Tuesday, September 29, 2020
Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel and Raphael, Archangels
Eating with angels
Thou preparest a table for me in the presence of mine enemies.
Seems only right to use King James’ native tongue to speak of feasting with saints, especially saints who are angels.
Thrones were set up.
The Ancient One sat in flames of fire
A surging stream of fire flowed out from where he sat
Thousands were ministering to him.
Court was convened, and the books were opened.
The Son of Man arrives on clouds and receives his just acclaim.
His dominion and glory shall not be destroyed and last forever.
Daniel saw the visions, accompanied himself by angels. The missions given to angels by the Ancient One (and they always accept those missions) include protecting suicidal souls at Christmas (see Clarence on the bridge with Jimmy Stewart), fighting with the killer angels powered by fervent prayer (see This Present Darkness by Frank Peretti), standing quietly in fire over men that fire was meant to kill, and guiding me and all of us away from the jaws of danger and death time after time after time.
So much is happening just underneath what I can see.
War broke out in heaven
Michael and his angels battled against the dragon
The dragon and its angels fought back
But they did not prevail.
Remember, this is a week to ponder the condition of Job and make it personal. Job (the name means “Where is God?), then Jesus, and then me? Not blood kin, but a genealogy of story and significance. Wasn’t Job defeated when his family was hollowed out by unexpected death and disaster? Wasn’t Jesus busted in Gethsemane? Haven’t I been shattered by the ugliness of my sin and the earth’s endless indifference?
No!
Jesus spoke of himself, but not only of himself.
You will see heaven opened
And see the angels of God
Ascending and descending
On the Son of Man.
I think always, in my musings on angels, the moment Margaret remembers on the road home, north from Mt. Pulaski, a snowy icy night on mid-December, choir practice before the Nativity, she was alone. The car spun out three times around on the ice and she screamed (what she still screams), “O Jesus!”
In the presence of the angels I will sing your praise.
When I called, you answered me.
Forty years later, here she is, unharmed. She thought she was going heaven right then, but the car regained its balance. So many explanations, so little need for them. It was Gabriel, it was Michael, it was all the saints that carried her from the church on the hill named for the wartime Count, Pulaski.
Now have salvation and power come
And the Kingdom of our God
And the authority of his Anointed.
Therefore rejoice oh you heavens
And all you who dwell in them.
Always, until our beginning becomes our end, until heaven has arrived on earth, angels will save us from ourselves, because God’s instructions send them.
(Daniel 7, Revelation 12, Psalm 138, Psalm 103, John 1)
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