Angels as Ministers
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What is the significance of angels in Christianity?
Let him see. Not let him see a hallucination. Not let him see a vision of what's not real. Let him see what's really out there. And when he opened his eyes, the assembled host of angels was vastly superior in number and power to all of those chariots and armies of the king of Syria. And that's what God tells us is the world in which we live.
Do you believe in angels? Do you believe in demons? Just because we may not be able to see something with our naked eye doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. After all, God Himself is invisible. It's good to have you with us for this Saturday edition of Renewing Your Mind as we start a two-message study on angels. Although there is some fascination out there concerning the existence of angels or supernatural creatures, there is widespread skepticism when it comes to believing in the existence of anything beyond this visible and material world. Today we'll begin R.C. Sproul's series titled Angels and Demons. You can own this series when you give a donation at renewingyourmind.org before midnight tonight.
We'll send you the DVD and we'll unlock the messages and the study guide in the free Ligonier app. Well, let's see what the Bible has to say about angels. Here's Dr. Sproul.
One of my favorite angel narratives in all of Scripture is one found in the second book of Kings. And I enjoy this particular narrative because it reveals directly and indirectly so many things that we need to understand about the nature and function of angels. So let's take a few moments to look at this narrative that takes place during the life of the prophet Elisha in 2 Kings, beginning in verse 8. Here's the text. 2 Kings chapter 6, beginning at verse 8. Now the king of Syria was making war against Israel, and he consulted with his servants, saying, My camp will be in such and such a place. And the man of God sent to the king of Israel, saying, Beware that you do not pass this place, for the Syrians are coming down there.
So the king of Israel sent someone to the place of which the man of God had told him, and thus he warned him, and he was watchful there not just once or twice." Now you see here what the king of Syria is trying to do is to plan an ambush against the king of Israel, but somehow all of the secret plans that the king of Syria is making are told to the king of Israel so that he avoids the trap. So we read in verse 11, Therefore the heart of the king of Syria was greatly troubled by this thing. And he called his servants and said to them, Will you not show me which of us is for the king of Israel? He automatically assumes that he has a spy. in the camp. And so he inquires of that. And one of the servants said, None, my lord, O king, but Elisha the prophet who is in Israel tells the king of Israel the words that you speak in your bedroom.
And so he said, Go and see where he is that I may send and get him. And it was told him, saying, Surely he is in Dothan. So you get the picture. King Assyria finds out that it's not one of his men that's betraying him, but supernaturally his plans are being communicated by the prophet Elisha to the king of Israel, and so now the king of Syria changes his plan. If I'm ever going to be effective in capturing the king of Israel, first thing I've got to do is get rid of this Elisha. So he inquires as to where Elisha is staying, and he's told that Elisha is in Dothan, so he sets about to execute his plan to capture Elisha. So we read in verse 14, "...therefore he sent horses and chariots and a great army there, and they came by night and surrounded the city."
And when the servant of the man of God rose early and went out, there was an army surrounding the city with the horses and chariots. And his servant said to him, Alas, my master, what shall we do? Here Elisha goes to sleep in this little place in Dothan. His servant gets up first in the morning and goes to open the blinds and the curtains to let the light in. He looks out one side of the room, sees all these chariots and soldiers of the Assyrians. He goes the other side of the house, sees nothing but chariots, and he goes to the front and goes to the back.
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