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Debating Bible Basics Duncan Heaster  

 


2-1-5 Angels As Ministering Spirits

Now I want to talk about angels, and I suggest that angels is a subject that the Abrahamic Faith Church are very nervous about because they can see there are a lot of problems there. He did mention that he believed that the devil is the king of sinful rebellious angels. Well, I want to show that the Bible does not make a differentiation between good angels and bad angels.

When you read in the letters of Peter when he says angels bring not railing accusation against the Lord, he doesn't say the good angels, he just speaks about angels. When it says, praise him, all his angels in the psalms, or Psalm 103: 19 that in heaven God's kingdom rules over all, praise the Lord, it says, all his angels that do his pleasure. The angels, says Heb. 1: 13 are all ministering spirits helping us to reach salvation. So all the angels he says are ministering spirits. He doesn't say the good ones are helping you to get to salvation and the bad ones are trying to turn you away. He says all of them are trying to help you to reach salvation. So we can't entertain this idea of sinful angels.

Another of my questions I would like to present to Mark is, did Satan fall from a righteous state to a sinful state, and if so, when did this happen, what is the history of Satan? Now, if Satan didn't fall in the sense of sin, and I know some of the Abrahamic Covenant people say that Satan is an angel that never did actually sin, then I suggest to you that you have the idea, the conclusion that God actually created a sinful being with the power to go and tempt people. And that's a very, very serious thing to believe and quite anathema to scripture. So I want to know, did Satan sin, did Satan fall from a righteous state to a sinful state? What is his history, when did he fall, and is Satan a sinful angel?

Now God is not the minister of sin. God cannot be understood surely as being someone who has agents who are sinful demons or a sinful Satan that goes around making you sin. So then, we are told several times in scripture that Satan fell and we looked at one of them in Luke chapter 10. Now you read several times of Satan's fall. Now I would suggest that the fact that it talks of Satan falling at several different times is an indication that you can't take that as something dead literal. That is referring to the power of some adversary being overcome.

Mostly importantly in regard to angels, we are told in Luke 20: 35,36 that they which shall be accounted worthy to inherit the kingdom will not die because they are like the angels, they are equal unto the angels. So therefore angels can't die. If angels can't die, they can't sin, because we are told that the wages of sin is death. If you sin, you have to die. Now if angels cannot die, it follows they cannot sin. So then, does Mark believe the devil is mortal, or immortal? The Bible, I would suggest, says that sin brings death, therefore, we are told that because angels can't die, angels can't sin. Therefore, I would suggest the devil cannot be an angel. We are told in Heb. 2: 16 that Christ didn't come to save angels. They don't need salvation; it is us who need it.


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