Olive Drive Church
Lesson 16 Thursday, October 8, 2015
Teaching Outline
Q20. What kinds of angels are there?
A: The Bible tells us of two kinds of angels: elect angels and fallen angels (demons). Elect angels are those whom
God ordained not to fall but to serve and enjoy God and His ways. Fallen angels (demons) are evil angels who sinned against God and now continually work evil in creation. There is no redemption for fallen angels.
Introduction
Last week we saw that the Bible teaches that there are angels. They are created by God and have limited power and are under God’s control. We know angels are real. We briefly looked at elect angels. Tonight, we will finish the study of elect angels and then we will move to fallen angels. Finally, we will finish with a study of Satan.
I.
Two Kinds of Angels
The Bible tells us that there are two types of angels. The first category of angels is that of elect angels. In I
Timothy:
I Timothy 5:21 In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of the elect angels I charge you to keep these rules without prejudging, doing nothing from partiality.
Paul, the apostle, tells us that there are elect angels. These angels did not follow Satan in his rebellions. Elect angels are willing servants of the most high God. The elect angels have responsibility. They are to worship God and do His will. A Psalm of David:
Ascribe to the LORD, O heavenly beings, ascribe to the LORD glory and strength. Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name; worship the LORD in the splendor of holiness. (Psalm 29:1-2)
These elect angels rejoice in God’s work: when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy… (Job 38:7)
Jesus, in Luke, tells us that the angels rejoice when a sinner repents. When someone comes to Christ, they show great excitement: Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents. (Luke 15:10) Notice first that the elect angels are glad in watching the work of God. That the angels are glad to see people turn to Christ and to come into the kingdom. Remember that we are made lower than the angels.
Second, notice that the angels show emotion. They shouted for joy in Job 38:7 and now Jesus tell us that they experience like emotion at the salvation of a sinner.
Another responsibility of angels is that they do God’s will. What that means is God gives them power to go forth and accomplish his will. This can be through different means such as weather, (Psalm 103:20 Bless the LORD,
O you his angels, you mighty ones who do his word, obeying the voice of his word!) guiding the affairs of the nation, (The prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me twenty-one days, but Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, for I was left there with the kings of Persia, Daniel 10:13)
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being tasked with protecting believers,
( For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone. Psalm 91:11-12)
(See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven. Matthew 18:10)
(Hebrews 1:14 Are they not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation…) and sent forth to punish the enemies of God.
(Now the Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul, and a harmful spirit from the LORD tormented him. 1 Samuel
16:14)
( On an appointed day Herod put on his royal robes, took his seat upon the throne, and delivered an oration to them. And the people were shouting, "The voice of a god, and not of a man!" Immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down, because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by worms and breathed his last. Acts 12:21-23)
(Then I saw another sign in heaven, great and amazing, seven angels with seven plagues, which are the last, for with them the wrath of God is finished. Revelation 15:1)
I am only giving you a couple of examples. There are multiple examples of the employment of elect angels.
Elect angels are part of the created order and we should praise God that He would create these spirit beings to do his will. We must also understand that they are created to bring Him glory and to be obedient just as we are. Elect angels do nothing but obey God. Angels are either good or evil in Scripture. Scripture also teaches that the fallen angels rebelled a long time ago. This means that elect angels are not choosing to rebel in the here and now meaning the elect angels will not suddenly fall. There will not be any more angels that will follow Satan than already have. By the very word Paul uses to call these elect angels means the same it does for us- that God chose them. Also understand that the elect angels are battling Satan and the fallen angels. The final thing I would encourage us to remember about the elect angels is that God has only revealed what is necessary for us to glorify Him.
Much of our world speculates on the nature of the spiritual world. They do more than speculate- they create loads and loads of fiction leading people astray. We need to speak to these things when we come into contact with them. To allow people to continue to be deceived when it is within our power to correct is to participate in the deception. By understanding what the Bible says about the elect angels, you can share how they are involved in the narrative of Scripture. They are supporting roles in the unfolding of God’s redemptive plan. That is, they are ministering spirits first and foremost to the Son of God Jesus Christ because He is God.
Now, we move on to the fallen angels otherwise known as evil or demons. The word demon/demons is used
122 times in the New Testament. It is used three times in the Old Testament. All three uses of the word link demons to idolatrous worship.
Leviticus 17:7 So they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to goat demons, after whom they whore. This shall be a statute forever for them throughout their generations.
Deuteronomy 32:17 They sacrificed to demons that were no gods, to gods they had never known, to new gods that had come recently, whom your fathers had never dreaded.
Psalm106:37 They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to the demons…
We will come back to these verses. The fallen angels followed Satan in his rebellion. The Scriptures teach us that hell was designed for Satan and His followers. The Scriptures do not speak about how the angels fell or what
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caused them to rebel against a good, loving and gracious God or why they would follow a tyrannical leader like Satan.
We must also remember that Satan is an angel and nothing more; though, he was the chief angel. We will discuss more on Satan later. We will now look at the employment of fallen angels. In session one, we looked at what angels are, how they are created, their makeup, and though I used mostly elect angel passages, their makeup is the same in spiritual composition as with all angels. They are all spirits. Fallen angels are different in aim. They model the attributes of their chief, Satan, which are opposite of those of a good and gracious God.
Evil or fallen angels oppose God and strive to defeat His will.
And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day… (Jude 1:6)
Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. (1 Peter 5:8)
So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. (2 Corinthians 12:7)
Not only do they strive to defeat God’s will and oppose God, evil angels hinder man’s temporal and eternal welfare.
While he was yet speaking, there came another and said, "The fire of God fell from heaven and burned up the sheep and the servants and consumed them, and I alone have escaped to tell you." (Job 1:16)
And behold, there was a woman who had had a disabling spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not fully straighten herself. (Luke 13:11)
And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day? (Luke 13:16)
Even though evil angels oppose God and hinder man’s welfare, we see that God still uses them for His glory.
No matter how they try to fight to the contrary, they are servants of the God who created them.
God’s word tells us that He sovereignly uses the evil spirits and He does so for His great purposes.
(Judges 9:23, 1 Kings 22:23, 1 Samuel 16:14)
God is good and everything He does is good. So, if these things seem perplexing to us, we must remember that God works all things according to the counsel of His will and for His glory. It may be hard to understand how God can use evil demons like this, but we must remember that all that He is doing is right and good.
Additionally, we, of course, see God’s sovereignty over demons in Christ’s time on earth in flesh. The demons proved to be at utter submission to our Lord Jesus:
(Matthew 8:32, Mark 1:25-27)
Then a spirit came forward and stood before the LORD, saying, 'I will entice him.' (1 Kings 22:21)
We see that God uses false spirits. He uses an angel that will deceive Ahab. God does not lie. We know that from Hebrews. Here, this angel’s aim is to deceive. God is going to use this false spirit to bring about His will. I don’t think we can fully wrap our heads around this, but we can understand the fact that God is sovereign and that God is good and everything He does is good. He cannot deny His character which is truth. Also, understand that Ahab was a wicked king and one of God’s punishments for wickedness is that you dig yourself in deeper. This could be God’s judgment coming to fruition.
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He let loose on them his burning anger, wrath, indignation, and distress, a company of destroying angels. (Psalms
78:49)
…holding faith and a good conscience. By rejecting this, some have made shipwreck of their faith, among whom are
Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme. (1 Timothy
1:19-20)
We see demons promote idolatry.
Leviticus 17:7 So they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to goat demons, after whom they whore. This shall be a statute forever for them throughout their generations.
Deuteronomy 32:17 They sacrificed to demons that were no gods, to gods they had never known, to new gods that had come recently, whom your fathers had never dreaded.
Psalm106:37 They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to the demons…
Revelation 9:20 The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk…
Hopefully, you are noticing what I am noticing. In these verses, we expect to see idolatry in the Old Testament especially that of stone, wood, and metal idols. What is noticeable is the Revelation passage. The reality is that we are still serving idols and there is very real warrant that when we give ourselves over to these idols, that we are continually influenced by demonic forces especially in the life of the unbeliever. What do the Scriptures say about the god of this world blinding their minds? So many times we see idolatry in the Old Testament and think that could not happen to me. We participate in it all the time willingly. TV is an idol of our day and age. How many of us have TV in our house? How many things that glorify God come across the screen? How many of the shows you watch are not based around adultery, murder, theft, lying, cheating, sensuality, divorce (which God has clearly said He hates), greed, heresy, or blasphemy? Even when watching sporting events these are broken. If needed, are you willing to chuck it out and not allow those things that are against God and His declared will in your home? If not, then it is an idol! Based on this, there are probably demonic forces at work. You as a believer are no longer under the dominion of sin and Satan. God has given you the power to toss these things off. This is only one example. There are many others.
Evil angels also promote rebellion.
And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience--among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. (Ephesians 2:1-3)
And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
(Matthew 16:18)
Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons… (1 Timothy 4:1)
Now let’s take a few minutes to wall through how fallen angels effect humans. i.
Blindness – Matthew 12:22 Then a demon-oppressed man who was blind and mute was brought to him, and he healed him, so that the man spoke and saw. ii.
Mute
– Luke 11:14
Now he was casting out a demon that was mute. When the demon had gone out, the mute man spoke, and the people marveled.
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iii.
Seizures - Matthew 17:15-18 says, "Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and he suffers terribly. For often he falls into the fire, and often into the water. And I brought him to your disciples, and they could not heal him." And Jesus answered, "O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him here to me." And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was healed instantly. iv.
Deranging the mind – you can look these up later. There are multiple other ways demons effected humans in the Gospels. None of them were loving, caring or helpful. Even the girl in Acts who could predict the future was not good. It allowed for people to use her.
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Insanity - Luke 8:27-29
2.
Suicide - Mark 9:22
Let’s speak about the abilities of demons. Their abilities are, for the most part, the same as elect angels only they use their God-given ability to try and oppose God. Also, understand that there is never a case where an elect angel possesses a person or influences them in such a way that they cannot resist. With fallen demons, this is not the case. Demons will influence and even control a person in such a way that the person cannot resist.
Supernatural intelligence:
Act 16:16-17 As we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit of divination and brought her owners much gain by fortune-telling. She followed Paul and us crying out, These men are servants of the Most High God who proclaim to you the way of Salvation.
Mark 1:23-25 And immediately there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit. And he cried out,
"What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are--the Holy
One of God." But Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Be silent, and come out of him!"
James 2:19 You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe--and shudder!
Supernatural strength:
Mark 5:1-4 They came to the other side of the sea, to the country of the Gerasenes. And when Jesus had stepped out of the boat, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit. He lived among the tombs. And no one could bind him anymore, not even with a chain, for he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but he wrenched the chains apart, and he broke the shackles in pieces. No one had the strength to subdue him.
Acts 19:16 And the man in whom was the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered all of them and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.
Supernatural feats:
II Thessalonians 2:9 The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders,
Revelation 13:13 It performs great signs, even making fire come down from heaven to earth in front of people,
Now the 800 lb elephant in the corner everyone is wanting to ask about is something like this: do you believe in demon possession in this modern age? Who do you believe can be possessed by a demon? These are valid questions. I want to preface this by making a statement: God is sovereign and there is nothing that happens that
He does not decree.
I do not use the word possession usually. Notice earlier in the lecture, I did not use the language about fallen angels that I used for elect angels because I want to make sure everybody caught my meaning up to this point. The
ESV does not use the word ‘possess’ when speaking of demonic influence. It speaks that a person has an evil spirit, etc. The Scriptures also speak of varying levels of influence etc. from health issues and functionality to seizures and
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the lack of ability to function as a normal person. This is why I use the word demonization -that a person is influenced by a demon. This can be from an issue of blood to full control of a nonbeliever . (Luke 11:13-16, Mark 5:2-4)
A believer can be influenced by a demon at different levels, but cannot be possessed or placed under demonic dominion as they are no longer in the kingdom of Satan. (Romans 6, Ephesians 2:1-5) They have the Spirit in them that raised Christ from the dead. (Romans 8:11, 15)
We have seen elect angels and fallen angels. The elect angels serve God willingly. The fallen angels rebelled against God with Satan yet we have clearly seen that even though they rebel, fallen angels are subject to God’s rule and will. They can do nothing without His express permission or ordination. We will see this more fully in the next section on Satan. We must remember to fear God not any of the created order because we are governed by a sovereign
Creator, who is just, right, holy, good, faithful, merciful, jealous, has a holy love, and is graceful.
Now let’s finish out our study of fallen angels with the chief of the fallen angels. The catechism statement goes like this:
Q21. Who is Satan?
A.
Satan opposes God as the chief of all fallen angels by deceiving, tempting, and lying. Satan only has the access and ability that God permits him.
Let’s start with the origin of Satan. He was created at the same time as all the other angels and because
God said that His creation was good, I infer that Satan had not fallen yet. … when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy… (Job 38:7).
Notice it says ‘all’ the sons of God. This is a name for those angels.
It is also used of man. In this text, it is clearly speaking of heavenly host and the usage is implying that God is speaking of all that he had created.
The next question that is going to be on our mind is: if God created Satan holy, how could He sin and rebel? In other words how did Satan fall? I don’t know and the Scriptures do not really say. Paul alludes to pride growing in his heart. Some of you may have heard Isaiah 14:12-14 and Ezekiel 28:12-15 as descriptions of Satan’s fall. Historically these passages are speaking of a king. The prose used for this is typical of how kings were spoken of in that day.
Beale makes a case for Ezekiel 28 speaking of Adam and not Satan. There are inscriptions and supplementary material that use this kind of language speaking of other kings. The second reason is that there is really nothing in the text to tell me that I need to take this to mean Satan or that it is about the fall of Satan
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. That means that I have to read something into the text or that I am coming to the text with preconceived notions about this text- that it fits this model. We need to be extremely cautious. Therefore, I am not drawing the conclusion that Isaiah or Ezekiel are speaking about Satan.
Let us move on to the works of Satan. Open your Bibles to Job chapter 1. We are going to spend some time walking through this text as it is important for us to see and understand. Job lived in the land of Uz –pronounced like
Utz (the potato chip). The Scripture speaks of Job as a righteous man (blameless and upright) who feared God. He offered sacrifices for all his children. He was extremely prosperous. Some would put Job’s wealth at 5.2 million today- upper echelon.
In the next section, we see that the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord. Sons of God is meaning angelic beings. This seems to be something that happens regularly by Job 1:13, 2:1. As these angelic beings come before God, Satan is with them. This should be a very strange scene to us. As the Scriptures say, God’s eyes are pure and He cannot look upon sin. So, obviously, Habakkuk 1:13 is not to say it is impossible for God to look upon iniquity, but that God has such a disdain for sin. Not only does Satan appear before the Lord here, the New
Testament speaks of Satan as the accuser of the brethren, but we have an advocate that defends us.
As Satan is there, the Lord says to him, “Where have you been?” and “…going to and fro in the earth” is
Satan’s response. The Lord bates Satan more, “Have you considered my servant?” There are a couple of things to note. Satan comes before God. The Lord then proceeds to bring Job up to Satan. Satan obviously had thought about
1 This is a tough passage context of the passage is judgment of Tyre. The language is poetical stating how blessed the king of Tyre was.
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Job because he knew Job’s circumstances and that God had blessed him. Satan then proceeds to state that he could make him turn away from God.
Satan does not know the end otherwise, he would not have made the statements. Satan is not omniscient. Satan can guess the outcomes. Nowhere in Scripture does it give Satan the power to read minds or know anything exhaustively. Satan is on a leash with his power. God limits how far or what Satan can do to Job. We should see the sovereignty of God in this and also that nothing comes to us without the express permission of God. We have no need to fear Satan or his demonic host because they are controlled by a sovereign God.
Satan is not omnipresent like God is, so while he is a spiritual being, he can't attack in all locations at one time. So, I'm pretty sure people like us aren't commonly his attack target so to speak. There are bigger fish to fry. But, he does command demons who do his work throughout the world, but, based on how Scripture talks about our struggles and demonic forces, I think it's safe to deduct that most of our problems are from our sin nature
(unbelievers) or remaining indwelling sin (believers). It doesn't take Satan or a demon for us to be crazy, overwhelmed, tempted, stressed, terrified, etc. Sin does that to us. Demonization is a biblical reality for unbelievers.
The paradigm from Job shows that we need to be faithful and continue in the faith, trusting in God, and being obedient to His commands no matter the forces arrayed against us.
Just to recap, Satan is limited in knowledge, power, ability, and parameters of use of all these things by the sovereign God of all creation. Now, let us look at what Satan does do. I think one of the easiest ways to do this is to look at his names and what they mean.
Name Meaning Citation
Satan Adversary Matthew 4:10
Devil
Evil one
Great red dragon
Serpent of old
Abaddon
Apollyon
Slanderer
Intrinsically Evil
Destructive Creature
Deceiver in Eden
Destruction
Destroyer
Matthew 4:1
John 17:15
Revelation 12:3,
7, 9
Revelation 12:9
Revelation 9:11
Revelation 9:11
Adversary
Beelzebul
Belial
God of this world
Ruler of this world
Prince of the Power
Enemy
Tempter
Murderer
Opponent
Lord of the Fly
Worthless
Controls philosophy of the world
Rules World system
Controls unbelievers
Opponent
Solicits people to sin
Leads people to eternal death
I Peter 5:8
Matthew 12:24
II Corinthians
6:15
II Corinthians 4:4
John 12:31
Ephesians 2:2
Matthew 12:28
Matthew 4:3
John 8:44
Liar Perverts the truth John 8:44
Accuser
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Opposes Believers before God Revelation 12:10
As you can see from the names on the list, there is nothing positive to highlight. Satan is destined for eternal destruction. Satan and all his fallen angels will be cast in the lake of fire and brimstone.
2 Paul Enns, Moody Handbook of Theology
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And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, but fire came down from heaven and consumed them…
(Revelation 20:9)
In summary, we see the character of Satan and we know he does not have our best interest at heart. We can also see that we need to be cautious and look out for his ways. There are plenty of parts in Scripture that speak to how we are to defend ourselves. We already have an advocate who has crushed the serpent’s head at the cross. We need to remember God is sovereign- Satan is not. And he can do nothing to us.
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