The NXR Podcast - THE FRIDAY SPECIAL - Angels ｜ Classifications, Physicality, & Sexes

00:00:00.200 After this I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven.

00:00:04.720 And the first voice, which I had heard speaking to me like a trumpet, said,

00:00:08.960 Come up here, and I will show you what must take place after this.

00:00:12.900 At once I was in the Spirit, and behold, a throne stood in heaven, with one seated on the throne.

00:00:18.320 And he who sat there had the appearance of jasper and carnelian.

00:00:23.140 And around the throne was a rainbow that had the appearance of an emerald.

00:00:27.040 Around the throne were twenty-four thrones.

00:00:30.680 And seated on the thrones were twenty-four elders,

00:00:33.360 clothed in white garments with golden crowns on their heads.

00:00:37.820 From the throne came flashes of lightning, and rumblings, and peals of thunder.

00:00:42.620 And before the throne were burning seven torches of fire,

00:00:45.740 which are the seven spirits of God.

00:00:48.120 And before the throne there was, as it were, a sea of glass like crystal.

00:00:52.100 And around the throne, on each side of the throne, are four living creatures,

00:00:55.980 full of eyes in front and behind.

00:00:57.720 The first living creature like a lion

00:01:00.380 The second living creature like an ox

00:01:02.640 The third living creature with the face of a man

00:01:05.560 And the fourth living creature like an eagle in flight

00:01:08.620 And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings

00:01:11.820 Are full of eyes all around and within

00:01:13.940 And day and night they never cease to say

00:01:16.380 Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty

00:01:19.440 Who was and is and is to come

00:01:21.800 Revelation chapter 4 verses 1 through 8

00:01:27.720 this is the word of the lord thanks be to god thanks i feel like i should have been standing

00:01:34.580 for the reading of the word of god indeed amen i know i feel disrespectful sitting down much like

00:01:38.460 john chrysostom said that no one should be allowed to pray seated for respect of the angel that is

00:01:43.200 standing next obvious real quote the angel sits next to you obvious and not even because of

00:01:47.520 reverence for god but the angel the angel is right next to you yeah take it up with him

00:01:53.380 Does he have a verse?

00:01:55.280 No.

00:01:55.800 He's Chrysostom.

00:01:56.800 Did he make it up?

00:01:57.900 Yes.

00:01:58.560 Yeah.

00:02:00.060 We're excited.

00:02:01.340 I made it up.

00:02:02.400 Chrysostom made it up.

00:02:03.420 Yeah.

00:02:03.800 There you go.

00:02:04.660 Well, Ben, for this one,

00:02:06.000 why don't you just get us started with,

00:02:08.660 all of us, let's do all three of us,

00:02:10.360 because Brian, we've all been talking about it.

00:02:12.440 We've all got a lot of ideas,

00:02:13.680 but let's line it out in question form.

00:02:16.520 What are some of the main,

00:02:18.400 if we could boil it down to like top five questions

00:02:21.340 that we want to answer about properly understanding angels?

00:02:26.100 What are those questions?

00:02:27.720 I would ask questions like,

00:02:29.820 are there different classes of angel?

00:02:32.320 Great question.

00:02:32.940 It's a big one.

00:02:33.520 Also an easy one.

00:02:34.300 Are all angels the same or are there different classes?

00:02:36.520 Right, because people tend to think

00:02:37.920 when they hear the word angel,

00:02:38.980 angel means something specific too.

00:02:40.920 Angel means messenger.

00:02:42.060 Right.

00:02:42.400 And we see particular types of angel in the Bible

00:02:45.360 that appear as humans.

00:02:47.120 Two of them are named at least,

00:02:48.520 you know, are debatably another,

00:02:49.880 but are named and they bring messages from God, Gabriel and Michael.

00:02:54.540 I would also add, do the saints have guardian angels?

00:02:58.180 I think that's one that I'm personally fascinated with.

00:03:00.560 Yep.

00:03:01.200 Okay, so great question.

00:03:03.220 So that's two right there.

00:03:04.280 Are there different classifications of angels?

00:03:06.740 Do individual saints, Christians, have guardian angels?

00:03:10.620 Ben?

00:03:11.520 The two biggest questions for me, and these are kind of related,

00:03:14.360 is how do we understand John saying

00:03:18.540 that he was in Revelation 4,

00:03:20.180 that he was in the spirit

00:03:21.280 and in the spirit,

00:03:23.240 he saw in heaven thrones

00:03:25.440 with being seated upon them

00:03:27.660 with crowns on their head.

00:03:29.920 This is a spiritual thing.

00:03:31.800 And yet these are,

00:03:32.820 this very physical language.

00:03:34.680 This is very like brick and mortar space,

00:03:37.980 something you can see, touch, feel, smell.

00:03:40.420 So how should we understand the language

00:03:42.640 that's being used here?

00:03:43.680 That's sort of the second part of the question.

00:03:45.600 Is it analogical?

00:03:46.860 Is it purely metaphorical?

00:03:48.200 Is it univocal or equivocal?

00:03:50.520 What kind of conclusions are we actually able to draw

00:03:53.660 about the angelic dwelling place

00:03:56.120 and the heavenly dwelling place from texts like this?

00:03:59.080 What does it mean that an angel is spiritual?

00:04:02.240 Does it mean that that vision is of something else

00:04:06.040 or something projected

00:04:07.100 or something not really truly its essence?

00:04:08.960 Or does it mean that he was actually seeing

00:04:12.840 the real thing.

00:04:13.740 That is what that thing is.

00:04:14.880 Right.

00:04:15.220 What it looks like

00:04:16.080 but in a different plane.

00:04:17.020 And that it's still spiritual

00:04:18.180 but not exclusive,

00:04:19.540 not only,

00:04:20.300 merely spiritual.

00:04:21.200 Yeah.

00:04:21.300 But it's like us.

00:04:23.200 We are a spirit,

00:04:24.880 you know,

00:04:25.020 a soul body composite,

00:04:27.220 right?

00:04:27.460 There's both elements there.

00:04:29.200 And then angels,

00:04:29.940 perhaps there's an emphasis.

00:04:31.360 There may be more spiritual

00:04:32.940 but still a physical component.

00:04:35.280 Or maybe in a different realm,

00:04:38.240 in the heavenly realm,

00:04:40.080 maybe to be spiritual

00:04:42.120 doesn't mean precisely what we often conceptualize in our mind.

00:04:45.520 Maybe 1 Corinthians 15,

00:04:47.020 there are heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies.

00:04:48.800 To me, that's like the biggest question

00:04:50.580 that I'm almost certain we won't actually answer,

00:04:54.860 but we'll give it our best shot.

00:04:56.180 Yep, we've got some thoughts.

00:04:57.340 We'll kick it around.

00:04:57.860 And then last question, here would be my question.

00:05:00.920 So that was two questions.

00:05:02.480 Yeah, it was kind of a two-parter, but...

00:05:04.040 Yeah, well, like what kind of language,

00:05:05.440 how much can we draw from that?

00:05:06.360 Is a language strictly under the banner of analogical,

00:05:10.240 typological symbolic language or is can we read some of this literally yeah um and then that that

00:05:17.000 was a question as per the your hermeneutics how to read the angel passages in the bible but then

00:05:22.600 the question you're deriving from that is how how physical slash how spiritual are angels yeah yeah

00:05:28.340 your question again are there different classes of angels and then are there guardian angels among

00:05:32.520 one you know as one of the classes and then my question in a typical chauvinistic uh style

00:05:40.440 Are there any female angels or are they all male?

00:05:45.040 Yeah.

00:05:45.340 I think we should start with,

00:05:47.120 first let's start with classifications

00:05:48.820 and then go to how much of this is literal physical.

00:05:52.680 Yeah.

00:05:53.340 That makes sense.

00:05:54.360 Because if you just start with literal physical,

00:05:57.560 part of the difficulty is there are some,

00:05:59.800 for lack of a better word,

00:06:00.940 there are some unhinged angel texts in scripture.

00:06:04.620 Ezekiel, we're talking about wheels.

00:06:06.560 Yeah, wheels within wheels with eyes all over.

00:06:08.720 With eyes all over.

00:06:09.300 And then, you know, Revelation chapter four,

00:06:11.660 you've got the four living creatures

00:06:13.400 covered in eyes with six wings.

00:06:15.300 They cover their face, they cover their feet

00:06:16.940 and two wings, they're flying.

00:06:18.560 24 elders seated on 24 thrones with golden crowns,

00:06:22.280 cherubim, seraphim.

00:06:22.940 And the seven spirits of God

00:06:24.180 that are fire before the throne.

00:06:25.420 Right, and it says,

00:06:27.520 and in them are the seven spirits of God,

00:06:30.500 which I mean, right there, I'm like, okay.

00:06:32.280 That already is bizarre.

00:06:33.460 Which is super bizarre.

00:06:34.400 Honestly, I'm like, is that soul shattering?

00:06:36.320 Is that like Harry Potter straight up Voldemort style?

00:06:39.080 I have an idea of that whole passage

00:06:40.600 that I'm just going to like shamelessly throw in

00:06:43.860 eventually whenever we get there.

00:06:45.220 Yeah, wow.

00:06:45.740 And that I think answers all of it.

00:06:47.840 We even...

00:06:48.500 Okay, well, maybe you lead with that.

00:06:50.440 We even have passages,

00:06:51.640 this is probably bringing in another category altogether,

00:06:55.260 but I think it fits in the classes

00:06:56.520 because you have to answer this,

00:06:57.460 is the angel of the Lord.

00:06:59.480 Right, yeah.

00:06:59.820 And passages like in Exodus,

00:07:01.640 where in the burning bush,

00:07:03.380 the angel of the Lord is speaking.

00:07:05.540 I mean, he's appeared in the midst of the fire.

00:07:07.880 So real quick, let's define, yeah.

00:07:10.360 So let's define a couple of terms.

00:07:11.600 What's a theophany?

00:07:13.020 A theophany is an appearance of God in bodily form.

00:07:16.440 Right, but it doesn't mean that God himself

00:07:18.440 in an ontological sense that God in his essence is flesh,

00:07:22.240 but it means that God is taking upon himself,

00:07:25.360 not even flesh, but a physical, visible manifestation form.

00:07:30.560 So like we would say it was a theophany

00:07:33.300 or maybe even more particularly in my opinion,

00:07:35.260 a Christophany of God walking with Adam and Eve

00:07:39.500 in the garden in the cool of the day.

00:07:41.200 But Jesus was walking with them.

00:07:42.680 The reason why we say it a Christophany

00:07:44.120 is because this was not Jesus, God in the flesh,

00:07:47.840 because this predates the incarnation.

00:07:50.180 He had not yet taken on flesh.

00:07:51.700 It would be to limit or reduce the incarnation,

00:07:54.980 what happened there.

00:07:55.500 Right, the incarnation.

00:07:56.340 Exactly, it would say the incarnation is,

00:07:57.920 you know, he was already doing this.

00:07:59.340 He could have just, you know, showed up again.

00:08:01.560 We can't do that because the incarnation

00:08:02.560 is the strangest thing that's ever happened

00:08:04.240 The history of the world.

00:08:05.280 It's incredible that God became man.

00:08:06.880 Yes.

00:08:07.400 Yeah, incredible.

00:08:08.320 But God appeared as man.

00:08:10.480 So another one, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

00:08:12.660 Yeah, in the midst of the fire.

00:08:13.780 There was a fourth one who looked

00:08:15.140 as though he was one of the gods.

00:08:17.380 Yeah.

00:08:17.660 You know, a son of the gods.

00:08:20.220 Sounds like, you know, 0.96

00:08:21.600 Abraham hosted Yahweh for dinner

00:08:23.840 with two other angels with him.

00:08:25.980 So there are two angels.

00:08:27.080 And in that case, in terms of classifications,

00:08:28.740 we would say these are messenger angels.

00:08:30.140 And angel just means messenger.

00:08:31.460 So these are like Gabriel type angels, right?

00:08:33.760 but there's two of them are that is what I'm saying.

00:08:37.900 But there's a third that is the angel of the Lord.

00:08:40.760 So accompanied by two messenger type angels,

00:08:42.880 but one is the angel of the Lord

00:08:44.120 that we would say again is a Christophany.

00:08:46.580 Jacob wrestles with the angel of the Lord.

00:08:48.900 And that's a Christophany.

00:08:50.420 I have wrestled with God.

00:08:52.020 Right, it's not Gabriel, it's not Michael.

00:08:53.720 Right, and then Joshua dressed for battle,

00:08:58.160 but it says the angel of the Lord.

00:08:59.520 Are you for us or against us?

00:09:01.340 No.

00:09:01.760 You know, no.

00:09:02.420 Well, you know what?

00:09:04.480 Man, I preached through Joshua recently

00:09:06.160 and digging into the text,

00:09:08.340 there's a really good case to be made

00:09:10.200 where instead of no meaning neither,

00:09:14.060 he says, are you for us or for our enemies?

00:09:17.840 And it's like two separate questions.

00:09:19.580 Are you for us?

00:09:20.460 And there's not an answer.

00:09:21.620 Are you for our enemies?

00:09:23.180 No.

00:09:24.140 Because he doesn't actually say neither.

00:09:25.280 He's clearly for them.

00:09:26.400 He's for them.

00:09:26.940 Yeah, by the end of it.

00:09:27.900 No.

00:09:28.720 Like, how dare you even ask? 1.00

00:09:30.340 Yeah, of course I'm not for your godless pagan. 1.00

00:09:32.120 enemies. I'm about to wipe those people up. In the angel discussion, though the angel of the 1.00

00:09:39.580 Lord is a messenger in the sense that it is bringing the revelation of God somehow, the

00:09:44.860 message of God, we clearly make a distinction that we're not saying that God himself is in

00:09:51.540 the same category of being as other beings that are called angels. This is a word you can use

00:09:57.480 generally, to refer as well to human messengers, pastors and other human messengers. In fact,

00:10:02.680 a lot of people think that in Revelation 1, when Christ is holding the seven stars for the seven

00:10:08.740 churches that are the seven angels, that he's actually referring to the pastors of those

00:10:12.240 churches. Because the angels are the pastors. The lampstands are the churches. Yes, exactly.

00:10:18.020 The seven ministers is another translation. And he's holding them in his hand. And I see it as

00:10:23.180 it's also, you know, because John is caught up

00:10:25.420 in the same chapter, in the very beginning,

00:10:27.300 he's caught up on the Lord's day.

00:10:28.940 So it's the day that Christ rose from the dead.

00:10:30.860 Christ, who is Lord of the Sabbath, 0.68

00:10:32.920 he never uses his authority,

00:10:35.300 his lordship of the Sabbath to remove the Sabbath,

00:10:37.980 but he strictly reminds those who'd abused the Sabbath,

00:10:41.360 namely the religious rulers of the day,

00:10:43.280 that God didn't make man to observe his Sabbath,

00:10:46.520 but he made Sabbath to serve man,

00:10:48.780 that man needed a rest.

00:10:50.080 God didn't need to rest on the seventh day,

00:10:52.240 but he rested to set an example

00:10:53.920 for his finite creatures who would need to rest.

00:10:56.500 And then Jesus doesn't eradicate the Sabbath,

00:10:58.320 but simply reminds us as Lord of the Sabbath

00:11:00.460 that the Sabbath is a gift to us.

00:11:03.180 And then he renews, not removes,

00:11:05.060 but renews the Sabbath from the last day of the week

00:11:06.920 to the first by virtue of his resurrection,

00:11:09.280 then twice more by appearing to the disciples

00:11:11.940 in both instances on the Lord's day.

00:11:14.220 So multiple cases to be said for that

00:11:16.120 and not just, oh, it was the Catholic church.

00:11:18.060 I mean, you know, like the Christian Sabbath

00:11:20.360 is very much the first day of the week.

00:11:22.460 And then the apostle John, back to Revelation,

00:11:24.740 is caught up in the spirit on the Lord's day,

00:11:27.780 which is the Christian Sabbath

00:11:29.140 that the New Testament church already

00:11:30.740 with the first century church was meeting.

00:11:33.740 They were meeting, sure, every single day,

00:11:35.980 daily, devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching,

00:11:38.360 the breaking of bread,

00:11:39.100 which I don't think is the Lord's supper.

00:11:40.380 I think it's a daily potluck meal and theology and prayer.

00:11:44.960 But then on the first day of the week,

00:11:47.260 that is, I think, the whole church,

00:11:49.460 not just small groups and organic discipleship

00:11:51.900 and fellowship and communion,

00:11:53.380 but that's the church actually gathering

00:11:56.040 in an ecclesia, formal sense

00:11:58.260 for the ordinary means of worship church.

00:12:01.180 That's the Lord's day.

00:12:02.700 That's already been being done in the first century.

00:12:05.520 It's unique to the other daily meetings

00:12:07.540 throughout the week.

00:12:08.420 That one's unique.

00:12:09.440 And on that day, John's caught up.

00:12:11.660 And so I think he's seen church.

00:12:13.960 He's seen heaven,

00:12:14.660 but he's also seen church from heaven's perspective.

00:12:18.080 What church, we see church on earth,

00:12:20.680 but he gets to see church in heaven.

00:12:22.360 So the lampstand is the church, but it's lit.

00:12:24.840 And I think it's because the church is gathered

00:12:26.720 and it's the Lord's day,

00:12:28.380 the day that they're supposed to be gathered.

00:12:30.180 And when the lampstand that is the church is lit,

00:12:32.860 AKA gathered on the Lord's day, the Christian Sabbath, 0.84

00:12:35.820 Christ isn't walking in their midst

00:12:38.120 and holding the minister, the pastor,

00:12:40.640 and the sword, the minister speaks the word of God,

00:12:43.520 but the sword actually begins to protrude

00:12:46.460 not from the minister's mouth,

00:12:47.860 but from Christ's mouth and cuts the hearts of man.

00:12:50.840 And so we come, we gather

00:12:51.980 because man shall not live by bread alone,

00:12:53.580 but every word that proceeds from the mouth of God,

00:12:55.420 Christ is God.

00:12:56.680 And a word proceeds not only from the minister's mouth,

00:12:58.720 but from his.

00:12:59.720 And apart from that, you can't do anything.

00:13:01.620 So if you're listening to this, you like YouTube,

00:13:03.900 you claim to be a Christian,

00:13:04.860 but you don't go to church, stop it. 1.00

00:13:06.720 Stop.

00:13:07.060 Stop it, guys. 0.99

00:13:07.820 Go to church. 0.69

00:13:08.360 The devil will get you.

00:13:09.180 So I'm gonna take a stab at answering the first question.

00:13:11.740 Yeah, let's talk about,

00:13:12.840 we've made a distinction now.

00:13:13.960 The angel of the Lord is a Christophany or theophany,

00:13:17.100 different category.

00:13:17.960 We have angelic messengers,

00:13:19.180 but what kind of classification

00:13:20.000 are we seeing in scripture for angels?

00:13:22.540 So the first thing that we have to understand

00:13:24.980 is that when we use the term angel,

00:13:26.920 we're using a catch-all term

00:13:28.280 to describe many different beings.

00:13:30.040 Yes.

00:13:30.540 So an angel is a rank of the angels.

00:13:34.200 An angel is actually the lowest rank.

00:13:37.560 That doesn't take away from their nobility,

00:13:39.580 that just in the rank of order,

00:13:41.280 they are the lowest ones

00:13:42.220 because they are the most concerned

00:13:44.040 with the affairs of man directly.

00:13:45.920 They are most like unto man.

00:13:47.660 They're most concerned with what's happening to man.

00:13:50.220 They are the messengers.

00:13:51.860 They herald God's decree to man.

00:13:54.400 Gabriel does this to Mary, et cetera.

00:13:56.660 The angel Gabriel also goes to Daniel, et cetera.

00:14:00.060 And they're ministering spirits.

00:14:01.180 And they're ministering spirits, yes.

00:14:02.400 But when it says all angels,

00:14:03.220 that doesn't necessarily mean the wheel guys.

00:14:05.260 Right.

00:14:05.820 And it doesn't necessarily mean the four living creature guys.

00:14:07.820 It could, maybe, but we don't know.

00:14:09.820 It could, and some other,

00:14:11.240 But certainly the angels, as it pertains to messengers, man-facing angels, are not all

00:14:17.520 them ministering spirits to serve the children of Abraham who are to inherit salvation.

00:14:22.520 But then we would say the larger context of the word angel is the spiritual servants of

00:14:28.680 God that are serving him in different ways, but in the spiritual plane.

00:14:34.020 And so these would include things like the seraphim, which are the highest of the order

00:14:37.920 of angels.

00:14:38.440 and I believe they are the spirits of fire before God

00:14:43.080 that contain the seven spirits of God.

00:14:44.960 But we know that they are fiery spirits

00:14:47.600 that guard God's holiness.

00:14:50.020 They are guardians of God's holiness.

00:14:51.960 And we have the cherubim.

00:14:53.600 The cherubim are guardians of God's throne.

00:14:55.940 They're also just guardians in general.

00:14:57.520 They guard everything.

00:14:58.320 They guarded the garden of Eden

00:14:59.360 before the flood wiped it away. 0.99

00:15:01.220 And so the cherubim are the living creatures.

00:15:03.480 They're the ones who in Ezekiel,

00:15:05.700 all of them have four faces,

00:15:07.940 the lion, the ox, the man, and the eagle.

00:15:10.820 In Revelation 4, each one has a different face.

00:15:14.180 One of them is the lion, one is the ox,

00:15:16.020 one is the man, one is the eagle in flight.

00:15:17.780 They're all covered with wings.

00:15:19.760 Also, it's interesting, in Ezekiel,

00:15:21.780 they only have four wings,

00:15:23.180 but in Revelation 4, they have six wings.

00:15:26.380 So that's fascinating in itself.

00:15:27.860 And they're covered with eyes, which is terrifying.

00:15:29.200 It's like you get a two-door sedan

00:15:30.680 and you get a four-door sedan.

00:15:31.840 Double it and give it to the next.

00:15:32.500 There's multiple different types of these beings.

00:15:36.300 But that's the cherubim. 0.96

00:15:36.960 But that would be like subclasses

00:15:38.420 within overarching class being cherubim. 0.75

00:15:40.600 Right, so they're guarding the throne of God. 0.97

00:15:42.580 And then you have the ophanim,

00:15:44.580 which are a little bit more of a subtextual category,

00:15:48.160 but they would be the wheels within wheels

00:15:49.920 that are next to the cherubim

00:15:52.480 and together are the living creatures with the cherubim.

00:15:55.240 And they are the throne of God.

00:15:57.280 They bring that, they proceed from the throne of God.

00:16:00.260 Some people believe that this is what Moses

00:16:02.140 was encountering in the burning bush,

00:16:04.000 but that's kind of iffy.

00:16:05.260 And then you have powers and principalities and dominions and authorities, which are more concerned

00:16:12.180 with the realm of men, but really concerned with ensuring God's decree is carried out in the realm

00:16:17.180 of men. And then you have angels and archangels. Angels are the messengers that we've already

00:16:21.780 discussed. They're ministering spirits. And then the archangels seem to be some special category.

00:16:26.780 We only see the word appear in reference to the cry of an archangel in scripture.

00:16:31.400 And specifically Michael.

00:16:33.080 At least that's what we think.

00:16:34.300 Yeah, yeah.

00:16:35.360 Even that is a supposition.

00:16:37.120 Right, but they seem to be a special category of angel

00:16:41.640 that is a warrior, the head of God's armies.

00:16:45.120 It's not Christ.

00:16:46.240 Michael is not Christ.

00:16:47.580 No way.

00:16:48.040 But he is the head of Christ's armies,

00:16:50.840 which is very fascinating,

00:16:52.180 assuming it's Michael, but the archangel.

00:16:53.500 Right, yeah.

00:16:54.360 And so those are kind of all the different categories.

00:16:56.440 So in my mind,

00:16:57.560 well, then we also have the watchers thrown in there.

00:16:59.540 Yeah.

00:16:59.740 From Daniel 4, we know that there's a category of heavenly being

00:17:03.080 that's a servant of God called the Watcher.

00:17:05.300 And we don't know if they might be another name

00:17:07.800 for one of these other existing types of angels.

00:17:10.400 It could be another name for, my guess is another name for messengers,

00:17:15.300 just angels, angels.

00:17:16.440 Or it could be, probably I lean stronger towards this,

00:17:20.980 if messenger, angel, angel, angel, angel, messengers,

00:17:24.460 so there's your, you know, Gabriel.

00:17:26.040 If that's a very large class and the Watchers was like,

00:17:29.740 like, uh, the, the highest, it's a rank, you know, like a rank with, but within that class

00:17:34.700 within an army, everybody is a person, right. But a general is not a captain. It's not a

00:17:39.240 lieutenant. It's not an intelligence officer. It's not a combat engineer. And so within the

00:17:43.540 thrones, dominions, rulers, authorities, overseeing thrones, bringing messages to men

00:17:47.880 for all we know, that might be the same type of thing that actually has a different role

00:17:54.040 or a different rank. Yeah. It could be like, they're all generals. So they're all in that

00:17:58.460 class, but there's two-star generals. Yeah, there's lots of variations. Are you a beef jerky

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00:19:40.200 purchase. So I'd like to say two more things just real quick. So in Revelation 4, I think that one

00:19:46.120 compelling argument would be that the 24 elders are watchers. I think that the fiery spirits are

00:19:51.300 the seraphim and the cherubim are named. They are the living creatures. The seven spirits? Spirits

00:19:56.580 of God. Are what? The seraphim. The seraphim. Because they're fire guarding the holiness of God.

00:20:02.180 Four living creatures are cherubim. The living creatures are the cherubim because they're

00:20:05.700 guarding the throne. The Ophanim is the throne. And the 24 elders are the watchers. So I don't 1.00

00:20:12.920 think that's all of the angelic categories. I also think that there could be more. God is not

00:20:19.740 obligated to tell us. The Bible doesn't tell us this is the exhaustive place. He's not obligated

00:20:24.820 to tell us that these are all the heavenly beings. We get peeks behind the curtain into the heavenly

00:20:29.040 realm. We don't get full access. And we know this because Paul says, I was caught up to the

00:20:35.560 third heaven, whether in body or in vision, I don't know. And I'm not allowed to tell you.

00:20:39.420 And you're like, thanks, Paul. Yeah. He was supposed to obviously supposed to divinely

00:20:44.480 inspired. I'm not criticizing the Holy Spirit, but we know for a fact that there are things about

00:20:50.400 this topic that are a outside of our knowledge and be intentionally. So God didn't, he did not

00:20:59.140 intend for us to know this all the way to the bottom thing. So that would be my attempt at

00:21:03.800 answering. Yeah. So the 24 elders, that's interesting. I think you could say that,

00:21:08.640 but you're saying that more probabilistically than certainty. Oh, I'm not having any certainty

00:21:13.180 behind it. I'm saying that would help, that would help me personally conceptualize the scene that's

00:21:19.720 going on. Because we know that the watchers are some category that decrees something that's then

00:21:26.340 carried out. It would even work, I think, with your idea that, and I do think that's right,

00:21:31.860 that it's the heavenly church.

00:21:33.460 I've heard that before.

00:21:34.260 I think it's really compelling.

00:21:35.360 It's the liturgy from heaven's perspective.

00:21:36.980 And so you're actually seeing the watchers

00:21:38.620 that are overseeing the heavenly liturgy,

00:21:41.460 ensuring that it's-

00:21:42.300 I thought you were gonna,

00:21:42.840 I smiled because I thought

00:21:43.700 you were gonna make fun of me,

00:21:44.480 but go ahead.

00:21:44.920 No, no, no.

00:21:45.940 I've heard that before

00:21:46.780 and I think that it's-

00:21:47.660 Right, and I've heard it before too.

00:21:48.920 I think it's really compelling.

00:21:49.660 It's the thing that I'm saying.

00:21:51.460 I agree with that one.

00:21:52.240 It's not my original.

00:21:53.160 Sure, and none of this is like stuff

00:21:54.720 that we for the first time came up with.

00:21:56.860 Well, in a few of the episodes

00:21:58.340 that we've recorded,

00:21:59.120 there have been a couple-

00:21:59.740 There have been some firsts.

00:22:00.800 Originals, yeah.

00:22:01.360 This is not one of them.

00:22:02.160 This is not one.

00:22:02.560 That's true. 0.92

00:22:02.920 Except for what I'm saying about the Watchers and the 24 elders.

00:22:05.820 That's Ben's theory.

00:22:06.220 So the only thing that I would push back on that, Ben,

00:22:08.160 is just because it just seems like a very God-facing role.

00:22:12.480 They're taking off their crowns and throwing them down

00:22:14.840 and singing along with...

00:22:16.680 This is the throne room.

00:22:18.500 Whereas I kind of imagine the Watchers

00:22:20.880 being more higher concern of the affairs of men.

00:22:24.980 And not because they don't...

00:22:26.380 Talking about Watchers that didn't fall,

00:22:28.460 But the good watchers that never rebelled, not because they're not, that they don't, that their allegiance isn't to God above men, because it is to God, but it's actually their role.

00:22:39.460 They're more turned towards man.

00:22:41.180 Yeah, their role, they're designed to be.

00:22:43.000 But the elders, everything in the Revelation 4 description seems like, none of it seems, like messengers don't get listed.

00:22:50.180 You know what I mean?

00:22:50.640 Like they don't make the list.

00:22:51.660 I see watchers, to me, makes more of a sense of relating more to the messengers than cherubim.

00:22:59.300 I think that's a really good point.

00:23:01.740 My understanding of the watchers would be more like the messenger is the manager.

00:23:06.680 Exactly, a messenger manager.

00:23:08.020 And the watcher is like the COO, CEO type person.

00:23:12.420 And I think that it would condemn them yet more to look down and condescend to that far.

00:23:19.500 but also the number 24 like it's very clearly intentional so the idea that like i don't like

00:23:27.000 the idea that by happenstance when none of it's happened to god's sovereign over all things

00:23:30.640 including even you know a fall of angels but but i but then it's like that seems like a number like

00:23:36.700 god's it was very precise he started with it he still has 24 of these guys eight of them fall

00:23:41.400 right no yeah it's not like well we had once upon a time we had 36 i don't even necessarily think

00:23:46.440 that that's all the watchers.

00:23:47.780 Oh, okay.

00:23:48.260 I think that that's 24 elders of the watchers.

00:23:51.540 Oh, I see, I see, I see, I see.

00:23:53.640 Okay.

00:23:53.860 Now, I would have to reconsult my notes,

00:23:56.200 but I'm trying to remember

00:23:57.020 what some of the traditional views

00:23:59.460 of that passage would be.

00:24:00.880 Apostles and tribes?

00:24:02.600 Yeah.

00:24:02.820 Leaders, patriarchs and apostles?

00:24:04.780 Yeah, patriarchs and apostles are what I've heard.

00:24:06.840 Uh-huh.

00:24:07.420 Because it's 12 and 12.

00:24:08.720 But who are the apostles?

00:24:10.100 Would Paul be in there

00:24:10.980 or would Matthias be in there?

00:24:12.840 Oh, yeah.

00:24:13.540 um uh the the classic traditional joke that everyone always says is that they're half

00:24:20.880 cheeking it yeah paul and uh yeah yeah sure they're sharing a seat who's in whose lap but

00:24:26.380 then i've also heard others you know say that like that the the 12th seat is um well never mind

00:24:33.040 never mind i'm not even going to share that one guys basically long story short i'm presenting

00:24:37.540 that as a brand new idea like brand spanking new yeah that would help me understand the

00:24:43.320 passage for what I believe it to be, which is a purely heavenly scene. A big point I think to

00:24:48.220 make, we've already made it, but just a big point to remember is that in a lot of these things,

00:24:52.480 I think in particularly here with the angels, there are things we know, and then there are

00:24:56.180 things that we can composite and compile together based on the data. But because the scripture's

00:25:01.900 main focus isn't here, there's going to be, you have like two different instincts that are always

00:25:07.740 kind of warring in the church.

00:25:08.860 You have the hyper-biblicist minimalism. 1.00

00:25:12.720 Right.

00:25:12.920 It's like, if it's not directly said

00:25:14.480 about them in scripture.

00:25:15.500 Chapter and verse.

00:25:16.040 Do not say it.

00:25:16.400 And then you give them one,

00:25:17.340 they're like, New Testament, please.

00:25:18.540 Yeah, yeah.

00:25:19.380 They don't like half the Bible.

00:25:20.500 And then even then on that view.

00:25:22.000 I won't take a shower

00:25:22.880 unless you can show me in the red letters.

00:25:24.880 What's funny is that people

00:25:25.940 that tend towards that

00:25:26.940 also tend to think of the angels

00:25:28.640 as a monolith generally.

00:25:30.100 It's just like, there's the angels, right?

00:25:31.920 And some of them are fallen and whatnot.

00:25:33.400 Don't tell me there's Nephilim spirits, whatever. 0.99

00:25:35.720 On the other side,

00:25:36.700 you have like the medieval and these conceptions with multiple ranks and nine ranks and there's

00:25:41.960 and they went all the way out not only with angels but with their demonology right yeah and they had

00:25:46.680 developed an elaborate and some of it was almost a bit of a reach empiric where they were in they

00:25:52.620 were they were like trying to in their fight against the demons they're like well there's

00:25:56.260 this demon and so i'm not even right now saying which one i think is right i'm just saying those

00:26:00.720 Those are kind of the polar ends.

00:26:02.000 The polar ends of the spectrum.

00:26:03.460 And both in there.

00:26:04.340 Yeah, Pseudo-Dionysus.

00:26:05.340 In his celestial hierarchy, he makes up.

00:26:08.460 He just makes it up.

00:26:09.240 Two angelic ranks to make it the number nine.

00:26:11.440 Yeah.

00:26:11.980 And he makes up the virtues in the potestas,

00:26:15.260 which are the ones that exercise power

00:26:18.960 over the other angels underneath them.

00:26:20.960 Yeah.

00:26:21.320 And then the virtues,

00:26:22.340 which counteract the vice of the demons.

00:26:24.560 That's the right.

00:26:25.420 And we're excited.

00:26:26.360 He made it up.

00:26:27.280 Some like apocryphal sources,

00:26:29.500 but pretty much he just...

00:26:30.220 But a lot of it had to do with...

00:26:32.240 To his credit, the rest of it's really good.

00:26:33.460 With things like balance and the beauty of numbers

00:26:37.300 and things like that.

00:26:38.180 They were, they had...

00:26:40.180 The triad of triads.

00:26:40.740 You certainly can't say that they didn't ask the why behind things.

00:26:44.660 Like why would there be this number of angels and this type?

00:26:47.720 In fact, they would be accused of not being content

00:26:49.700 with not knowing the why.

00:26:50.660 Yeah.

00:26:51.000 However, we do...

00:26:52.860 That said, we know a lot about this class of spiritual beings.

00:26:57.580 One thing we haven't talked about though, guys,

00:26:59.140 is a divine council.

00:27:01.400 Yeah.

00:27:01.920 Right.

00:27:02.340 Because that is a conversation that it's controversial.

00:27:05.900 Sure.

00:27:06.200 But it also, it definitely has implication.

00:27:09.220 It does.

00:27:09.680 For how you view a lot of scripture.

00:27:11.300 So I don't know if you guys want to jump in on that at all.

00:27:14.880 Well, I feel like that might have to be its own thing.

00:27:17.420 But in terms of like...

00:27:18.060 Maybe we just reference it and say this is also...

00:27:20.180 Whether it's Trinitarian language,

00:27:22.160 we're aware of the divine council.

00:27:23.480 Whether it's Trinitarian language or in our image

00:27:26.160 is a divine council of lower G, you know.

00:27:28.640 The basic idea of the divine council is that

00:27:30.860 there is a group of spiritual beings

00:27:35.000 that are the divine council,

00:27:37.180 that it is not improper to call them Elohim

00:27:39.360 because the Bible does.

00:27:40.840 God's.

00:27:40.860 Which is God's.

00:27:42.380 But none of them are God's in this sense.

00:27:46.520 Yahweh alone can create ex nihilo. 0.98

00:27:50.220 But it is perfectly permissible to call them God's. 0.98

00:27:53.220 It's a word that has range that can be used of, 0.98

00:27:56.060 even kind of, I'll give a crass example,

00:27:58.020 but this is how language works.

00:28:00.340 People will look at another person and say,

00:28:01.980 bro, you're a God.

00:28:03.020 Yeah.

00:28:03.520 And they mean that you are elite at this thing.

00:28:06.380 Right.

00:28:06.620 And in this sense,

00:28:07.740 the divine counsel idea is also that part of what is happening

00:28:11.960 in the ancient Near East,

00:28:14.220 and then also in scripture,

00:28:15.960 you know,

00:28:16.440 controverting it is that again,

00:28:18.300 from the one people go out all these demonic religions,

00:28:20.980 the nations are given over Deuteronomy 32 to be governed by

00:28:25.180 table of nations,

00:28:25.960 fallen spiritual beings of some sort,

00:28:28.980 that there are spiritual powers behind thrones

00:28:32.260 that are misleading the nations

00:28:34.260 that are actually have held the nations captive to deceit.

00:28:37.680 And that one of the things that the scriptures are doing

00:28:40.680 is actually contradicting the idea of the false,

00:28:46.140 of the pagan religions,

00:28:48.080 like you see in Mesopotamia and Canaanite religion, 0.68

00:28:50.720 that these are the real gods 0.52

00:28:52.260 and that Yahweh is just another one of these.

00:28:54.100 And it's to show, well, no, there is a divine council of angelic beings

00:28:59.100 or of spiritual beings that God has set as in Job that he speaks to.

00:29:04.140 He assembles this council of spiritual beings and he speaks with them. 0.85

00:29:09.200 And then, but that those false ones are actually liars and deceivers.

00:29:13.980 And that one thing Christ is doing is he's binding the strong man

00:29:18.320 so that the nations will no longer be held captive to these beings.

00:29:22.100 He's supplanting them. 0.90

00:29:24.720 The Prince of Persia.

00:29:25.920 Yeah.

00:29:26.180 So this is a lot of like the Michael Heiser stuff.

00:29:29.460 And honestly, there's a lot of good stuff.

00:29:31.460 Michael Heiser is, I mean, he's controversial for some,

00:29:34.440 but I think there's a lot of-

00:29:36.320 When he's in his lane, he's pretty good.

00:29:38.320 It's when he has some really,

00:29:39.980 what I think is tremendously sloppy theology

00:29:41.900 when it comes to other areas like sovereignty

00:29:43.680 and other areas as well.

00:29:46.180 But there's compelling biblical arguments that he makes

00:29:49.160 that this, and not just like from ancient Near Eastern texts,

00:29:53.220 which is an area of his expertise.

00:29:55.120 There's actually compelling biblical evidence

00:29:57.040 in Psalm 82, Deuteronomy 32, that there is such thing.

00:30:01.220 Now, whether or not God,

00:30:03.220 like you're referencing in Genesis is saying,

00:30:05.120 let us make man in our image.

00:30:08.360 That's yet to be.

00:30:09.200 Classical interpretation of that verse

00:30:10.700 that God is Trinitarian.

00:30:12.400 Divine counsel view is that God is speaking

00:30:14.380 to the divine counsel and that the spiritual beings

00:30:17.320 that he made are imagers in the heavenly realm

00:30:20.320 and that men are imagers on the earthly realm

00:30:23.060 to oversimplify.

00:30:24.660 So there's also a category then there

00:30:26.500 that mixes up with how you,

00:30:28.200 whether you accept that or not as biblically sound

00:30:31.620 and then where you'd fit the divine counsel in

00:30:34.660 would be some subset of angelic or spiritual being as well.

00:30:39.860 Right.

00:30:40.160 Okay.

00:30:40.380 So that's classifications.

00:30:41.480 I feel like we've got,

00:30:42.340 we're, you know,

00:30:43.880 so that we don't make this a two hour episode,

00:30:45.640 So we've got to now talk about, okay, physical-spiritual dichotomy.

00:30:50.200 A lot of people think of angels.

00:30:51.960 This is what I'm saying.

00:30:52.660 They think of angels, messenger angels, like Gabriel, appearing to Mary.

00:30:57.120 They think of them in the same way that you would think about a theophany, right?

00:31:03.660 Because God really is, if we're talking about ontologically in terms of God's essence,

00:31:07.800 he really is a most pure spirit.

00:31:09.540 This is the confessional position.

00:31:11.120 A most pure spirit without body, parts, or passions.

00:31:14.420 meaning the parts, meaning that God is not divisible.

00:31:16.560 There's not one piece of God

00:31:18.240 that could be subtracted from the rest of God

00:31:20.120 and he'd still be God.

00:31:21.620 And philosophical, if we're doing, you know,

00:31:24.220 philosophical theology,

00:31:25.700 God is what we would call a simple being.

00:31:27.320 And we're not being demeaning in that sense.

00:31:29.020 God is the most complex, you know,

00:31:31.400 being in all the universe.

00:31:33.160 But a simple being, we're complex beings if,

00:31:36.100 you know, pardon the crude analogy,

00:31:38.180 but if we amputated your left arm, Ben,

00:31:41.240 you would still be bent.

00:31:42.720 You wouldn't lose your core identity.

00:31:44.400 You'd be bent, missing an arm, but you're still bent.

00:31:46.800 There's nothing, all that is in God is God.

00:31:49.660 There's nothing that can be removed from God.

00:31:51.740 And God is not the sum total of all his parts.

00:31:54.660 So it's not that, well, God has justice and has peace

00:31:57.600 and has this and has that.

00:31:58.880 He's not a composite.

00:31:59.300 And then, you know, these powers combined,

00:32:01.320 I'm captain planet.

00:32:02.400 That's not how God works.

00:32:03.760 So God is not without parts.

00:32:05.460 God without passions, impassibility, divine impassibility.

00:32:08.860 What we're saying is that first and foremost,

00:32:11.500 in the simplest sense, the divine cannot suffer.

00:32:14.560 The divine cannot die.

00:32:15.980 He is immortal.

00:32:17.080 And partly because the divine cannot change.

00:32:19.160 Right, right.

00:32:19.960 Because impassibility is really a subset of immutability.

00:32:23.420 Yes.

00:32:23.880 Because change, even change in feelings or emotive states,

00:32:29.520 God does not emote.

00:32:30.520 He's not a teenage girl.

00:32:31.960 And so what we have in biblical language

00:32:34.240 when speaking of God, and we'll come back to angels,

00:32:36.460 but when speaking of God is we have,

00:32:38.580 we should understand biblical language

00:32:40.660 underneath the banner of the doctrine of analogy

00:32:43.120 in two primary categories,

00:32:45.320 one being anthropomorphic.

00:32:47.620 So his eyes are roaming to and fro.

00:32:49.400 Well, he doesn't have a body.

00:32:50.520 He doesn't have eyes.

00:32:51.080 He doesn't have eyes, right?

00:32:52.040 His right arm is not short,

00:32:54.060 is mighty to save.

00:32:55.280 He doesn't have an arm.

00:32:56.380 So that's anthropomorphic language,

00:32:59.360 speaking of God in a physical way,

00:33:01.820 but with analogy, not literally.

00:33:05.220 Anthropopathic is speaking of God in an emotional way.

00:33:08.160 So like the Lord's anger flared up

00:33:10.160 And it flared up in a moment because he just came into new information

00:33:14.380 that previously he was unaware.

00:33:15.660 No, of course not.

00:33:17.080 He's the omniscient one.

00:33:18.120 He doesn't flare up.

00:33:19.680 He's not a petty God.

00:33:21.560 He's not the Greek gods who just get mad all of a sudden

00:33:24.900 and demand blood or wrath won't go away.

00:33:28.540 No, no, no.

00:33:28.980 God, before the foundation of the world, he did demand blood,

00:33:31.820 but he put that blood forward himself,

00:33:33.660 and he knew that he would require it

00:33:35.920 since before the foundation of the world were even laid.

00:33:38.660 Propitiation is actually a pagan term

00:33:40.640 to satiate the wrath of the gods,

00:33:42.780 but it finds its place in Christian theology

00:33:45.380 and even in the New Testament scripture.

00:33:47.340 But the one difference is that in Christian terms,

00:33:50.180 a propitiation is the sacrifice that God requires,

00:33:53.400 but that God also supplies.

00:33:55.120 It's the sacrifice that is God,

00:33:57.540 the son of God is the sacrifice put forward by God

00:34:00.440 to satisfy God.

00:34:02.880 And that's, I mean, this is the pastor moment,

00:34:06.080 preaching the gospel.

00:34:07.600 That's the gospel.

00:34:09.020 The substitutionary atonement 0.94

00:34:11.000 and that God puts forward the perfect lamb.

00:34:12.900 Behold, the lamb of God

00:34:13.840 that takes away the sins of the world.

00:34:15.480 All that being said,

00:34:16.480 anthropomorphic, emotional,

00:34:18.460 I'm sorry, physical, but analogy.

00:34:22.280 And then anthropopathic, emotional, but analogy.

00:34:25.400 All that is true of God.

00:34:27.860 And when we see appearances of God,

00:34:31.280 it is not him taking on flesh

00:34:34.280 unless, until we're talking about

00:34:36.400 the second member of the Trinity,

00:34:37.520 the God, man, Christ Jesus in the incarnation 2,000 years ago. But everything preceding that,

00:34:42.460 it's a theophany or Christophany. But I don't think when the Bible talks about angels that

00:34:48.580 we should apply our classical theism lens in a one-to-one ratio to angels in the way that we do

00:34:55.640 God. For me, the framework texts that confuse me in this regard are the passages describing

00:35:05.540 Christ's current state, that he is glorified man and he is at the right hand of God the Father.

00:35:12.620 In the phrases like that, we have a mixture of literal language and anthropomorphic analogical

00:35:18.740 language, because we know that Christ literally is seated because he is a glorified man. He has

00:35:25.140 flesh forever. And yet he's not seated literally at the right hand of God the Father, because God

00:35:31.800 the father does not have a right hand. Right. So we have a mixture of language and the same thing.

00:35:36.520 Half of it is purely literal. It's, it's, it's univocal language. The other half is analogical.

00:35:42.280 Right. When we talk about the angels, it seems to do the same thing. And so I am confused by it.

00:35:50.040 It called, yeah, they're, they're called spirits and they're also described as

00:35:53.160 very straightforwardly having these attributes that you can look at. Right. And it seems like

00:35:57.840 we were talking about this last night when you describe the the the living creatures

00:36:02.580 or the cherubim is it describing what it actually is right or is it describing some

00:36:09.260 analogy of what it is that's sensible to us or an analogy that really comes as a physical

00:36:15.180 description in the plain words of the text but is actually describing uh less of what they are

00:36:20.340 and more of why they are their role and their function yes so boving does this in in volume

00:36:25.920 two of his reform dogmatics, he discusses the angels. And he says that the rule of analogical

00:36:33.680 language also applies to them because they're pure spirit. And it's my understanding that they

00:36:38.660 take that from when he calls them ministering spirits. But that's the only thing. Pure spirit.

00:36:44.400 And they're saying angels are pure spirit. And so now- And pure male.

00:36:48.340 Yeah. But if you go, yes, angels are pure spirit, well, then you have to then say that all of the

00:36:57.940 language regarding any physicality of them would be analogical with no exceptions. And so he says

00:37:04.300 that the cherubim being, it's the majesty of the lion. It's the strength of the ox. It's the

00:37:10.180 swiftness of the eagle to carry out God's decree. And it's the dignity of the man that it matters

00:37:15.180 that it's doing this.

00:37:16.680 But all of that is analogical.

00:37:18.380 It's all true knowledge.

00:37:19.780 It's genuine takeaways about their nature,

00:37:22.240 but not about their appearance.

00:37:24.300 And so on the flip side of that-

00:37:26.440 Right, what you just said, true knowledge,

00:37:28.240 people need to understand that analogical language

00:37:30.380 in the Bible is not lying.

00:37:32.480 No, it's true.

00:37:33.380 It's all saying something true.

00:37:34.960 It's just in what sense is it true?

00:37:36.480 We're not agnostics.

00:37:37.520 It's true, genuine knowledge of God.

00:37:39.600 And so then on the flip side of that,

00:37:40.920 you have to reckon with,

00:37:43.500 We've already brought it up in another episode,

00:37:45.620 but texts like when Samuel's ghost appears

00:37:49.120 to Saul and the witch of Endor,

00:37:51.820 they can A, it's pure spirit. 0.52

00:37:53.640 It's not his body.

00:37:54.540 Right.

00:37:55.320 It's not his body coming out

00:37:56.940 of whatever grave Samuel's body is in.

00:37:58.180 At that time, it is pure spirit.

00:37:59.500 Right.

00:37:59.820 And yet they can A, recognize it as Samuel

00:38:01.800 and it is not omnipresent.

00:38:03.780 It's bound to a geography.

00:38:05.060 So pure spirit without a body.

00:38:06.260 It can also speak.

00:38:07.120 It's still a physical locale.

00:38:08.880 Right.

00:38:09.500 A spirit that's bound.

00:38:10.420 And it can speak.

00:38:10.960 I think that one, I told you guys this last night, I think that the answer is that there

00:38:15.860 is such thing as a spiritual body or a type that is real. And it would be improper for us to call

00:38:22.660 it physical, even though we, some of the things that we mean by physical, I think are true of it,

00:38:27.800 that it's real. And it's not just like a hologram, but that there's genuinely a different category

00:38:33.320 that we're actually making a category error when we try to reason our physicality into

00:38:38.560 this type of being. And 1 Corinthians 15 is an interesting passage to me on this, where Paul's

00:38:43.960 talking about the resurrection. And there are two ways I think you could think about this. One of

00:38:48.260 them makes sense for what I'm saying, and the other interpretation wouldn't. But he says,

00:38:51.500 how are the dead raised? 1 Corinthians 15, 35. With what kind of body do they come? You foolish

00:38:57.540 person. What you sow does not come to life unless it dies. And what you sow is not the body that is 1.00

00:39:02.000 to be, but a bare kernel, perhaps of weed or of some other grain. But God gives it a body as he

00:39:06.960 has chosen and to each kind of seed, its own body for not all flesh is the same. So he's saying in

00:39:12.500 the resurrection, there'll be different types of bodies. Your body will be to your resurrected body

00:39:17.140 as a tree is to the seed that grew it. So it's related, but it's not identical. He says for not

00:39:23.420 all flesh is the same. Now he's making a more basic point about the nature of flesh in general

00:39:27.800 or of bodies in general for not all flesh is the same, but there is one kind for humans and other

00:39:32.720 for animals, another for birds, and another for fish. There are heavenly bodies and earthly bodies,

00:39:37.660 but the glory of the heavenly is of one kind, and the glory of the earthly is of another.

00:39:41.840 Then he's, you know, the glory of the sun. So two ways you can think about that. Either Paul,

00:39:46.020 when he says heavenly bodies and earthly bodies, is talking about celestial bodies,

00:39:49.820 like the stars. That's one way you could think about that, that he's just talking, he's now

00:39:55.180 explaining it further when he says the glory of the sun, the moon, and the stars. Another one would

00:39:58.900 be to say that Paul is talking about the particular type of state of being that God gives to things

00:40:05.600 like heavenly beings, like angelic beings, which I think is at least possible. Which are, of course,

00:40:11.860 just stars. Yeah. And then if you go one step further and you understand that even in your

00:40:17.620 world, that is not what stars are, only what they're made of. But in that sense, then I think

00:40:23.200 that we're talking about a class of being that is not, it is spiritual, but that doesn't mean

00:40:30.880 that it's everything we often think of when we think of spiritual in this sense.

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00:41:47.780 Yeah, because we think of spiritual as living outside of any physical plane

00:41:52.400 in an ethereal, strictly, you know, 17th dimension type thing

00:41:55.580 that has no visible kind of, but that's...

00:42:00.160 It's like a thought.

00:42:01.360 Right, it's like a thought.

00:42:02.420 We think of spirit as like this thing that is totally intangible.

00:42:07.340 And what I'm saying is that I don't think the biblical evidence backs up

00:42:10.640 that that is what, when we're talking about created spiritual beings,

00:42:14.680 Again, to make the distinction,

00:42:16.520 there is this absolute gulf of being

00:42:18.920 between the creator and the creature.

00:42:21.300 You cannot reason from one to the other.

00:42:23.320 There is no analogy.

00:42:24.740 And those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.

00:42:27.500 And in terms of God in his essence, which is spirit,

00:42:31.660 we're not really going there.

00:42:33.060 We're not touching that.

00:42:34.340 We're talking about angels.

00:42:36.080 And what does it mean for them to be spirit?

00:42:37.820 He alone has a seity.

00:42:39.160 He's self-existent.

00:42:39.820 He's not created.

00:42:40.560 But God did create heavenly bodies.

00:42:43.100 Okay.

00:42:43.540 So, and I'm not, just to be clear right now,

00:42:46.480 because it's kind of in the zeitgeist,

00:42:47.560 I'm also not talking about like a spiritual resurrection,

00:42:50.200 full preterism type of stuff.

00:42:51.540 You get resurrected and you get a physical glorified body.

00:42:55.260 But I'm saying that I think we can argue.

00:42:59.100 Right now we're still awaiting the resurrection.

00:43:01.500 And so both for the damned and for those who are righteous,

00:43:05.620 there's a spiritual existence,

00:43:07.960 but still has some kind of substance to it.

00:43:11.080 In a sense that Samuel, like you said,

00:43:13.080 He could talk.

00:43:13.860 He could be recognized, which is huge.

00:43:17.520 And even the woman, I mean, the witch of Endor,

00:43:19.460 you can tell she's shocked.

00:43:20.580 It's like, you know, she had this familiar spirit

00:43:23.840 that she was using that would take on the form

00:43:25.800 and pretend to be whoever the dead, you know, 0.99

00:43:28.480 and she's ripping people off.

00:43:29.580 Like, oh, you want to talk to your mom?

00:43:30.860 You miss her so much.

00:43:31.780 Let me go.

00:43:32.060 Congratulations, it's the devil.

00:43:33.360 But at least back then, you know, the witches of Endor, 1.00

00:43:37.160 the mediums, at least they put forth an effort.

00:43:39.400 At least they had a spirit that, you know,

00:43:41.300 and whereas a lot of people today,

00:43:42.760 is like, well, just, there's not even,

00:43:45.040 they haven't even taken the time

00:43:46.340 to get a familiar spirit.

00:43:47.800 But that does happen today.

00:43:49.120 It reminds me of what we were talking about with Egypt

00:43:52.120 in that the gods of Egypt,

00:43:55.020 their witchcraft stopped working at some point.

00:43:57.680 That there is times in places

00:44:00.300 that are yet under darkness 0.87

00:44:02.260 or I think can return to darkness through apostasy

00:44:04.440 and corruption and grievous sin.

00:44:06.740 Actually, the judgment's more severe.

00:44:08.340 Where the magic starts working again.

00:44:09.980 This is what I'm concerned about.

00:44:11.140 We're going to talk about this in another episode.

00:44:12.760 with DMT and some of these spiritual pathways

00:44:15.140 opening through pharmakeia and degeneracy,

00:44:18.380 where some of those old doors

00:44:20.240 that are genuinely closed when a people turn to Christ,

00:44:23.380 you find genuine protection

00:44:24.920 because Paul says that we have power

00:44:27.660 to tear down every stronghold

00:44:29.280 and lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God.

00:44:31.720 Second Corinthians 10, three to five.

00:44:34.180 So-

00:44:34.600 And I think there's a corporate national application.

00:44:36.740 I believe that 100% that this is true of peoples.

00:44:40.060 I think it's true of individuals.

00:44:41.480 I think it's true of families.

00:44:42.780 I think it's true of schools.

00:44:44.180 I think it can be true of business entities.

00:44:45.880 I think it can be true of nations.

00:44:47.380 And even empires of nations.

00:44:50.900 But the problem is that when Jesus comes

00:44:53.600 and casts the demons out and it's filled,

00:44:57.140 the house is swept clean and put in order

00:44:59.300 and then filled with devotion to Christ

00:45:01.460 and the altar is erected to the true and living triune God.

00:45:04.780 But then the people become unfaithful and turn from God

00:45:08.300 and the house is now empty of the spirit.

00:45:10.640 then what happens is those demons, they don't disappear.

00:45:14.100 They went somewhere.

00:45:15.400 They're still around.

00:45:16.340 And then they come back with seven other demons worse than themselves.

00:45:20.560 And what Jesus talks about at an individual level,

00:45:23.640 I think that there is a corporate application for nations.

00:45:27.920 The West, because honestly, you know, G.K. Chesterton talks about this. 0.51

00:45:31.580 Like paganism is a hop and a skip away from Christianity.

00:45:34.240 Yeah, right.

00:45:34.840 And understand what I'm saying there in the sense that like paganism understands,

00:45:38.900 paganism gets supernatural.

00:45:40.640 they get spiritual, they get sacrifice, they get blood,

00:45:43.820 they get all these kinds of things.

00:45:45.180 It's only secular humanists.

00:45:46.940 It's only materialists that are all so sophisticated. 0.99

00:45:50.400 I feel like Jesus would look at Mr. Pagan Man and say, 1.00

00:45:54.420 I tell you the truth, you are not far from the kingdom. 1.00

00:45:57.260 Whereas he would look at your Western modern and say,

00:46:02.420 goodness gracious, you're the bottom of this arrow.

00:46:04.680 This is why you can read a book like Till We Have Faces by C.S. Lewis,

00:46:07.980 set in a pre-Christian pagan society,

00:46:10.640 And walk away from the book thinking,

00:46:12.500 wow, what a great book expositing Christian virtue.

00:46:15.500 And then you can read the Ransom Trilogy

00:46:18.260 and That Hideous Strength, also written by C.S. Lewis,

00:46:21.920 about a pagan society, post-Christian, 0.98

00:46:23.960 and think those people are damned to hell. 0.97

00:46:26.040 And there is no virtue in them whatsoever. 0.99

00:46:28.100 It's like what happened in Canaan. 0.59

00:46:30.060 Canaan, Joshua, who is Yeshua,

00:46:32.600 I mean, he's like a Christ figure.

00:46:34.580 And the people of God drive out the giants

00:46:36.680 and they drive out the pagans

00:46:37.960 and they don't do it perfectly,

00:46:39.000 but they do genuinely drive out Baal. 0.84

00:46:41.880 He's put to flight and Molech 1.00

00:46:44.180 and these human sacrificial cults. 1.00

00:46:46.400 Well, then what happens?

00:46:47.740 By the time Christ comes, 0.97

00:46:49.960 Israel has become like Egypt and Babylon. 1.00

00:46:52.640 It's full of unclean spirits. 0.99

00:46:54.840 The people are all oppressed by unclean spirits.

00:46:56.040 They're just drenched in demons.

00:46:57.440 And full of the most base,

00:47:00.020 like Herod slaughtering children, 0.68

00:47:01.840 just like Pharaoh. 0.87

00:47:02.880 Right.

00:47:03.740 You see the exact principle play out 1.00

00:47:06.220 that the Baals were cast out, 1.00

00:47:08.540 But then emptiness came, it became a desert waste, 0.99

00:47:13.620 a haunt of jackals and out.

00:47:14.940 And then it, of course, what happens when you have a vacuum,

00:47:18.640 it's a job description to the demons.

00:47:20.640 And so they flood back in and we're in danger,

00:47:23.520 that is happening.

00:47:24.660 We're also in danger of that further happening in our nation

00:47:27.100 with all of these trifling with demonic

00:47:30.780 and we could get a UAPs and a bunch of other stuff.

00:47:34.520 And we will.

00:47:34.860 And overall, we believe that the trajectory is likely long.

00:47:38.540 It could be thousands of years, and it's also up.

00:47:41.720 But we leave room for, when we say, oh, a little dip,

00:47:45.040 we're not talking about a bad week.

00:47:47.060 We're talking, like I say, we've been in a dip

00:47:49.740 since the Enlightenment, arguably, earlier.

00:47:52.460 And so big dip.

00:47:53.080 Could fully fall.

00:47:53.960 Oh, yeah.

00:47:54.620 America could absolutely, in fact,

00:47:56.100 in terms of tipping point, we're very far gone.

00:48:00.360 Yeah, it's likely that it will fall.

00:48:01.560 And you look back over the history of nations,

00:48:04.320 and we see many of the Eastern Christian realms

00:48:08.060 that were conquered by Muslims

00:48:10.280 are still Muslim today. 1.00

00:48:12.640 Muslim ruled today. 1.00

00:48:14.180 God sends chastening enemies in. 1.00

00:48:17.260 He doesn't withhold judgment ultimately

00:48:19.060 from those chastening instruments in his hand,

00:48:21.740 the demons or the pagans or whoever,

00:48:24.540 but he really does chasten his people.

00:48:26.760 Right.

00:48:27.040 And we really can be given over to these things.

00:48:29.160 So classes of angels,

00:48:30.500 and we've already done some of that

00:48:31.980 in terms of the how much should we understand

00:48:34.180 literally versus analogically.

00:48:36.360 And okay, so angels are spirit,

00:48:38.480 but there is a physical sense, a physical component,

00:48:41.420 which back to the Samuel, he comes up.

00:48:44.520 He doesn't just appear, but he's called up.

00:48:47.880 He's ascending from Sheol in the belly of the earth. 0.90

00:48:50.760 And we've talked about like the belly of the earth

00:48:52.540 that it seems as though, even though there's spirit,

00:48:56.100 this is before the resurrection, still waiting,

00:48:58.840 they're held in a physical space.

00:49:01.240 Right, I just wouldn't call it.

00:49:02.540 Whether it's in the belly of the earth.

00:49:04.680 Physical, yeah.

00:49:05.340 I would call it a heavenly body.

00:49:07.180 Okay, but I'm saying the space under the earth,

00:49:10.640 they're held in a physical space.

00:49:13.040 It's not just on another plane.

00:49:14.860 It's in this world.

00:49:16.020 It's in this world in a physical space,

00:49:18.000 like deep under the earth.

00:49:19.960 Same thing with the angels locked in gloomy dungeons.

00:49:23.600 Yeah.

00:49:24.160 Right?

00:49:24.400 They're not locked in a spiritual prison.

00:49:27.200 In an imaginary gloomy.

00:49:29.260 There probably are spiritual components to it,

00:49:31.120 But it's also a prison, very arguably, down in a physical place.

00:49:38.060 Let me ask you this.

00:49:38.960 Yeah.

00:49:39.360 So I'm thinking about Enoch and Elijah

00:49:41.460 and how they could maybe help conceptualize what we're talking about

00:49:46.000 because they were still in their physical bodies

00:49:47.880 when they were taken up to be with the Lord.

00:49:51.380 And there's debate as to what happened to them after that.

00:49:54.320 But they were in a heavenly place with a physical body.

00:49:58.600 We know that.

00:49:59.400 Just like Christ is now.

00:50:00.300 Possibly, yeah.

00:50:01.120 it's most likely. What do you think, because you just said you don't like the word physical.

00:50:07.760 So man is made from the dust of the earth. That's the earthly body is made from the dust.

00:50:14.640 Augustine in book eight or 11, I can't remember which, of City of God says that the angels were

00:50:19.880 created when God said, let there be light. Are you comfortable with saying that a heavenly body

00:50:23.700 could be, emphasis on could be, made of whatever light is that's not produced by a star or a source,

00:50:31.360 but just whatever God's, whenever God says, let there be light, and it just is.

00:50:34.420 Well, the thing is, what we see is always light with our eyes. It's always some kind of light.

00:50:40.320 I think I'm just most comfortable saying that I think that there is such thing as a heavenly body.

00:50:45.680 Yeah.

00:50:46.320 That is, if you want to call it physical with all the asterisks, that you don't necessarily mean

00:50:51.320 that it is made of kneecaps and the same components that a physical i would be i would

00:50:57.980 not want to say that in fact i would be much more comfortable saying even if it came to this that

00:51:04.780 this angels ministering spirits are able for a time to put on a physical body that is truly a

00:51:12.100 physical body but that's not their normative state at all times or in every situation i'm not

00:51:17.920 necessarily saying i actually believe that but i think i'd be more comfortable with that than

00:51:22.100 calling them physical i think they have a different type of i think it's a category error i think i

00:51:29.600 would be most comfortable saying that they have a body that's not an earthly body yes it's a

00:51:35.460 heavenly body but it is a body but it's a real body right and that the category doesn't mean

00:51:40.100 that you couldn't touch it yeah it doesn't mean couldn't see it doesn't mean you couldn't see it

00:51:45.420 couldn't hear it and it doesn't mean that they're even that's pure analog you know analogy that they

00:51:50.160 have eyes and wings and faces that i actually think that probably is what they are when you

00:51:55.640 see that and i think that the angels that appear as men i think that that actually is what they are

00:52:00.440 sure i just think it's a heavenly body it's just a it's not exactly the same type and that there's

00:52:06.120 some element there of mystery that is not explicated fully right to us okay yeah i i agree

00:52:12.940 with that. At least I think it's plausible. Last question. Angels being male. Yeah. Oh,

00:52:19.660 wait, guardian angels. Take it away, Joe. Yeah, I know, but we only have so much time. The answer

00:52:22.920 is yes, there are guardian angels. They take care of you. The answer is that every angel is a

00:52:27.300 guardian. Yeah, just like, okay. All angels are ministering spirits. Whether or not each individual

00:52:32.180 Christian has their own individual guardian angel. We don't know. We don't know. I've actually

00:52:36.240 strongly grown in opposition to that idea. Of to what? That we each have our own. Everyone has an

00:52:40.780 individual guardian angel right and the point is that we don't know because we're not supposed to

00:52:44.360 know because we're great at making things that ought not to be accessories accessories like an

00:52:48.220 angel's an accessory like well it's my angel no it's not it's actually not your no it's not right

00:52:52.760 so but but to your question about male right so okay so what are some of the passages in scripture

00:52:59.120 that talk about angels being female what yeah what is what is the passage what is what is it

00:53:03.920 is zachariah three i'm gonna look is that the one that everyone uh yeah zachariah i think it's four

00:53:09.320 Zechariah 4, probably.

00:53:11.440 Yeah, let me, you guys keep going

00:53:13.080 because that is literally the only time.

00:53:15.000 But I don't know of any of them, arguably.

00:53:17.320 Brian, you find it, but it talks about storks.

00:53:23.000 And it seems like, I mean,

00:53:24.600 there's a strong argument to be made

00:53:27.300 for like, these aren't even,

00:53:28.360 this is not even positive, this is negative.

00:53:30.200 These are like demonic spirits.

00:53:34.120 Or there's also an argument to be made

00:53:36.460 for these being using corporate language

00:53:40.180 and not individual angelic beings,

00:53:43.440 but like the two witnesses in Revelation, right?

00:53:46.000 You could interpret that as two individual people

00:53:48.080 bearing witness,

00:53:48.800 but you could also interpret it as two churches,

00:53:51.320 those kinds of things.

00:53:53.520 So Ben, take it away for a second.

00:53:55.680 Well, I was going to say,

00:53:56.800 the thing that I am curious about is,

00:54:00.940 and I think it's a really compelling point, by the way,

00:54:03.120 that your loaded question is getting to,

00:54:04.840 which is that there's no female quote unquote female angels but then how do we get female 0.94

00:54:11.700 demons zachariah five nine then i lifted my eyes and saw and behold two women coming forward 0.82

00:54:20.060 by the way this whole section is full of angels like the whole the whole thing in zachariah so

00:54:24.620 it's like this is totally normal in the context two women coming forward the wind was in their

00:54:29.080 wings they had wings like the wings of a stork and they lifted up the basket between earth and 0.84

00:54:33.880 heaven. And then I said to the angel who talked with me, what are they taking? Where are they

00:54:37.660 taking the basket? And he said to me, to the land of Shinar to build a house for it. And when this

00:54:42.240 is prepared, they will set the basket down there on its face. So that's the one passage in the

00:54:47.160 whole Bible. It says two women. That some people say, well, they had wings and they were women and

00:54:51.960 they were doing this thing that seems. In the context of other. Of a lot of other angels doing

00:54:56.740 stuff. That's the only even

00:54:58.560 plausible 1.00

00:54:59.320 female manifestation 0.99

00:55:02.700 of spiritual beings. 1.00

00:55:04.600 Right. I'm not convinced

00:55:06.860 that they're, I don't know that we can

00:55:08.940 be, but I'm not convinced that those

00:55:11.040 are the same

00:55:13.080 thing as an angel.

00:55:14.920 Right. But I'm also not

00:55:16.780 sure what to do with them if they're not.

00:55:18.660 Right. You know? Yeah.

00:55:20.620 It's kind of a tough one. Well, in the same way that

00:55:22.700 like the church, you know, like

00:55:24.860 Mother Kirk

00:55:26.280 might like you can use or a ship you know like uh the wind threatened to to break her apart 0.55

00:55:32.960 well god says he's like a mother hen yeah to us god god does use feminine language sparingly but

00:55:38.580 he does right one point that i've made this is exceedingly sparing a minute ago considering it's

00:55:42.520 the only text yeah i was a minute ago before we were recording had and i did i never thought i'd

00:55:49.100 never thought of before which is the idea that maybe because in the heavenly realm the heavenly

00:55:54.540 beings, that this is a, a place where in the heavenly realm, there isn't the feminine in this

00:56:00.220 sense that we're used to on earth because God himself is not, he does not have a feminine

00:56:06.420 component. Even what we just said about analogy, he's not, there is no God, the mother, there is

00:56:11.560 no sister God, there is father, son, and spirit all referred to by male pronouns revealed as

00:56:19.380 men, which makes sense then in how we are created in God's image hierarchically and

00:56:24.220 in our relationship as sexed beings, it makes sense to me that there wouldn't be

00:56:29.560 if that passage isn't a spiritual angelic being that exists in this class and we're just wrong,

00:56:35.600 but it would make sense to me that there wouldn't be female angels in this heavenly realm,

00:56:41.040 but that it would be a male, like it's weird to call it a male space because we're all,

00:56:45.480 ladies are going to be saved

00:56:48.100 and you know 1.00

00:56:48.900 obviously 0.98

00:56:49.200 women are Christians 1.00

00:56:50.380 women are going to be glorified 1.00

00:56:51.460 they're not going to be 0.66

00:56:51.940 they're not going to become men

00:56:53.140 like some of the

00:56:53.940 some of the false gospels

00:56:56.000 right

00:56:56.320 fake

00:56:56.900 what are they called

00:56:57.780 they're just like

00:56:58.480 Gnostic gospels

00:56:59.220 like Thomas

00:57:00.240 yeah

00:57:00.660 well now you can become a man

00:57:02.400 because you're a true

00:57:03.280 you've earned

00:57:04.280 didn't marry 0.72

00:57:04.960 become a man 0.72

00:57:05.520 you've earned it

00:57:05.940 in the gospel of Thomas

00:57:06.860 yeah like at the end

00:57:07.540 of the gospel of Thomas

00:57:08.480 I'm pretty sure

00:57:08.940 like that's the whole thing

00:57:10.200 she becomes a man now

00:57:11.000 and she's like

00:57:11.700 you're saved

00:57:12.160 you're a man

00:57:12.840 congratulations

00:57:13.520 but it's like

00:57:15.160 It's pretty funny.

00:57:16.000 I almost said based, but I really don't mean it.

00:57:18.420 I really don't mean it.

00:57:19.420 It would have been a joke.

00:57:20.120 No, no. 1.00

00:57:22.260 Woman is the glory of man. 0.84

00:57:23.600 She's an image bearer of God.

00:57:24.900 And in our class of being,

00:57:26.580 it is good and fitting that there is male and female.

00:57:28.580 Both male and female.

00:57:30.620 So God created man.

00:57:31.840 But angels aren't married or given in marriage.

00:57:32.700 God created man in his image,

00:57:34.340 but then mankind, both male and female, he made them.

00:57:37.600 So both male and female are bearing the image of God. 0.63

00:57:40.880 But in terms of glories, woman is the glory of man.

00:57:46.320 Man is the glory of God.

00:57:47.960 But glory and image, that's two different concepts being spoken of.

00:57:52.180 So both male and female made in the image of God,

00:57:54.640 but man bearing the glory of God, woman bearing the glory of man.

00:57:58.980 As it pertains to the heavenly realm,

00:58:01.560 I think what I struggle with is that competing glories.

00:58:06.540 This gets into head coverings.

00:58:07.940 This gets into a bunch of stuff, 1 Corinthians 11.

00:58:09.800 I mean, there's a lot here that we don't have time for at all.

00:58:13.080 Not even a little bit.

00:58:14.060 But one of the ideas of 1 Corinthians 11 of covering the head

00:58:16.780 is not just because even the angels that haven't fallen,

00:58:20.600 that remained in an upright, you know,

00:58:22.380 stayed in their proper abode, 0.92

00:58:24.960 that they're just, those angels are just such horned dogs.

00:58:27.620 You know, if they look down and see, you know,

00:58:30.320 the Christian church gathering on the Lord's day and worshiping,

00:58:33.220 they're like, yeah, the guy behind the tree, you know,

00:58:36.700 with that insanely cool yellow coat.

00:58:38.820 And so you got to, you know, cover the head, you know, hide your wife, hide your kids.

00:58:43.200 I don't think that's, you know, I don't think that's what's happening.

00:58:46.040 I don't think angels or rapists just waste effort opportunities.

00:58:48.720 And the other thing is, I agree with you that there was a fall of angels.

00:58:52.660 I don't believe that the angels are just willy nilly.

00:58:56.060 It's like, how many did we lose today?

00:58:57.940 Right.

00:58:58.460 You know, Michael's not reporting the numbers.

00:59:00.240 So the reformed view is that much like with Adam and Eve,

00:59:03.920 there was a period after which they would not have been tested anymore.

00:59:08.520 Yeah.

00:59:09.400 So had Adam not succumbed-

00:59:11.140 I agree with that one.

00:59:11.980 An angel gets its wings.

00:59:13.340 Right.

00:59:13.700 So yeah, so had Adam not succumbed,

00:59:15.560 all of Adam and Eve's progeny

00:59:17.120 would not have had the same test

00:59:18.600 because the covenantal head wouldn't have succumbed.

00:59:20.820 Right, it was a probationary period.

00:59:22.380 Eventually Adam would have achieved it

00:59:24.080 and all his posterity would have achieved it with him.

00:59:25.940 Angels-

00:59:26.420 The difference is,

00:59:27.500 the fundamental difference is that angels

00:59:29.160 are not covenantal as far as we know.

00:59:31.240 There's no federal headship.

00:59:32.260 Right, because they don't marry

00:59:34.400 nor are given in marriage. 0.95

00:59:35.620 They don't reproduce. 0.96

00:59:36.040 Not in heaven they don't.

00:59:36.720 Right, so they're all unique creations

00:59:38.560 that are uniquely created,

00:59:39.880 not generated from previous generations.

00:59:43.020 And so there's no,

00:59:44.900 the concept that we have of the covenant doesn't apply.

00:59:48.760 They may have a covenantal structure,

00:59:50.720 but it would be completely foreign to us.

00:59:52.780 So because of that,

00:59:53.780 it seems like the Reformed view

00:59:55.140 is that all of the angels were created at a single time,

00:59:58.940 that they're not still being made.

01:00:00.860 And they all had some period of testing.

01:00:05.080 Probation.

01:00:05.760 And then that was it.

01:00:07.940 And now they all have positively endowed holiness

01:00:10.380 such that they cannot fall.

01:00:11.780 They've all been created in a state of integrity,

01:00:13.740 but not immutable, right?

01:00:15.240 So without sin, without being fallen, but able to fall.

01:00:20.420 So state of integrity, but not immutable integrity.

01:00:23.920 But then angels, humanity would have achieved

01:00:26.080 that collectively.

01:00:27.420 Angels made at the same time,

01:00:29.500 but would achieve that individually.

01:00:31.360 And probably, I think it's safe to assume,

01:00:33.860 we don't say it definitively,

01:00:35.040 but it's plausible that they would achieve that individually

01:00:38.180 in a task-based scenario, like an angel gets his wings.

01:00:42.200 Almost like, it's a wonderful life.

01:00:44.740 Yeah, seriously, that's what I'm saying.

01:00:45.940 It is canon.

01:00:46.540 Basically, that's what I'm saying.

01:00:48.400 It's much like how Christ is Christ,

01:00:50.480 and the pastor represents Christ,

01:00:53.140 and then how the angelic ministers represent the deacons

01:00:56.080 who are tested for a time until their worth is proven.

01:00:58.640 Well, it could have been getting to Daniel

01:01:00.020 and beating the Prince of Persia, immutable now.

01:01:03.060 Like you were already in a state of integrity.

01:01:04.500 integrity even though there's no like positive this is exactly this i like this enough that i

01:01:09.780 now it's pretty awesome believe it whole i believe that i will fight to the death there's no it's

01:01:14.400 like primary water level well here's the thing there's no it's like there's gospel jesus christ

01:01:19.880 then primary water and then uh angels individually reaching a state of immutable integrity but i

01:01:25.540 would almost see task oriented i like the task oriented thing but i don't but i think it would

01:01:31.080 have all been at one time yeah like i don't think that maybe i'm okay with that but i mean i'm okay

01:01:35.560 with that too it's just either one makes sense that would be my sensibility yep kicking out

01:01:39.940 so all that being said angels my point with competing glories going back to that i don't

01:01:45.260 think so one the reason we got off on that for the listener just so that you're reminded is we

01:01:49.900 don't think that at this point in time at this juncture um that uh angels are still going to be

01:01:55.660 able to fall. Even within my theory, it's absolutely plausible that by these 6,000 years in,

01:02:02.140 2,000 years after Christ, in his incarnation and coming, that even at an individual basis,

01:02:08.880 that every angel, because so much of the angel's task was oriented to seeing through the Messiah.

01:02:14.560 And we see a third of the stars fall.

01:02:17.500 And they've already fallen, exactly.

01:02:19.260 In a chunk, it seems.

01:02:21.060 So all the angels that stayed in heaven, exactly, one fall in a chunk,

01:02:26.040 all the angels that stayed remained in a state of integrity,

01:02:29.420 but maybe individually hitting immutability, meaning unable to fall.

01:02:34.080 But by this point, they've all hit it.

01:02:35.920 They've all maxed out.

01:02:36.780 You're all good.

01:02:37.680 Or collectively, that's perfectly plausible.

01:02:40.060 Either way, they're all good.

01:02:41.260 So back to the glory kind of thing and female versus male angels.

01:02:45.180 The point is, I think it's silly to say that now, today, at this period of time, 0.99

01:02:51.300 that angels in heaven, a woman needs to cover her head

01:02:55.920 because they'll be tempted to rebel against God out of lust.

01:02:59.480 That's not it.

01:03:00.420 But this is what I do think, that when we worship,

01:03:03.380 there's a sense in which God in his mercy,

01:03:05.440 there is a sense that we could speak of condescension and not God demeaning us.

01:03:09.460 It's not despairing, but to say that God, that he tabernacles among us,

01:03:13.360 that he is willing to step down, as it were,

01:03:16.880 analogical language from his throne

01:03:18.680 in order to inhabit the praises of his people

01:03:21.260 and dwell with us.

01:03:22.540 But there's another sense,

01:03:24.160 and maybe the more important biblical sense,

01:03:26.880 in which when the church gathers for worship,

01:03:29.700 it's not just God condescending,

01:03:31.540 if there's any element of that at all,

01:03:33.280 but it's the church ascending,

01:03:35.320 that the church is now seated with him in heavenly places,

01:03:38.600 that we've ascended the delectable hills.

01:03:41.820 We're getting a glimpse of the celestial, that the church is going to heaven on the Lord's day,

01:03:46.360 that in the spiritual sense, we are gathering together and we are going to heaven. And if we're

01:03:51.520 going to heaven, so not about the angels and their lust problem for our women, it's not that. But if

01:03:57.640 we're going to heaven, in heaven, there is no competing for the glory of God. And man is the

01:04:04.780 glory of God, woman, the glory of man. So by concealing the woman, a head covering, it conceals 1.00

01:04:11.200 woman, which is the glory of man, so that man's glory, woman who's the glory of man, 0.88

01:04:14.940 is not competing with the glory of God. The glory of man is not rivaling the glory of God. The only

01:04:20.360 visible glory on display in heaven and within church on the Lord's day goes to heaven for

01:04:26.760 worship, the only visible glory on display is the glory of God. And that that is why the woman would 0.99

01:04:32.320 cover her head. Including the glory of God demonstrated in man? Yes. Because the idea isn't 0.93

01:04:37.940 necessarily competing glory is kind of the right term at least but it seems to me like

01:04:42.700 it's actually about all of the glories falling into their proper order

01:04:48.080 because the angels are glorious right there's a glory of the heavenly body and a glory of the

01:04:54.560 earthly body and a glory of the sun and glory of the stars but the the angels i think bear the

01:04:58.940 glory of god yes so it's all of it is god all of it's subordinate glory the glory of the way that

01:05:06.260 i describe glory all the time is the glory of a thing is the weighty goodness of that thing

01:05:09.900 being and doing what it was made to be and do right so it we have the glory of man who is the

01:05:15.900 glory of god and then he's bearing glory the woman was given to him to be his helper and she is his

01:05:22.660 glory so that needs to be covered to demonstrate right that's what i'm ordering okay yeah i full

01:05:28.000 i think that's great that's yeah exactly that's being covered so it's it's the only the only glory

01:05:33.360 on display is the glory of God.

01:05:35.460 Man is the glory of God.

01:05:37.500 Man's glory is not on display,

01:05:39.200 but man, who is God's glory,

01:05:41.660 is on, so God's glory,

01:05:42.840 and angels, I think, fall into,

01:05:44.900 I think it's the same principle.

01:05:46.260 Man is the glory of God. 0.85

01:05:47.520 Woman, the glory of man.

01:05:48.920 Angels are the glory of God. 0.99

01:05:50.620 Full stop.

01:05:52.080 I guess I still don't think

01:05:53.860 that precludes the possibility

01:05:55.280 of an angelic feminine 1.00

01:05:57.520 because the glory would be 1.00

01:05:59.940 properly ordered anyway.

01:06:02.100 Could be, at least.

01:06:02.680 Right, sure, they could be there and covered.

01:06:04.300 And it could just be one of those things that we don't.

01:06:06.360 Or whatever the covering would be.

01:06:07.720 Or even in the way God designed them,

01:06:09.240 they have a built-in covering or whatever.

01:06:10.620 Yeah, like I think. 1.00

01:06:11.860 And if there was a feminine angel,

01:06:13.660 you say, it would be fitting that we don't see a lot.

01:06:17.480 Yeah, no, that's what I'm saying.

01:06:18.760 It would be totally fitting.

01:06:19.480 It would actually be like they're in the mess hall of heaven

01:06:22.540 and they're cooking up the man.

01:06:24.820 Well, here's the thing.

01:06:26.560 God doesn't say, this is actually interesting.

01:06:28.900 I've never thought about this.

01:06:30.280 I'm kind of opening a door a little bit in my mind.

01:06:32.680 Because Jesus does not say that in heaven,

01:06:36.240 there aren't lady angels.

01:06:38.140 He just says they aren't married or given in marriage.

01:06:41.440 So it would seem like you could just say...

01:06:45.120 So I think what you're saying is compelling.

01:06:48.800 But then what I'm also saying is that I can't get...

01:06:51.540 But it doesn't have to be what I'm saying.

01:06:52.760 No, no, I understand that too.

01:06:54.460 I know that you're not like making dogma or anything.

01:06:56.340 But I'm also saying I'm not unconvinced

01:06:58.500 that Zechariah 5 is not mentioning feminine angels.

01:07:01.440 And because I can't actually think of anything,

01:07:05.060 even with properly ordered glories

01:07:06.700 and hierarchy of creation,

01:07:08.120 all of that being a basic presupposition.

01:07:11.280 I can't think of anything that would preclude

01:07:14.680 the possibility of a feminine spirit

01:07:17.320 as an ministering angel.

01:07:20.180 As a possibility.

01:07:21.140 Yes, as a possibility.

01:07:22.580 So conclusively, what we're saying

01:07:24.000 is that maybe.

01:07:26.540 Maybe, right?

01:07:28.140 Yep.

01:07:28.600 So we're out of time.

01:07:29.200 Definitely different classifications of angels.

01:07:30.980 And definitely masculine.

01:07:32.520 Yep, and definitely masculine, maybe feminine.

01:07:35.420 Definitely different classes of angels.

01:07:37.460 Definitely guardian angels.

01:07:38.540 Definitely guardian angels.

01:07:39.860 In a sense, not just you and your one individual.

01:07:41.700 Not like the Padre Pio way, but in the Calvin way.

01:07:44.900 Right. 0.67

01:07:45.200 There you go.

01:07:45.560 And then, yeah, and then definitely the masculine angel,

01:07:48.780 maybe the feminine angel.

01:07:50.520 And then in terms of spirit, yeah, spiritual bodies,

01:07:54.340 but that doesn't mean what you probably think it means.

01:07:57.720 Heavenly being doesn't mean there's no physicality.

01:08:00.560 Your body is nothing.

01:08:01.420 It doesn't mean just floaty.

01:08:03.720 You could see it with your eyes right now.

01:08:05.820 You could see it.

01:08:06.040 You could touch it.

01:08:06.820 Yes.

01:08:07.600 It could talk to you.

01:08:10.280 And they don't all just look alike.

01:08:12.460 It's bound by space.

01:08:13.620 You'd be able to pick one out.

01:08:14.760 That's Samuel.

01:08:15.900 Oh, that's the rich man.

01:08:17.520 That's Lazarus.

01:08:19.560 And then apply that to angels.

01:08:21.220 Those are people, but same kind of thing.

01:08:23.300 And that's before the resurrection.

01:08:25.040 I think we've solved like 80 to 90% of the problems.

01:08:28.560 You're all welcome, Christendom.

01:08:30.180 Yep.

01:08:30.420 Within that framework, male angels could absolutely procreate with the daughters of men. 0.72

01:08:38.720 Well, I think they did.

01:08:40.100 Especially those male angels in rebelling to God who left their heavenly abode.

01:08:43.860 Jesus only says that the angels in heaven.

01:08:46.600 They don't.

01:08:47.140 They don't.

01:08:48.200 It doesn't say they can't, but he says the angels in heaven.

01:08:50.620 There's two elements.

01:08:52.200 They don't.

01:08:53.620 That's meaning they're not willing to rebel against God in that way.

01:08:56.440 And angels who are in heaven.

01:08:58.180 We're talking about angels who left heaven.

01:08:59.920 and what they can do.

01:09:02.160 He's not talking about marriage.

01:09:03.860 And you're accused of doing something horribly unnatural.

01:09:05.680 Well, he's not talking about copulation.

01:09:07.880 He's talking about marriage.

01:09:09.060 Those are not the same thing.

01:09:09.880 Otherwise, fornication is an impossible category

01:09:11.760 is another objection as well.

01:09:14.380 So, I mean, to me, for other reasons,

01:09:18.080 it's clear that this did happen.

01:09:20.640 And so you have to add that as a data point

01:09:22.760 into your understanding of the thing.

01:09:25.100 Your angel.

01:09:25.880 Someone would call that a circular,

01:09:27.420 that I'm begging the question.

01:09:28.840 I get that.

01:09:29.420 but I'm convinced from the text.

01:09:30.940 Frankly, using that text as a proof text 0.99

01:09:33.860 against angels fornicating with women 0.99

01:09:36.960 and producing offspring is a midwit take. 0.96

01:09:39.100 See our published works. 0.99

01:09:40.260 Right.

01:09:40.840 Like it's been addressed.

01:09:42.300 Right here.

01:09:43.040 Dude.

01:09:44.500 I'm with you.

01:09:45.340 All right.

01:09:45.660 Well, thank you guys for tuning in.

01:09:46.860 Real quick, right here at the end,

01:09:48.040 I just wanted to remind you to become a member

01:09:49.900 at patreon.com forward slash right response ministries.

01:09:54.800 Exclusively for our Patreon members,

01:09:56.400 we have all 10 episodes, early access, ad-free.

01:10:01.340 Some of my favorite episodes to be looking forward to

01:10:03.760 is episodes that deal with Bigfoot or fairies

01:10:06.760 or ghosts or angels or giants

01:10:09.380 or particularly our episode on witches.

01:10:12.500 If you wanna watch these episodes now

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The NXR Podcast - June 07, 2024

THE FRIDAY SPECIAL - Angels ｜ Classifications, Physicality, & Sexes

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