December 15
Those who preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven—things into which angels long to look.
1 Peter 1:12 (NASB)
Angels are associated with Christmas like turkey is associated with Thanksgiving. Everywhere we turn during the Christmas season we see angels…on wrapping paper, on top of Christmas trees, and certainly in nativity scenes. Is this biblical?
In Luke 2, we read that an angel of the Lord suddenly stood before the shepherds. At the very hour of Jesus’s birth, this angel proclaimed the gospel to shepherds, announcing that Jesus—the Savior, the Anointed One—had been born! Furthermore, this good news of great joy is for all people. Truly, the fullness of time had come for God to send forth His Son. In so many words, this messenger was delivering the message that this little baby was the long-awaited Messiah.
Then, according to verse 13, there suddenly appeared with the one angel a multitude of angels (called a heavenly host). The word “multitude” can also be translated as an army or a band of soldiers. Ironically, this army of soldiers announced peace!
Use your sanctified imagination for a moment and picture the scene. The sky is filled with angels, a vast host of them, from horizon to horizon, as far as the eye can see. And what are they doing? They are praising God! They are giving glory to God in heaven and proclaiming peace to people on earth!
God created angels as intelligent, moral creatures. Many of the angels rebelled; yet, Jesus did not come to redeem angels. Instead, the Babe of Bethlehem came to redeem human beings who have sinned and turned away from God. Moreover, we learn from 1 Peter 1:12 that angels are keenly interested in this grand work of God. Peter tells us that angels “long to look” into these things. (The same Greek word is used of John peering into the empty tomb in John 20:5.) Meaning, these heavenly beings “stretch forward the head” or “stoop over to look” to gain information on human salvation. If the angels praised God for the birth of the Savior, how much more should we, the ones He came to save!