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One of the major tasks of angels is to serve as messengers for God. This function is clearly demonstrated in the birth narratives of the Gospels, and perhaps pre-eminently in the first chapter of the Gospel of Luke. There we read:
There was in the days of Herod, the king of Judea, a certain priest named Zacharias, of the division of Abijah. His wife was of the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless. But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren, and they were both well advanced in years. And so it was, that while he was serving as priest before God in the order of his division, according to the custom of the priesthood, his lot fell to burn incense when he went into the temple of the Lord. And the whole multitude of the people was praying outside at the hour of incense. Then an angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing on the right side of the altar of incense. And when Zacharias saw him, he was troubled, and fear fell upon him.
(vv. 5-12)
Zacharias was a priest of the tribe of Levi. The Jews' central sanctuary was the temple in Jerusalem, and it was the practice that local priests from the various districts around the nation were selected by lottery to have one turn in their lifetime, if they were fortunate enough, to serve in the temple of Jerusalem. Zacharias won the lottery, the unforgettable experience of going up to Jerusalem to participate in the ministry of the temple—in this case, going in and offering prayer at the altar of incense in the Holy Place. On this occasion, when the priest would go in, he would pray for the nation, and so it would always attract a large group of people who would surround the temple and watch the priest go in and wait for him to come out. It was something like what happens during the election of a pope. Huge throngs of people gather around in St Peter's Square and watch the chimney of the
Sistine Chapel to see the smoke that comes out. If it's black, that means the vote has failed to elect a new pope; if it's white, that signifies that a new pope has been elected, and the people go wild when they see that sign. In the same way, the people in Jerusalem awaited the return of the priest, because if he came forth quickly, that meant the prayers had been offered and God had favorably heard the intercession of the priest.
However, on the day Zacharias goes in to pray, there is a delay. The cause is a radically unexpected intervention in the life of Zacharias as he is ministering in the temple. There appears to him an angel, and Scripture records that "he was troubled, and fear fell upon him."
That's noteworthy for this reason: The biblical worldview is unintelligible apart from the biblical teaching of the reality of the angelic world. But in our culture and in our time, there is skepticism about these things, because people say the perception of angels is not part of our common experience. When we look back to the Bible, we sort of "telescope" the events in the Bible and assume that angels were appearing every fifteen minutes. That's not the case, though angels did appear from time to time. We forget how many events were occurring in addition to those recorded in Scripture. The visible manifestation of one of these spirit beings was actually extraordinarily rare. Normally the angels were invisible, as was the case with Elisha and his servant, so that Elisha had to pray that his servant's eyes would be opened in order for him to see the reality that was there. When we see that this priest is devastated by fear when the angel appears, that should alert us to the rarity of that kind of experience even then. Zacharias was not accustomed to meeting and speaking with angels every day.
Luke then writes:
But the angel said to him, "Do not be afraid, Zacharias, for your prayer is heard; and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth. For he will be great in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine nor strong drink. He will also be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother's womb. And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God. He will also go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, 'to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,' and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord." And Zacharias said to the angel, "How shall I know this? For I am an old man,
and my wife is well advanced in years." And the angel answered and said to him, "I am Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God, and was sent to speak to you and bring you these glad tidings. But behold, you will be mute and not able to speak until the day these things take place, because you did not believe my words which will be fulfilled in their own time." (vv.
13-20)
The angel identifies himself as Gabriel. Only two angels in all of Scripture are identified by name—Michael, whom we looked at already, and Gabriel.
Both Michael and Gabriel are said to be emissaries sent from the immediate presence of God, and to hold the rank of archangel, a commander of the host of heaven. Notice that Gabriel's function in this setting is, first of all, to be a messenger. He delivers a message. He makes an announcement. He tells Zacharias what is going to come to pass. But not only does he bring a message, he speaks the command of God. So he's not a mere messenger boy sent to communicate some information; he comes from the presence of God with the authority of his divine Master upon him to command Zacharias to do certain things. One of the things that he commands is that this child that is to be born is to follow a certain order of behavior in his life, similar to the Nazirite experience.
Another command is that the child's name is to be John. This command is significant because, in the Jewish tradition, whoever names someone or something has authority over that thing or person. For instance, the first task that God gave to human beings in the Garden of Eden was to name the animals, showing the dominion of humans over the animal kingdom. The animals didn't name Adam; Adam named the animals. Historically, throughout biblical history, when children are born, it is the parents of the child who have the authority to name the child. But on rare circumstances, that authority is withheld from the parents, and God intervenes into the situation, indirectly saying, "This child will serve Me in a special way, and so I am reserving for Myself the right to give his name." So, the angel comes from the presence of God and says: "Look, you're not going to call your son Zacharias Jr., and you're not going to name him after Uncle Abraham. His name shall be John."
Zacharias is dazed by unbelief. He finds this message very hard to believe. So the angel says that he will be mute until the things announced by the angel take place. Months later, when the family comes together to
name this child, they're considering different names, including naming the child after his father, Zacharias (Luke 1:59). But Elizabeth declares that his name is to be John. The family is shocked, so they ask Zacharias, and he writes on a tablet, "His name is John" (Luke 1:63). He submits to the authority of the mandate that was given to him by Gabriel, and when he manifests his obedience, his ability to speak is restored.
Gabriel is sent on another mission in the first chapter of Luke's Gospel.
We read:
Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin's name was Mary. And having come in, the angel said to her, "Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women." But when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and considered what manner of greeting this was. Then the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name JESUS. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. And He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end." Then Mary said to the angel, "How can this be, since I do not know a man?"
And the angel answered and said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God. Now indeed, Elizabeth your relative has also conceived a son in her old age; and this is now the sixth month for her who was called barren. For with God nothing will be impossible." Then Mary said, "Behold the maidservant of the Lord! Let it be to me according to your word." And the angel departed from her. (vv. 26-38)
This passage is the source of a huge controversy in church history, a controversy that goes on even in our own day. In the Roman Catholic Church, there are two camps that are strongly divided theologically in terms of their understanding of the role of Mary in redemptive history. These camps are called the maximalists and the minimalists. The minimalists think that Mary has a significant role, but they want to minimize it; the maximalists think of Mary as Co-Redemptrix with Christ, and they hold to what they call the Eve/Mary parallel. In the New Testament, a parallel is drawn between the destructive impact of Adam and the redemptive impact
of Christ as the new Adam. The Eve/Mary parallel goes along the same vein: just as through one woman the world is plunged into ruin because of her disobedience, by another woman's obedience—Mary's—redemption comes into the world. So, members of this camp want to maximize her position.
It is in the context of this discussion that we find references to what is called "Mary's Fiat." When Gabriel tells Mary that the Holy Spirit will overshadow her and she will bring forth a child who will be the Son of God, her response to Gabriel is this: "Let it be to me according to your word."
She's saying, "So be it." The construction in which she responds to the angel is in the imperative, and that is where the word fiat appears; the Latin word fiat is translated as "let it be." So, the theory is that Christ could not have been born apart from this imperative of Mary. By contrast, the Protestant understanding of this text is that Mary's expression is one of emphatic acquiescence to the authority of God, whose message has come to her, and it's a sign not of her authority over Gabriel but of her willingness, in a servant's posture, to be obedient to the call that has been given to her by God.
So here we see, again, the angel functioning both as messenger and as authoritative communicator of the Word of God.
There is one last passage I want to call to your attention regarding the visitation of angels, but it is one that has been somewhat problematic and enigmatic. We find it in the fifth chapter of the book of Joshua, when Joshua is preparing his army to go against Jericho. The people of Israel have realized that Jericho is a fortress and that the soldiers of Jericho are formidable, so if Joshua and his troops are going to be victorious in the conquest of Canaan, they're going to have to get past Jericho. Just before the battle occurs, Joshua has a memorable experience: "And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, a Man stood opposite him with His sword drawn in His hand. And Joshua went to Him and said to Him, 'Are You for us or for our adversaries?'" (Josh. 5:13).
Joshua has an eye for military talent. He can see that this man looks like a formidable warrior, but he has never seen him before, and he's not sure whether he's one of his own soldiers that he has never met or if this is a ringer brought in to fight for the inhabitants of Jericho. So Joshua wants to find out whose team he is on. He goes up to the stranger and says, "Are you
for us or for our adversaries?" The answer is wonderful. The answer is, "No." He says, "No, but as Commander of the army of the LORD I have now come" (v. 14a). With that, Joshua falls on his face to the earth and worships him. And Joshua says, "'What does my Lord say to His servant?'
Then the Commander of the LORD's army said to Joshua, 'Take your sandal off your foot, for the place where you stand is holy.' And Joshua did so" (vv. 14b-15).
We have seen that Gabriel and Michael have the title of archangel, or commander of the heavenly host. But as we will see in the next chapter, angels are never to be worshiped. Yet here we see Joshua falling down and worshiping the Commander of the army of the LORD, with no subsequent rebuke from the angel. When humans do worship angels, the angels always stop them; since this angel accepts worship from Joshua, most scholars believe that what we have here is a pre-incarnation christophany—that this Commander is Christ. When He appears to Joshua and Joshua says, "Are you for us or for them?", the Commander replies: "No, I'm taking over. It's not a question of whether I am for you, but whether you are for Me."