king. This is the Lord of heaven and earth, and he is surrounded by beings that have been created with one singular purpose, worship, to express his holiness over and over and over again.

There is not any other attribute of God which is given to the third degree except holiness, and you've heard me say this before, for those who've listened to me for a while, God is never called love, love, love.

He is never called mercy, mercy, mercy. He's never called justice, justice, justice, or goodness, goodness, goodness, but he is called holy, holy, holy, and that is a Hebrew expression. Anytime something is said twice, it means that it is important.

This is why when Jesus said Simon, Simon, or barely, barely, he would say it twice to express importance, but anytime something is said to the third degree, that is the Hebrew expression of the superlative, so by God being called holy, holy, holy, it is expressing the fact that this is the attribute of God which influences all the other attributes of God.

God's love is a holy love. God's mercy is a holy mercy. His justice, a holy justice. This is why we say we worship a holy God, and there is none other like him. Holy expresses his absolute uniqueness.

There is none like him. Holy means to be separated, to be distinct from, or to be other than. He is holy. There is none like him, and that's what these angels are created to do, simply to express the unique character of God and his holiness.

Now, we get a description of these angels, and I'm gonna attempt my, a little artistic flavor, and I'm gonna draw a picture. Not great, mind you. It's gonna be more like a stick figure, but I do wanna, I wanna do this because we see the angels as having six wings.

It says, with two, they covered their feet. I'm gonna try to make that look like a wing, but it's not really working. Okay, with two, they covered their face, and with two, they flew. Why did they cover themselves?

And by the way, have you ever seen a Christmas tree angel that looked like that? No, you don't see angels depicted with all these wings sticking out of every place. In fact, it's, the only time I've ever seen it was in R .C. Sproul's church.

He had stained glass behind his, it was actually in the old St. Andrews. They have a new building now, but in their old building, it was about a 12-foot circular stained glass window, and it was beautiful, and it had a seraphim around a throne, and they were, and you knew it was a seraphim because they had the six wings, and the idea is this.

God's holiness and his radical glory, when I say radical, I mean in a good way. It's an incredible glory. It's so much that they must cover their faces, but his presence is so holy that they must also cover their feet because they're standing on holy ground.

You remember when Moses was before the fiery bush, and the Lord spoke from the bush, and he said, take your sandals off because the ground upon which you stand is holy ground. So their faces, their faces are covered so as not to look upon the holiness of God.

Their feet are covered so as to not stand open-toed in the presence of the glory of God, and they have the wings which allow them to encircle the throne. It's an amazing picture of what these creatures, and they are creatures, look like and what they were created to do.

They are God's worshiping angels. Now I wanna move on to that. Again, we could go on and talk about what it means when they go and they take the torch, or they take the coal and they burn his lips. Again, listen to R .C.

He knows it much better than I do, but it's a wonderful picture of how God takes a man of unclean lips and gives an atonement for him, and it's all there. It's a very wonderful picture of what is done for us in Christ.

So there is the picture of the seraphim. Now I wanna invite you to turn to Genesis 3, and we're gonna look at the cherubim, the cherubim. Now, most of you know enough about the Bible. I don't have to give a big background to this, but just in case you understand, this is after the fall.

Man has been exiled from the garden. God has sent him out where now he will have a new life, no longer under the protection of the garden, no longer under the providence of the garden, which was giving him everything he needed for life and happiness.

Now he has been exiled, and we're gonna read verses 22 to 24. It says, then the Lord God said, behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand and take also the tree of life and eat and live forever, therefore the Lord God sent him out of the garden deep to work the ground from which he was taken.

Verse 24, that he drove out the man, and at the east of the garden of Eden, he placed the cherubim. This is the first reference to the angels in scripture. It says he placed the cherubim and a flaming sword that turned every way to guard the way to the tree of life.

Now, if seraphim were created by God to worship, cherubim were created by God to protect, to protect. You say, why do you know that? How do you know that? Everywhere we see cherubim mentioned in scripture, they are functioning in some way in a protecting fashion.

Even carved over the Ark of the Covenant, they were there in a sense as a protectors of God's holy Ark. And so the first time we see, we see an angel with a sword holding back anyone who would make his way into the garden.

There is a passage in the book of Ezekiel, which gives a little bit of a description of the cherubim. We do have to be careful, however, Ezekiel is highly apocalyptic literature, and thus it uses symbolic literature, and so we have to be a little careful as to how we, I remember, I just, I remember reading this text years ago, and I remember somebody saying, I hope angels don't look like that.

And, or no, actually what she said was, I never pictured an angel looking like that. And I said, well, you've never seen an angel. All you've ever seen is Christmas tree toppers, and you know, the things you see at the store.

You know, we don't, we don't, exactly. Yes, they don't look like the thing with the arrow. Pre-Cupid, they don't look like Cupid. Well, let's look, we'll look at the Ezekiel passage. Go to Ezekiel chapter one.

It's actually several times in Ezekiel, but we'll go to chapter one. We'll look, again, at verse four. And again, this is all, this is a picture here. How much of it is meant to be taken extremely literally, I cannot give you a certain, but I know this.

It's certainly meant for our instruction, so it's good to read, seek to understand as best we can. It says, as I looked, behold, a stormy wind came out of the north, and a great cloud of brightness surrounded it, fire flashing forth continually, and in the midst of fire, as it were gleaming, metal.

And from the midst of it came the likeness of four living creatures, and this was their appearance. They had a human likeness that each had four faces, and each of them had four wings. Their legs were straight, and the soles of their feet were like the sole of a calf's foot, and they sparkled like furnished bronze.

Under the wings, on their four sides, they had human hands, and the four had their faces and their wings thus. Their wings touched one another. Each one of them went straight forward without turning as they went.

As for the likeness of their faces, each had a human face. The four had the face of a lion on the right side, the four had the face of an ox on the left side, and the four had the face of an eagle. Such were their faces, and their wings were spread out above each creature had two wings.

Each of the wings touched the wing of another while two covered their bodies, and each went straight forward wherever the spirit would go, so they went without turning as they went. As for the likeness of the living creatures, their appearance was like burning coals of fire, like the appearance of torches moving to and fro among the living creatures, and the fire was bright, and out of the fire went forth lightning, and the living creatures darted to and fro like the appearance of a flash of lightning.

Now it goes on to talk about creating a wheel, or seeing a wheel, and these things, and I do not wanna try to get into trying to explain Ezekiel tonight, and this is quite the book. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we won't draw that.

I am gonna make a little drawing, but I only wanna say this, there's one thing in there I wanna mention, not the four faces, but again, the wings, because remember, we learned something about the seraphim by the wings, their wings, they had two for flight, two that covered their feet, two that covered their face.

Well, the cherub had four wings, you remember, you just read that, it's four, not six. With two, they had fluid, they were actually kind of like this, they kind of connected, right? So they would touch, they said their wings were touching one another, and I think that's how we get the wheel, I think the things go around.

But with two, they covered their bodies. So they had two wings that were extended, and two wings that covered their bodies. I believe, and again, you take it for what it's worth, I believe this is a picture of the fact that again, they are protecting angels, and it's an armor, a picture of armor, okay?

Because their role in the economy of God is the protection of God's holy things. You've got those who proclaim God's holiness, and those who protect God's holiness. The proclaimers have the covered faces and the covered feet, the protectors have the covered body, because they are the ones who are armored, ready for battle.

Again, highly symbolic, picturesque, and yet still, I think, reasonable as a way to understand why there's a different wing assembly, almost like you got your fighter jets, and you've got your other kind of jets, maybe I'm thinking about jets because of Cody, I don't know, but you know, you've got different purposes, right, God creates these creatures with different purposes, and so we have two different types of angels, so the imagery here being, I believe, of the cherubim.

The Ministry of Angels: Worship, Providence, Protection, and Death

All right, so that finishes last week's lesson, and we don't have much time to get into the next, but I'm gonna give you the answers here, and I'm gonna make a few comments on these things, and then we will have done what I wanted to do, and that's talk about the, because we've spent a lot of time the last few weeks talking about this, I don't wanna belabor it.

The answers to this last part, the ministry of angels. We've already talked about the seraphim and how they minister, and the cherubim, and what they minister, well, let's look at the blanks here. Number one, they worship God, we've already talked about that tonight.

We've seen that in the seraphim. All angels, though, are created as worshiping beings, as we are created as worshiping beings. We are created to worship God, that is our main purpose. What's the first catechism question?

Well, we say, which catechism, right? What is the chief end of man? To glorify God, and enjoy him forever. That's right, that's our chief end, our chief purpose, is to worship God. That's what we were created to do.

In fact, why does, well, slightly, why does evangelism exist? Because worship doesn't. We are going not to get people saved, we are going to get people to worship God, because that's what they were created to do.

Now, in the midst of that, they get saved, and that's the benefit. But the real reason why we evangelize is because God deserves to be worshiped. Evangelism exists because worship doesn't. You're not worshiping God, and you should.

That's the call. Yeah, they get saved, and that's great, but the real reason is the glory of God. If God didn't save me, he would still deserve my worship. That's right. That's a hard thing to think of today.

If God chose not to save me, he would still deserve to be worshiped by me, because he'd still be God. So, angels are created to worship. They worship God. Number two, and in the scriptures, again, good Isaiah six, Revelation four, six through 11, also talks about that, praising God.

There's several scriptures. Letter B, they minister to Christ. And again, there's several times we can, they announced his birth. They protected him as a child. They strengthened him as a man. They explained to other men his resurrection.

The angels were all through that. I could give you several scriptures, but for sake of time, we'll just, you understand these things yourself. This next one might take a minute. They carry out God's government.

You say, wait a minute, what do you mean? Angels are part of the providential work of God. Do we understand? I think we do. We call ourselves sovereign grace. We understand God is sovereign, which means that God is absolutely in charge of everything in the world.

Start to stop, beginning to end, God answers to no one. And he is the one who is the cause of all things in the sense that he's the first cause of all things. Nothing would be without him. And we can talk about secondary causation.

We can talk about means and ends, and we will talk about that at some point, but the point and purpose of what I'm saying is God is sovereign. Yet, God does use people to accomplish his will. We know this, that's why we're called the evangelist.

If God was simply going to enact his will without our participation, we would have no command to go and do. But we have the command to go and do, which means God places us in those positions to fulfill his will in whatever way that he sees fit.

You've heard people talk about divine appointments. You know, I ran into this one, or I did this, or this happened, this person was in my life at this time, and it just happened to be a divine appointment.

We talk about that. That's God's providential leading in people's lives to get accomplished what he means to get accomplished. God's will will be done in that sense. So God uses men to accomplish his purposes, yes.

God also uses angels to accomplish his purposes. Let's look at a scripture, Psalm 103. Just if you want to, there's many, many scriptures, but just for the sake of giving you at least something to consider.

It says in Psalm 103, verse 20, bless the Lord, O you his angels, you mighty ones who do his word, obeying the voice of his word. Notice it says they do his word. Now, why does God have them do anything?

Because he's working out his providence through them. He's calling about their, he's calling about the things he wants done through them. Read the book of Revelation. See how many times God uses angels in the apocalypse, in the bringing about of the end of all things.

You know what I'm talking about. Even in the midst of, remember John sees the angel falls down, don't worship me, because I'm not God, but I'm here, I have purpose. Hebrews one and verse seven says of the angels, you don't have to go there, it just says of the angels, he makes his angels winds and a minister, and his minister is a flame of fire.

They can call them his ministers. What does the word minister mean? A servant, yeah, it is a servant. A servant, it's the root of that word that we use administrate, or administer, right? The minister is the root of that word.

The idea is the functioning go between, the person who's doing it. If I hire an administrator to work my business, I'm putting them in charge of certain things in my business to see to it that those things get done, right?

And that's what we call that person administrator. But the root of that, the idea behind that is a minister. That's, you know, people often call me. You're the minister of the church. That's because the job is ministry.

It's administrating God's purpose and plan in the will of the church, right? Or his will for the church. But yet at the same time, we're all called ministers, right? In fact, what is the purpose of the pastor and the elders according to Ephesians?

Equip the saints for the work of ministry. The job of the pastor is not to minister, but to equip the saints to minister to one another, right? Our job is to teach you how to do that to each other, right?

To become ministers of one another. Well, angels are ministers. They're administrating God's will on the earth. God is sovereign. His providential control is over all things. And yet, he uses means. He uses people.

He uses angels. He uses whatever he sees fit to use to bring about his will. All right, letter D. They protect God's people. They protect God's people. If you're in Hebrews, I mentioned Hebrews 1 earlier.

Hebrews 1 mentions a lot about angels, but this is what it says in verse 14. It talks about the ministering spirits, we just use that phrase, sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation.

They are to serve those who are to inherit salvation. Now, I wanna talk about some, again, I got a few extra minutes. You gotta give me a few extra minutes, right? Don't leave. There's a big question mark over one thing that some people are really firm on this, some people are not so firm.

I tend to be in the not so firm category, but it's the concept of what's known as the guardian angel, meaning every believer is assigned his own particular angel for the purpose of watching over that individual.

You've all heard of this. I mean, you've all seen this fantasized in film, and you remember the show Highway to Heaven? With Michael Landon and Little Joe. When he grew up, he became an angel, and his job was to go from town to town in the back of a big car, and he would go along and he would help people out.

Later on, they fantasized that a little further with Touched by an Angel, that was sort of the same idea. There were these people who were responsible to minister, and those shows were not highly theological, neither were they really accurate theologically, but the point being, there are some passages that seem to live to the idea that as believers, we have a certain providence of God that is worked out through angels.

I want to just show you a passage that just sort of comes to me on this.

It's Matthew chapter 18 and verse 10.

Matthew 18 and verse 10. See that you do not despise one of these little ones. Now, I have to stop because immediately, we hear little ones, and we think children, and yes, the context here could be children.

It could also be believers, though. Just keep that in mind that this can be referring to believers, so we'll talk about that another time. The point is, he goes on to say, for I tell you that in heaven, there are angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven.

Notice he refers to them as their angels. T-H-E-I-R in English is, we know there are different ways of saying their. T-H-E-I-R in English means the possessive form of their, meaning that angel is theirs.

It belongs to them, and so this passage makes people question whether or not this angel is referring to special angels given care over children, because it says little ones, or special angels given care over believers.

I tend to fall into the second category that it would be referring to believers, but then you have to come to the next thing. Well, does that mean that I believe that every believer has a guardian angel?

I think it's possible. I think the passage is certainly possible, but again, I'm not willing to die on that hill. I do know this. It's a nice thought to believe that God would so concern himself with my life that we would have angels watching us.

Yes, sir?

Would that mean that nonbelievers do not have a guardian?

I would, yeah, I would think so. If I'm interpreting correct, like I said, if this little ones here is referring to believers, then I would say yes, but if it's referring to children, again, we'd have to spend a little more time digging into it to see where we might land on that, and we may land on a different understanding, and that's okay, because this is certainly not a salvation issue.

It's just an issue of how we would understand this particular text, but if it is referring to believers, then I would say yeah, then I would say unbelievers would not necessarily have appointed watchers, and I'll give you my answer, a forwarding answer as to why I think that.

I want to end here. Go to Luke 16. Go to Luke 16. We'll end here, because this is actually where we're going anyway. You led me right where I was gonna go. Letter E on your sheet, they assist believers at death.

They assist believers at death. In Luke chapter 16, we read the narrative of the rich man and Lazarus. I say the narrative because some people believe this is a parable. I don't. I think this is a narrative.

I think Jesus is telling a story of something that happened. However, again, there are those who say it's a parable, and I'm not gonna argue that tonight. The point is there is no other parable in all of scripture where proper names are used.

He is called Lazarus. He is given a name. Nowhere else. The good Samaritan didn't have a name. The good steward didn't have a name. The men with the talents didn't have a name, but we're given a proper name here, and I think there's something to that.

But this is what it says. It says, there was a rich man who was clothed in purple and fine linen and who feasted sumptuously every day, and at his gate was laid a poor man named Lazarus, covered with sores who desired to be fed with what fell from the rich man's table.

Moreover, even the dogs came and licked his sores. The poor man died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and was buried and in hell, or Hades, being in torment. He lifted up his eyes, saw Abraham far off, and Lazarus at his side.

I don't have time to go through the rest of the text and explain everything, but for now, let's just stick with what we've just read. When the believer died, he had an angelic escort into the presence of Abraham.

It's clear. He died and was carried by the angels. That's why I said in your sheet here there, assist believers in death. I believe that when I die, it's gonna be the most comfortable thing that ever happens to me after it's over.

Now, before it's over, I don't know what I'm gonna go through. I could get a disease, I could be in a car wreck. I don't know what's gonna happen, but at the moment, lights out on this side, it's going to be comfort on the other side because God has established comfort as our passage.

But for the unbeliever, as you asked, this is going there. The unbeliever, it says, he closed his eyes and he opened his eyes in hell. No angelic escort. Some of you have seen the old movie Ghost with Patrick Swayze where the demons come out of the ground and they're pulling down, not bad either.

They don't get any demons either. It's just close your eyes here, open them in hell. And that's it. What a tremendous and fearful reality that there will be not a moment of rest except between the death of the damned and his condemnation forever.

No angelic escort, no moment to rethink what's happened. Open his eyes in hell. So I would, again, blend to the idea that there wouldn't be angels for unbelievers. So we've looked at a lot over the last few weeks.

I know you probably have many questions. I know I have many questions. But that, this is gonna conclude the portion of the elect angels. Next week, we're gonna look at the fallen angels. There are two categories of fallen angels.

There are the demons and then there is Satan. So we'll have at least a couple of weeks on that subject. Doug, did you have a question, sir? Yeah. Absolutely. And there's another example of them protecting his people.

God has such an amazing way of protecting his people, whether it's individual as guardian angel, as we, again, we sort of fantasize that or romanticize that, or it's allegiance. I don't know. I pray and thank God that I know that he has me in whatever way he has.