The Angels That Ministered to Jesus
The Bible identifies angels as “ministering spirits” (Heb. 1:14), and we find them ministering to their incarnate King in times of trial. Today, Sinclair Ferguson looks at two of these moving moments in Jesus’ life.
Welcome again to Things Unseen, and especially if you’re new to our podcast. We’ve devoted this week to thinking about angels in the run-up to Christmas. And we ended yesterday reflecting for a moment on the visit of the archangel Gabriel to Mary to announce the coming of the birth of Jesus. And we certainly see the wonderful ministry of angels in His life. Now, you might think that’s not surprising because He’s their Creator and their King, but I think it’s worth noting that angelic appearances in Scripture come in clusters, especially when the kingdom of God has reached a crucial point of either advance or severe conflict, and that’s exactly what we find in the life of Jesus, both of them.
I said yesterday that the description given to these angelic creatures in Daniel 4 is a very interesting one. They are “watchers,” and they were watching over Jesus during His ministry. Remember how He said He could call twelve legions of angels, and they would come at a moment’s notice (Matt. 26:53)? He didn’t actually call for their help at that time, but there are a couple of occasions mentioned in the Gospels when the angels did come, and they came specifically to minister to our Savior. I find them very moving incidents, and today, I want to reflect on them, just for a moment or two.
The first occasion is early in His ministry. Jesus had been baptized, and then, you remember, He was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to face down the devil. It’s really a rerun of the garden of Eden in a sense, isn’t it? But our Lord is in the wilderness, not in a garden, and He’s surrounded by wild beasts, not by tame animals. His situation is the very antithesis of Adam’s. And you’ll maybe remember how Matthew tells us that when the devil left Him, “behold, angels came and were ministering to him” (Matt. 4:11). He must have been absolutely exhausted. We don’t know how many came, but you can imagine the privilege they must have felt.
I remember a wonderful associate minister I once had preaching a children’s sermon on Jesus as the Light of the World, the Light that couldn’t be extinguished. And he had brought along a very realistic everlasting candle and invited the children to blow it out. The first tried and failed, and then the second, and then the third, and there was such eagerness to be the next to try, each child confident he could do it, that I thought for the moment there was going to be a riot in the church. It was fantastic. And when I think of the enthusiasm of those children, unable to contain their cries of, “Let me try,” I can imagine the eagerness the angels must have felt: “Let me go to minister to my King”—no, hungry and weak, tempted, surely physically exhausted as the temptations climaxed and they saw Him in His fragility. So, it’s well there is no jealousy among these angels in heaven, don’t you think, when the Father said just to some of them, “Go to My Son and minister to Him.”
But isn’t it interesting—and I think it’s important to notice—it wasn’t the angels who overcame the devil or resisted the temptations. They didn’t act for Jesus or instead of Jesus. He won the victory, and they ministered to Him. I wonder how they did that. Was it perhaps just by being there because they loved Him? Who knows, perhaps one of them knew what to do because he’d been in charge of the ravens who had looked after Elijah. And maybe one day, we’ll know too, for if you think about it, the only person who could let others know about the visit of those angels was the Lord Jesus Himself.
But then, when we turn to the end of Jesus’ ministry, we find another angelic visitation. This time, only one angel was sent. It happened in the garden of Gethsemane. Jesus was praying that if it were possible, the cup of judgment and dereliction might be taken from Him. But it wasn’t possible for Him to be saved from death and us to be saved from condemnation. And Luke tells us, “There appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him” (Luke 22:43).
Again, we don’t know exactly how he did that, but I wonder if you’ve ever noticed the rather surprising words that follow. I think we might expect to read that thus strengthened, Jesus resolutely committed Himself to drinking the cup. But listen to Luke’s account: “There appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening Him. And being in an agony he prayed even more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down on the ground” (Luke 22:43–44). Far from easing the strain, far from diluting the challenge, far from somehow making it easier for Jesus, the angel’s presence only strengthened Him to face the depth of the challenge that awaited Him and to experience it in an even more overwhelming way. Who knows if the angel said anything; all we know is that he came to strengthen Jesus. And surely, all the angels watching must have been holding their breath at the suffering of their King and that He was willing to undergo that for us.
The famous Scottish minister, Alexander White, used to say that after he had seen the Lord Jesus in glory, he would most of all want to meet the angel who strengthened Him in Gethsemane. I think you can understand why he said that, can’t you, because this is the angel who was so close to Jesus as He made His way to the cross of Calvary. What a great Savior our Lord Jesus really is.
