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....Continued....as this is really a good read....Metmom note #3....

Telling The Difference

So the question is: how do we interpret the dramatic rescues, the healings and the help given to people who are in desperate straits?

What do we say about the accounts of ‘divine interventions’ of heavenly beings that make everything turn out just right, regardless of what people believe about Christ?

Think through the following:

1. God’s good angels are given assignments limited to the people of God. They are not sent indiscriminately to all men and women. “Are they not all ministering spirits, sent out to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation” (Hebrews 1:14). Thus, we have the function of angels defined for us in Scripture. If angels are ever sent to those who refuse to accept Christ and therefore “will not inherit salvation,” we have no account of it in Scripture.

2. God’s good angels participate in acts of judgment for the unconverted.

Yes, angels are sometimes sent to the unconverted, but only to judge them. We think immediately of the angels that visited with Abraham had the responsibility of executing judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah. Angels did help Lot escape the city, but only because he was a believer in Jehovah and therefore a “righteous man” (2 Peter 2:7).

Repeatedly, in the book of Revelation, angels are directly involved in executing the judgment of those who have not come under the protection of Christ’s sacrifice. For example, in chapter 14 a succession of angels comes announcing judgment. One warns that if anyone worships the beast “he also will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mixed in full strength in the cup of His anger; and he will be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb” (Revelation 14:10). The angel that followed announced the impending judgment and the next angel executed it.

Read carefully,...... “Then another angel, the one who has power over fire, came out from the altar; and he called with a loud voice to him who had the sharp sickle, saying ‘Put in your sharp sickle, and gather the clusters from the vine of the earth, because her grapes are ripe’” (v.18)

Then notice what this angel does........“So the angel swung his sickle to the earth and gathered the clusters from the vine of the earth, and threw them into the great wine press of the wrath of God” (v.19). Later in the book, an angel invites the birds in midheaven to eat the flesh of kings, commanders, and mighty men (19:17,18) now that God has destroyed them in judgment.

3. Evil angels have all of the essential powers of good angels. Therefore evil angels perform many similar assignments as those of good angels for their evil master, Satan. Think of the awesome “victory” (albeit temporary) Satan wins when millions of people mistake his intervention into human lives as the intervention of God and His angels!

Remember, Satan’s goal is not to create as much misery as he can on planet earth; he is willing to do some good things while keeping his eventual goals in sight. His primary objective is to spread false doctrine, to reinforce the idea that God can be approached directly without a mediator, an acceptable sacrifice and blood. He does not mind if people believe in God, in supernatural occurrences and miracles. Indeed, these serve his purpose very well.

If you are a Catholic, Satan will appear as Mary; if you are a Protestant, he will appear as Christ and if you are a Hindu, he will appear as Krishna. Now that Princess Diana has become a international icon and a religious symbol, reportedly there are sightings of her, too. Satan will take whatever form expected to keep people shielded from the Gospel of Christ. It is naive to say, as some do, that these stories must be the work of good angels because the miracles are good and beneficial. We must boldly say that “good” miracles can be done by “bad” angels.

The famous spiritist, Emanuel Swedenborg recognized the difficulty of distinguishing good angels and bad. After years of spiritism, he wrote, “When spirits begin to speak with a man, he ought to beware that he believes nothing whatever from them; for they say almost anything...they would tell so many lies, and indeed with solemn affirmation, that a man would be astonished...if a man listens and believes, they press on and deceive, and seduce in [many] ways.” Note 2

Please do not forget the great sin of our time: the belief that God can be approached without a mediator, without an acceptable sacrifice and without blood.

Only the full biblical message can combat the rampant spirituality of our times; a spirituality that is a substitute for the Gospel of Christ. The fear that Paul had for the saints in Corinth should be ours today, “But I am afraid, lest as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds should be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ” (2 Corinthians 11:3).

Millions are deceived by angels whose presence preaches “another gospel.” As Paul warns, “But even though we, or an angel in heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to that which we have preached to you, let him be accursed” (Galatians 1:8).

Let us remember that angels do not always get their theology straight!