One important part of Jesus’s birth narrative is the presence of angels. The angel Gabriel appeared to the Virgin Mary, announcing that she would bear a son. And then, on the night Jesus was born, a whole host of angels appeared to the shepherds.
Angels are mysterious creatures to us. In the New Covenant, we do not see them and we do not communicate with them. But they are mentioned all over the Bible, and so we affirm their existence. We know that they play a role in history, as servants of God, either helping humans or administering judgment on them.
Angels are heavenly, spiritual beings. They were created on Day 1 of Creation Week, as part of the completed throne-room heaven (Genesis 1:1, Job 38:6-7). The number of them is a fixed number; they do not reproduce and we have no evidence that God keeps making new ones. Neither do we see angels dying or ceasing to exist; they are immortal beings who live forever.
Apparently, God created the angels with some degree of free-will, having the ability to obey God or disobey. We know this because one of the angels fell from God’s grace in Genesis 3. He appeared to Adam and Eve in the form of a serpent, and he sought their destruction. He was cursed by God from that time forward, and we know him as Satan or the devil. Some of the angels chose to follow Satan, becoming fallen angels, and we refer to them as demons or evil, unclean spirits. But the rest of the angels stayed faithful. They chose to submit to God, not to rebel. It’s these good and righteous ones that we still refer to as “angels.”
There are different kinds of angels mentioned in scripture, in particular the cherubim and the seraphim. When Adam and Eve were exiled from the garden of Eden, cherubim were placed at the entrance – with a flaming sword – to prevent them from returning (Genesis 3:24). When Isaiah had a vision of heaven, he saw seraphim flying about singing, “Holy, holy, holy” to the Lord (Isaiah 6:2-3). From these examples, we see that angels sing praises to God in heaven and they do his will in the earth.
But the word “angel,” in both Hebrew and Greek (malak and aggelos), simply means “messenger.” Angels are messengers of God, and this term is used for the heavenly, spiritual beings as well as human beings. Many times in the OT, humans are referred to as “messengers” (that’s what you’ll read in your English Bibles), but in the Hebrew, it is the same word for angels. So we have spirit-angels and human-angels.
This usage continues into the NT, with the first human-angel being John the Baptizer. When it says he was the “messenger” to prepare the way, in Greek, it’s the same word for angel (Matt. 11:10, Mark 1:2). In the book of Revelation, letters are sent to the “angels” of 7 churches in Asia Minor. These would have been human-angels, most likely the pastors and elders of the churches. Likewise in 1 Corinthians 11, whenever a woman spoke in tongues or prophesied she was supposed to wear a headcovering. Why? “Because of the angels” Paul says, a reference to the pastors and the elders.
There’s another usage of “angel” in the Bible, one that we could call a divine-angel. One of the key figures of the OT is a character named “the Angel of the LORD” (or The Angel of YHWH in Hebrew). He’s first mentioned in Genesis 16, appearing to Hagar in the wilderness. The Angel said to her, “I will multiply your descendants,” which is something God usually says. Only God would have that power, not a created spirit-angel. Hagar’s response was to call him “The God Who Sees.” The Angel of YHWH appeared to Moses in the burning bush, and when He spoke He said, “I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob” (Exodus 3:2-6). After He appeared to Samson’s parents, in Judges 13, they said “We shall surely die, because we have seen God.”
There are many other examples we could point to, but the common belief is that The Angel of YHWH was none other than the divine Son of God, the pre-incarnate Jesus. This doesn’t mean that Jesus is a created angel, by no means. But Jesus is the Word of God, and as the Word, Jesus is the chief messenger of God. He is the Chief “Angel” over all other angels. For this reason, some theorize that Michael the Archangel was none other than Jesus. Michael being Jesus’s pre-incarnate name; the name of The Angel of YHWH (Jude 1:9, Zechariah 3:1-2).
So all over the Bible, we have angels, angels, and more angels. Human angels, spirit angels, and a divine angel. This is significant to the Christmas story because spirit-angels play a prominent role. Gabriel appeared to Mary at the Annunciation (Luke 1:26-27). An angel appeared to Joseph at a later time (Matthew 1:20). The angels appeared to the shepherds, singing praises to God and telling them where to find the Child (Luke 2:13). An angel appeared to Joseph in dreams, telling him to escape to Egypt and later when to return (Matthew 2:13, 19). In each case, what were the angels doing? They were being messengers. They were relaying revelation from God that was useful and helpful to God’s people.
Consider the angels’ perspectives as these things took place. These angels were angels who knew Satan before his fall. They knew the demons before they fell. These angels had an opportunity to rebel against God and become our enemies, but they refused. These angels were faithful; they loved God and they chose to keep following Him. And if you think about it, they cared about us. They cared about mankind. They weren’t seeking our destruction, they were seeking our salvation. That should give us great gratitude for the angels. We should understand that the birth of Jesus was a big moment for them, because it was a moment they had been waiting for since the beginning – not just for their own benefit, but for ours.
And who exactly was this Child who was born? To the angels, it was their chief leader. It was the messenger above all messengers. They knew Him as their Lord and their Creator; they knew Him as a fellow servant of God. And they knew what his birth meant: It meant that The Angel of YHWH had become man. God Himself became man in order to overthrow the kingdom of Satan, in order to set man free from the bondage of sin. The Child was their hometown Hero come to earth, and He should be your hero, as well.
As a Christian, you yourself are a messenger of God. You are a human-angel in whatever sphere of authority God has given you. You must look to the examples of humans like John and of spirits like Gabriel. Speak the words of God, encouraging one another and saving the lost. Spread the news of the incarnation and the virgin birth. See it as the angels saw it and join your voice with theirs, singing “Holy, holy, holy” and “Glory be to God on high.”
But of all the angels you should emulate, the greatest of all is the divine-angel who became man. Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God – the second person of the Trinity – took on human flesh to suffer and die for your salvation. He has reconciled you to the Father and given you the Holy Spirit. So resist the temptations of the devil, and continue to follow the most perfect angel – Jesus Christ – who is true God and true man.
Adam McIntosh is pastor of Saint David’s Church in Tomball, TX.