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Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
Culture and society often produce sweet and cute images of angels.
Hallmark, Etsy, precious moments, they all do their part in this.
And there’s fondness for guardian angels,
and having guardian angel pins and little plaques on dashboards of our cars
but angels do guard us angels do guard us and in 2nd Kings the prophet Elisha
was protected by an army of angels Peter was freed from prison by an angel in Acts
chapter 12 and Psalm 91, which we sang in that really beautiful gradual, the
angels guard you in all your ways. But angels in the Bible are often awesome
and even scary beings. And in the second reading today from God’s revelation to
St. John, angels are warriors. They’re not just guardians or trying to get
their wings in heaven. They fight. Angels fight for us and we need them. We need
them because we’re at war. We’re at war with the serpent, with the devil, Satan.
We’re at war with evil and there are evil angels at war with us. Martin Luther
in the small catechism says the evil angels are many and powerful they hate
God and seek to destroy everything that is good especially faith in Christ. Make
No mistake.
The devil, Satan, and his evil angels,
they hate you.
And they fight to keep you away from what’s good
and away from God.
Evil angels don’t fight to cause you trouble
or to ruin your day or make life miserable for you.
No, they fight to deceive you and accuse you
and to destroy your faith in Christ they want to destroy you and sometimes
sometimes they win don’t they we’re tempted and deceived and we fall for it
we sin in thought word and deed maybe even doing things that would be
considered downright evil our focus goes off of Christ and our faith in him and
unto ourselves on pleasing ourself and then we’ll justify it with some lame
excuse and you know those times you know the war that you’re fighting but Michael
and his angels they fought against this evil and they won but they don’t fight
and win because they have special training like the Marines or the Navy
seals they have the authority of Christ they have the salvation and the power
of God’s kingdom that Jesus has won for us and Jesus won this by dying on the
cross and rising again from the dead for our forgiveness and for our eternal life
this this is salvation this is the power of God’s kingdom that Jesus has won for
us Jesus won this for us for those times when when the evil angels win when
you’re deceived when you sin again you you know those times you know the war
that you’re fighting but that war has been won Jesus gives us the benefits of
that victory he gives us forgiveness and eternal life and and that my friends
that is the gospel that is the good news of Jesus that is the good news from God
for us in Christ Romans chapter 1 kind of defines it the gospel is the power of
God for salvation to everyone who believes and that’s why evil angels want
to destroy your faith in Jesus is because faith clings to that gospel
faith receives the promises of the good news of Jesus faith clings to forgiveness
and salvation and st. Michael and his angels fought against that and to
reserved that and they fought with that authority the authority of Jesus and the
saints that have gone before us and are now with the Lord they fought with it
too verse 10 in the Revelation reading today says the accuser of our brother
brothers and sisters our brothers and sisters has been thrown down the accuser
been thrown down our brothers and sisters they fought and won verse 11
they fought and won with the authority of Christ with his blood and with the
word of their testimony that word of testimony that’s their faith in the
conquering blood of Christ the blood that he shed for their forgiveness and
for ours and they testify to the words of that forgiveness they fought and
they won also by the authority of Christ and so do we we experience the authority
of Christ today in the gospel reading in in that reading from Luke Jesus gave
authority to his people over the enemy we to fight against Satan and evil with
that same authority of Jesus with that same testimony of Christ and his blood
shed for us we fight with our faith as have all those who have gone before us
because we we can fight temptation when it comes up and we can win when we
fight and win. It causes Satan to fall from the heavens. That’s the power of the
authority of Christ that we can experience and exercise today. We
experience it together. We experience that authority of Christ when we gather
together in worship and we confess our sins together. And it’s during that time
when the pastor gets to say what is probably one of the most
important things that they say all week. They say, as a called and ordained servant
of Christ and by His authority, I forgive you all of your sins. You are forgiven by
Christ’s authority. And the angels and St. Michael fought for that and won. You
You know, in Texas, snakes and scorpions are kind of a thing, right?
Things we’ve got to be aware of, things we’ve got to be careful about here, but not in our
spiritual lives.
With the authority of Jesus, with His blood and the testimony of His Word, we step on
and crush the enemy with that forgiveness and that salvation that Christ has won for
us.
and in a way I want to commend to you to help you in this to help you to to
fight this this battle against against evil and evil angels and and and to win
is is in Luther’s morning and evening prayers maybe you’re aware of those but
if not to find page 266 in the hymnal don’t don’t have to look it up now but
extra points if you do later on page 266 or google it
Martin Luther’s morning and evening prayers in there are these beautiful
words in the prayer let your holy angel be with me that the evil foe may have
no power over me that’s that’s way better than a guardian angel pin or a
cute angel figurine in your house let your your holy angel be with me that the
evil foe has no power over me because he’s lost.” Angels are messengers.
The Greek word for angel, Angelos, means messenger. And in the Scriptures, angels usually have
a message of some sort. Well, here’s a message that they have today that’s of great comfort
for us, I think. The angels say, I’ve lost it in my notes here, this is great, yeah.
Sometimes the angels message is this, Satan, you lose. Your red pointy tailed
butt has been kicked, or whatever he looks like, we don’t know, you know. They
say, get out of heaven, get away from God’s people. Jesus shed his blood for
them, forgives them, delivers them from death. Salvation and the power of God and
his kingdom have come, you’ve been thrown out, get out, don’t come back.
Saint Michael and his angels have won this for you, and we’re still at war, we
still fight in that but we celebrate their victory for us and the final
victory when Christ comes again at the end of the Revelation reading and the
gospel both times there the beautiful word rejoice yeah you’re fighting a war
but it’s been one rejoice may God grant it amen now may the peace of God which
passes all understanding keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus
Bless us, our Lord.
Amen.
