St. Michael and all Angels (B) – Sunday 29th September 2024 – St Anne’s, Wrenthorpe (Eucharist)
John 1:47-end | Revelation 12:7-12 | Genesis 28:10-17
It sounds like the mother of all news headlines:
War has broken out in Heaven.
Michael and his angels are repelling the forces of darkness but are meeting with strong resistance.
More on this story later….
It all sounds a bit too contemporary…. a bit too much “now”….. too familiar and all too real…..
Yes, Im talking about the passage from Revelation…
With all the wars being fought in the world, and all the suffering they cause…
What are we recalling all of this for, today?
What does it mean for us?
Back to our reporter in the field…
Well it looks like the serpent hordes of darkness have been defeated, and all shall be well after all.
Michael has won the day! All made possible by that great weapon of Mass Hopefulness – love!
Back to you in the studio….
There is drama in the passage from Revelation – often quoted, often misquoted, but drama is needed sometimes to help us with the enormity of bringing light into the darkness, through Jesus.
Angels appear in scripture as if to question us, in the name of God.
They check to see that mortals understand what is going on or what might be asked of them.
I wonder if, amidst the noise of this current age, we are still visited upon by Angels trying to keep us going in the right direction.
Do our eyes just fail to see the Archangel at the end of our street, flaming sword in hand….?
Might you and I have been visited by Angels?
In our darkest moments, when all seems lost – are the battles for our soul, for our very being, are they fought elsewhere, by forces that know in whose image we are made, that the hope offered in that, must prevail?
What does the word “Angel” mean to you, I wonder?
Modern culture has taken the idea of Angels and created a range of alternative, spiritually-intentioned connections that rarely have a biblical basis. More often, they are a blend of other cultural and faith traditions.
That doesn’t mean that they have less value, but for us, the concept of Angels needs to be a bit more nuanced… a bit more of what we sense as Christian Disciples.
The bible makes many mentions of Angels, and centuries of theological debate has often confused our understanding. No surprises there!
When the question ‘do you believe in Angels’ Is thrown into any conversation, we are not always invited to consider messengers of God, or the casting out of The Devil….
Many of us will know someone who might say “I dont believe in God and all of that, but I do believe in Guardian Angels…”
We may be with someone who wants to make sense of how fragile life can be, and asks… what else is there?
Now that is familiar, and it is our prompt to listen carefully.
Whether we do have an angel just for us… for me or for you, I really dont know.
So why is Jesus mentioning Angels, in the Gospel today, and isn’t His reference quite familiar?
In today’s reading from Genesis, we encounter the moment where God was present with Jacob. This place is sanctified by Jacob, and he calls it Bethel – for it is holy – God’s House, attended to by angels, ascending and descending, making a physical link between earth and heaven….
I encourage you to go and read it yourself!
Jesus is the very presence of God – the Word made flesh.
This metaphor for the Temple and the older promises of its sanctity – the Holy place where God was encountered…. This is what John builds his Gospel of Good News upon.
And now, Jesus says, you will see more of such things… not just miracles or even a messiah….
Instead, In the everyday – Jesus makes real the connections between heaven and earth – God and Creation.
Jesus implies, you may not see the Angels themselves….. but in following Him, in seeking the Kingdom of God, through Him, then yes…. You will indeed see amazing things!
Where God – in all of this – comes and dwells – with all of us.
Let’s return to the archangel, for a moment…
The Hebrew meaning of Michael is – ‘who is like God?’.
The Book of Genesis says that we are made in the image of God.
Does that make us ‘like’ God?
Who amongst us, as disciples of Jesus,
bearers of the light and followers of the Way,
who will give their all to push back against the darkness,
to end the dominion of evil and misery…. In this life?
Who is like God?
I invite you all to pray and reflect on that.
For if we are ALL made in the image of God, then so it must follow that we are all as God – in all we could be.
Now that’s something to think about!
On the Feast of Saint Michael and All Angels, there is a tradition in some churches to celebrate and honour those who serve at the altar. I was a server at Wakefield Cathedral for over twenty years and it was nice to come together, remake commitments and reflect on serving in the sanctuary, where the sacrament of the Eucharist is happening.
Now, I am not sure there is anything particularly angelic about servers…!
We are all entirely human…!
So can we be – like Michael? Like angels?
Whether a HOLY PLACE or the HOLY Personhood of God in Jesus, it is to such as these that Angels visit and go about the business of God.
As messengers.
Warriors.
Or guardian protectors.
A likeness of woman or of man, or something entirely other.
Personally I will leave the dragon slaying and the casting out of Satan to the Archangels and their heavenly hosts. They have the qualification and the skill-set for such things.
And should I ever meet them, I might never even know.
For now, I will look for angels in the form of those around me and in the living out of discipleship….
Jesus described Discipleship as being: SO focused on the kingdom of heaven that you can contemplate losing your life in order to find it.
The New Testament sees every disciple as: having been baptised, we are now ready to bear witness to Christ, wherever it leads, whatever it costs.
For if the demons of this world are to be conquered, and if people are to seek and find God, then so much depends on how we live out our discipleship.
This is the Feast of Michael and ALL the Angels…
Yes, all the Angels, including Satan and those incarcerated until the day of judgement… yes even those Angels.
Because ALL can, and will and must be saved, for that is central to God seeing that ‘all was good’ from when Creation came to be.
The Archangel casts out Satan and the universe is saved from chaos and destruction, restored to order and goodness.
Righteousness returns to those whom Satan accused before God. To quote – they ‘have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they did not cling to life even in the face of death’.
This dramatic parallel between the visionary apocalypse and the human misery of those facing persecution at that time.
For we might not necessarily ‘get’ the imagery, as it is written.
And when people use this scripture to describe some other narrative, for their own ends, then beware….!
For The Revelation of St John the Divine was entirely relevant to the time, the places, and the peoples then.
Even so, as Christians who share scripture, worship, prayer and a witness to Christ, we know that the fight of light over dark, good over evil, is a forever story…. A constant battle… woven throughout most of all we see and do.
We must never give up… for we fight different dragons…. Injustice, hopelessness, ignorance, fear and hate…. And we do so with love….always.
Whether your consideration of angels begins and ends with Christmas decorations; or maybe you worry that such ideas are a distraction…. Angels will continue to be significant in our Christian life.
In the days to come, my sisters and brothers, I pray that you look upon the world with hope…. For in your prayers, and the way you love those around you, you take on the mantle of Angels, and continue the fight… in small ways… but always.
And if you want a different take on Archangels, I encourage you to visit the Apocryphal books of the Bible, and in particular the Book of Tobit. Following that you might have a read of Miss Garnets Angel, by Sally Vickers.
That’s my book recommendations all exhausted!
Go Michael!
Amen.
Image: I asked ChatGPT for an image of a ladder, outdoors, very tall 😊
Interesting: The Internet has much to say about angels. I found this better than some.