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GALACTIC NEWS FROM THREE ANGELS #2
TWO ANGELS NAMED LONNIE AND KEN
Yesterday, as we began to explore together a fascinating
Bible passage in Revelation, the “Three Angels” image in chapter 14, I
made the suggestion that some of you tuning in . . . might actually BE
angels. Now, we record five programs at a time here, so I don’t have any
way of knowing yet what kind of e-mail volume that suggestion might already
be bringing in. But I’m going to say the same thing here on Tuesday: some
of you listening — yes, I mean you — are angels.
Now, before you begin pinching your own arms and legs to see, or looking
for your birth certificate, let me share a marvelous story about angels
. . . and then let’s go right to the Word of God, which is always our
protection when radio preachers come up with, shall we say, “colorful”
things.
A few years ago, an ambitious young Christian woman determined that she
was going to make it in Hollywood — for the purpose of getting enough
clout that someday she would be able to tell God-oriented stories, on
television, her own way. So she paid her dues; she delivered coffee; she
did the producer’s laundry; she drove scripts around town and counted
paper clips. And bit by bit, she got to the point where, yes, she could
pretty much get a TV program made.
This story, by the way, is from the recent bestseller, How Now Shall We
Live?, by Charles Colson and Nancy Pearcey. The young lady’s name: Martha
Williamson. Which, if you’ve been watching CBS in recent years, you recognize;
she’s the top producer, and often the scriptwriter, for the Sunday night
megahit: Touched By an Angel.
But here’s the inside story. CBS had actually set her up to do the very
thing she had always dreamed about: a program about angels. Angel’s Attic,
it was called. The only problem was: the program was terrible. The script
was bad. It featured unbiblical concepts: the angels argued with God,
and didn’t want to do what He told them to do. They fought and bickered
among themselves. It was kind of a “cop show with wings.” So . . . Martha
said no. On principle, she wouldn’t do it. She had another writing offer
from another network, and was going to pursue that.
But . . . somehow a still small voice told her to go back to CBS. Take
a second look. Unfortunately, the job that was formerly hers for the asking
— now she’d have to interview for it. She might not get it, plus she could
lose the new offer from the rival network. Martha’s agent, needless to
say, was not pleased.
Well, she went into the meeting and faced the big brass at CBS. They still
wanted her; that was the good news. But the show was still a turkey, and
she began to tell them straight out WHY it was a turkey.
“First of all,” she told them, “angels don’t disagree with God. They don’t
argue with God. They’re His messengers; they love to obey Him; they instantly
obey Him.”
“But . . . but . . . that’s not very dramatic,” they protested. “We need
conflict and snappy dialogue, not obedience.”
“Can’t do it,” she said.
“How come?”
And she leveled them with this. “Because the Bible says this is the way
it is. This is truth. Angels obey.”
Incredibly, the big shots at CBS blinked, and said okay. Issue number
two, Martha said, was that the program suggested that when people died
and went to heaven, they became angels. “What’s wrong with that?” the
“suits” wanted to know.
And she gave them the same answer. “It’s wrong because the Bible says
so. Angels were created by God back at the beginning of time; people on
earth don’t turn into angels. They just don’t. The Bible says so; case
closed.”
Oh. And there was a long pause. Finally, after dotting some I’s and crossing
some T’s, CBS let her do Touched By an Angel her way. And the rest, as
we say, is history. Millions of viewers around the world tune in every
week to watch these three obedient angels — Monica, Tess, and Andrew —
tell people how much God loves them, and that He has a plan for their
lives.
Well, what does this have to do with Revelation chapter 14? And what does
it do with the rather bold statement I made yesterday and again today
— flatly contradicted by Martha Williamson, by the way — that you might
be an angel?
Several things, actually. First of all, friend, you and I are not angels.
I admit that. My wife comes close; I admit that as well. But we are all
human beings on this sorry old earth; God made us as sons and daughters
of Adam, and He created His holy angels up in heaven, and never the twain
shall switch sides. When you die, you don’t turn into an angel; that simply
is not taught on a single page of Martha Williamson’s Bible or yours either.
Having said that, let me take you again to the first verse in this thrilling
but mysterious prophetic Bible passage right in the heart of Revelation.
Listen again:
“And I saw another angel” — the first of three — “flying
in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach to them
that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue,
and people.”
Yesterday I suggested that two great pillars of eternal
truth come piercing through the mystery of Revelation’s beasts and metaphors.
First of all, this is the everlasting gospel the angel is proclaiming.
The “eternal” gospel, says the NIV. It’s for every people group, every
language group, every tribal group, every demographic group on the face
of Planet Earth. And it’s for these last days, which means you and me
right here in the 21st century. This angel is talking to us.
But right here is the point that really makes me excited. Because I don’t
believe, friend, that God is really going to send one solitary angel,
or even three of them, to fly through the sky and preach this eternal
gospel to a lost and dying world. That’s not what’s being taught here.
This great job, this commission, isn’t going to be given to three angels,
whether they’re named Tess, Monica, and Andrew, or Gabriel, or any other
cherubic name. I believe that people just like us — preachers, non-preachers,
old people, young people, missionaries, and backyard-barbecue witnessers
— are the people who are going to tell the world this everlasting gospel.
In one commentary we read through for Revelation 14, the writers make
this very point. Notice:
“The angel represents God’s saints engaged in the task
of proclaiming the everlasting gospel. . . . It is, of course, true that
literal angels assist men [and women] in the task of proclaiming the gospel,
but this is not the predominant idea here.”
So here are three angels pictured in Revelation. And
they have an everlasting gospel message, a never-changing, always-true,
eternally-the-same message to share. It’s two words long: JESUS SAVES!
But despite the metaphor of an angel, or three of them, doing this job,
it’s not really them who do it. It’s US! And I can prove it!
Two verses, both of them in the Gospel of Matthew, nail this down. The
first one, spoken by Jesus, is in chapter 24, verse 14. The great promise
for the end time:
“And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in
the whole world as a testimony [or witness] to all nations, and then the
end will come.”
Well, that’s a great promise, but it doesn’t say who
should do the job. Jesus was talking to His disciples, but He doesn’t
spell out that it’s their assignment. But go over just four chapters to
the final words of Matthew, chapter 28, verses 18-20, and this is too
clear to be missed. Jesus again, to His followers:
“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given
to Me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them
in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching
them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you
always, to the very end of the age.”
“Even unto the end of the world” says the King James.
And there you have it. Friend, if you’re a Christian — in fact, if you’ve
only been a Christian for the last 24 hours or 24 minutes — then you are
an angel. Your little voice is part of this great first angel’s message
in Revelation 14. And so is mine.
I’d like to think that this radio ministry, 70 years strong now, is part
of that first angel — telling a listening world, “Jesus saves.” You know,
especially at Christmastime, there’s one week of our programs that literally
is uplinked via satellite and the network of Adventist World Radio . .
. and it truly does hit the entire planet. That is unbelievable! And it’s
part of that Revelation angel’s message.
Have you noticed lately, sometimes, that when you log onto the internet
and maybe use something like CompuServe or AOL, the home page will have
a Christian theme right up front? You can click on a banner, and here
is dialogue about some spiritual issue, a verse-of-the-day, a place to
register your feelings on a certain belief in the faith. People writing
about Jesus Christ and His claim on our lives. I’ve seen that a number
of times, and just get hit by goosebumps. Because that message, “Jesus
saves,” hitting the whole planet over the Information Superhighway, is
a fulfillment of Revelation 14 that Pastor H. M. S. Richards, Senior,
could never have envisioned.
So this angel, flying in the midst of heaven, is actually — when you get
right down to it — YOU. And me. Beginning tomorrow, we need to get our
heads together and discuss what it all means.
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