Series: Angels; Eschatology
Sun am 20 May 2012 – Kobus Swart
(Heb. 11:39-40); Ps. 8:1-9 (NIV); 1 Cor. 6:3; Heb. 1:1-9, 13-14; Gen. 18:31 to Gen. 19:1-15; (Matt. 24:37-39); 2 Peter 2:1-9; Jude 1:5-7; Gen. 6:1-6; (1 Peter 4:17)
In the Old Testament we have seen several examples where angels have materialized. In the New Testament they are described as ministering spirits. Every authentic church that has been planted by God and by His direction has an angel (Rev. 2:1,8,18). The book of Revelation is full of angelic participation in the last chapters of human history, just before the great apocalypse, the unveiling of Jesus Christ as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
You have made them (man) a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor (Ps. 8:5 – NIV).
However, Paul reminds us: Do you not know that we will judge angels? (1 Cor. 6:3). Angels will never receive the assignment of sons. For to which of the angels did He ever say, “You are My Son, Today I have begotten You”? And again, “I will be a Father to Him And He shall be a Son to Me”? And when He again brings the firstborn into the world, He says, “And let all the angels of God worship Him. ” And of the angels He says, “Who makes His angels winds, And His ministers a flame of fire. ” But of the Son He says, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever, And the righteous scepter is the scepter of His kingdom. “You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; Therefore God, Your God, has anointed You With the oil of gladness above Your companions” (Heb. 1:5-9). But to which of the angels has He ever said, “Sit at My right hand, Until I make Your enemies A footstool for Your feet”? Are they not all ministering spirits, sent out to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation? (Heb. 1:13-14). See the difference between that which God has invested in His Son, and His corporate son, compared to what He invested in angels.
It would be important for us to look into the reason why God found it necessary to wipe out humanity in Genesis 6 (the flood) and why He destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah by fire. Jesus Himself said, “As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the coming of the Son of Man” (Matt. 24:37-39). How was it in the days of Noah? They were eating and drinking; they were marrying and giving in marriage. Nothing wrong with that on the surface. What about the case of Sodom and Gomorrah?
Before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house (of Lot), both young and old, all the people from every quarter; and they called to Lot and said to him, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them (the angels) out to us that we may have relations (sexual intercourse) with them” (Gen. 19:4-5). We are trying to track the root of the very situation that brought God to the point of final judgment. Peter offers some insight into this situation. Many will follow their (the false prophets) sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep (2 Peter 2:1-3). Then Peter links the Noah situation with that of Lot. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment (2 Peter 2:4-9).
Paul warns that we should not be ignorant of Satan’s devices. Now I desire to remind you, though you know all things once for all, that the Lord, after saving a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe. And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh (different than human flesh), are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire (Jude 5-7). In this season it is evident that judgment has begun in the Church (1 Peter 4:17). Every church is going to be weighed. Let that which is wood, hay and stubble be destroyed; let only the gold, silver and precious stones remain.
Now it came about, when men began to multiply on the face of the land, and daughters were born to them, that the sons of God (Elohim) saw that the daughters of men (Adam) were beautiful; and they took wives for themselves, whomever they chose. “Sons of Elohim” in many Bibles are translated as “angels” (with the implication that they were fallen angels). Then the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; nevertheless his days shall be one hundred and twenty years. ” The Nephilim (fallen ones) were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown. Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. The Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart (Gen. 6:1-6). Then God found Noah. Noah had an intimate walk with God. His DNA was not contaminated by the Nephilim. God wanted to protect the Royal Seed Line from which the Messiah was to be born.
Satan knew exactly through which avenue to contaminate mankind. Something brought God to the point of destructive judgment. Money, sex and power are the three major forces in the world. What drove the evil men to try to break into Lot’s house? God put the sex drive in man, to be a controlled sex drive within the boundaries of marriage. It’s a creative force put there by God which Satan loves to pervert. Was this perhaps the common denominator in the days before the Flood and Sodom and Gomorrah? Let us be aware of Satan’s effort to contaminate the Divine Seed because he fears the birth of the Manchild!
Let us become a Noah company. As the Lord is calling His people out of captivity, let us not look back and turn into a pillar of salt like Lot’s wife!