"If I got rid of my demons, I'd lose my angels."--Playwright Tennessee Williams
Working in a retail store, I've seen people's skin all summer long and it's truly mind-boggling the number of tattoos out there on the general populace's bodies. Among the most popular themes I've seen is angels, usually with their wings spread. There are countless depictions, of course, as you would imagine.
Here's a study on angels:
"Almost 250 times angels are talked about in the Bible. The word 'angel' means a messenger from God. They're not weird; they're just creatures, they're just individuals," explains Richard Jordan.
Hebrews 12:22: [22] But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,
"Angels are innumerable. Over and over and over, numerous scriptures talk about this fact. It's absolutely impossible for us to comprehend how many angels there are. That doesn't mean it isn't possible to count them, but it's sort of like the statement about the hairs on your head. Well, God knows the number of them but are you going to worry about counting all of them?
"Angels are of far greater intelligence than humans. For one thing, they've lived over 6,000 years; they've had a lot more experiences than you and I. Their intellectual capacity far exceeds ours and yet the humblest, simplest Believer teaches angels. We have the ability to teach them. To me that's fascinating.
"By the grace of God they can sit at our feet and learn. That's something! We've got some things to teach them. We have an impact on them even though we don't see them and have no contact with them. We have an impact by just being who God's made us in Christ. You realize you do something for them?
II Peter 2:11: 11] Whereas angels, which are greater in power and might, bring not railing accusation against them before the Lord.
"They're exceeding strong and exceeding powerful. David, who actually had some communion and contact with them in his day and in his program, writes in Psalm 103:
[19] The LORD hath prepared his throne in the heavens; and his kingdom ruleth over all.
[20] Bless the LORD, ye his angels, that excel in strength, that do his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word.
[21] Bless ye the LORD, all ye his hosts; ye ministers of his, that do his pleasure.
"If you think of what strength and might would be in its sum, angels go beyond that. They're just massive beyond our ability to comprehend."
*****
When it comes to fallen angels, the creatures that come out of the bottomless pit (Revelation 9) are in various stages of decomposition as part of their devolutionary development.
“Part of what Revelation 9 tells us about this degenerated condition of the fallen angels is ‘the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared unto battle; and on their heads were as it were crowns like gold, and their faces were as the faces of men,’ " explains Jordan.
“We’re told they’ve got the faces of a man, the hair of a woman and the teeth of a lion. I mean, these are some messed up dudes! They look like they’re in a scorpion shape but a scorpion looks like a horse. It’s a composite beast.
“They’re a combination of a horse, a man, a woman, a lion and a scorpion all combined into one creature! Now, that is a deformed, degenerated looking kind of thing! That’s the same thing we were looking at back in Isaiah with the dragons and satyrs.
“These creatures are in the bottomless pit suffering the ultimate consequences of sin. Just as unsaved humans literally go back to the form of a worm—degenerating back into the lowest form of life—it’s as if these creatures in the spirit world are back in that same kind of devolving state.
“Notice these creatures take on the appearance of beasts. These are not lovely, sweet, wonderful kind of characters that you want your daughter to bring home to meet dad, or your sons to bring home to eat turkey dinner with your mother. These are not appealing kind of creatures.”
*****
In the Book of Job, the oldest written book in the Bible, God talks to Job about this same future detailed in the Book of Revelation. There are some fascinating details in Job 38-42 about how God, from the outset—I mean, this is first book written—lays out how He’s going to take care of this character in the end.
“Job 40:15-18: ‘Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox. Lo now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly. He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together. His bones are as strong pieces of brass; his bones are like bars of iron.’
“You ever seen an ox with a tail that can move things like that? It says the tail’s going around like a cedar. That’s like if you took a telephone pole and had a tail—he just knocks everything down.
“You ever seen an ox tail; it’s a little-bitty twisted up thing. So this is a funny-looking ox. ‘Behemoth’ is an untranslated word. It says, ‘the sinews of his stones are wrapped together.’ The guy’s a supernatural creature!
*****
“The passage says, ‘He is the chief of the ways of God: he that made him can make his sword to approach unto him. Surely the mountains bring him forth food, where all the beasts of the field play. He lieth under the shady trees, in the covert of the reed, and fens. The shady trees cover him with their shadow; the willows of the brook compass him about. Behold, he drinketh up a river, and hasteth not: he trusteth that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth. He taketh it with his eyes: his nose pierceth through snares.’
“From Job 41, which says, ‘Canst thou draw out leviathan with an hook?’ you find out leviathan’s a seven-headed dragon. A behemoth is a beast made up of a lot of other beasts and that’s the Antichrist.
“If you turn to Revelation 13:1 you’ll see there’s a bear, a lion and a leopard. He looks like a leopard, but he’s got the feet of a bear and the mouth of a lion, and this dragon gives him his power. So the Antichrist is presented as a composite of a leopard, a bear, and a lion.
“In Job 40 (with the behemoth) we’re talking about the Antichrist, and then when you get to 41 we’re talking about the dragon, leviathan, and that’s Satan.
“Now, if you go down to Job 41:9, as he describes Satan through here and asks Job questions about what Satan’s doing, he says, ‘Behold, the hope of him is in vain: shall not one be cast down even at the sight of him? None is so fierce that dare stir him up: who then is able to stand before me?’
“That’s saying if Satan stood here tonight in front of us, and you could see into the spirit world and literally see him, it would scare you so bad you’d pass out from the fright.
*****
“Among the prophetic visions laid out in Daniel 7, Daniel has a dream in which he sees a leopard, a lion and a bear in one. Daniel looks out there into the future and he’s now looking at the ‘end time.’
“Daniel says, “After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it: and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns.
[8] I considered the horns, and, behold, there came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots: and, behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things.’
“That little horn turns out to be the Antichrist so these four beasts represent kingdoms in the earth. You’ve got three—the leopard, the lion and the bear—and then you’ve got one you can’t even describe it’s so bad-looking. And that’s the one the Antichrist comes from."
(new article tomorrow)
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