4th Sunday of Advent: 

"Angels - Love and the 2nd Coming"

Jean has an 'angel' room. No it isn't whatever room she finds me in...(that was supposed to be funny). The family room in our house is her 'angel room.' She has a shelf that is twenty feet long, and located more than eight feet off of the floor that is filled with angel statues, angel tree-toppers, angel candleholders, angel pictures, angel plates, angel cups...porcelain, stained glass, ceramic, fabric, wood, crystal, resin, all sorts of materials, colors, textures and sizes.

While the collection has been gathered for Jean, I get a great deal of pleasure glancing up at the various 'angels,' one of which is gold colored and blowing a long heralding-trumpet. That, to me, is the epitome of an angel...announcing the movements and actions of the Eternal and Holy God, Ruler of the Universe.

In Matthew chapter 1, an angel appears to Joseph. In Luke chapter 1 an angel, Gabriel, appears to Zechariah and about six months later appears to Mary. In Luke chapter 2 an angel, then an army of angels, appear to shepherds out in a field nearby the stable where Jesus was born.

Then in Matthew chapter 28 an angel rolled the stone away from the tomb and then sat on the stone awaiting the arrival of the two Mary's. Mark chapter 16, Luke chapter 24, and John chapter 20 all relate the same story, except Luke and John tell of two angels at the tomb.

But perhaps the most poignant appearance of angels in this narrative of the life of Christ comes in the first chapter of Acts. 9. After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. 10. They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. 11. "Men of Galilee," they said, "why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven."

 "This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven."

I must join with the apostle John when, after angels had given him a lengthy tour of heaven and things to come, said "..Even so, come, Lord Jesus." Revelation 22:20b

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