When angels sat down
And behold, there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat on it. (Matthew 28:2)
And she saw two angels in white sitting, one at the head and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. (John 20:12)
Angels are eternally active in the service of God. The Bible, at times in mysterious ways and at others in precise ways, gives us an insight into their service for God. This service is beautifully expressed in the life of the Lord Jesus. In Luke 1:19 the angel Gabriel introduces himself to Zechariah, “I am Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God.” This mighty angel was sent to announce, in the temple of the Lord, the birth of John the Baptist. Later, it is not to the temple but to the lowly town of Nazareth that Gabriel was sent from the presence of God to announce the birth of Jesus (verse 26). An angel told a few shepherds of the birth of Jesus, and those shepherds saw and heard a heavenly host fill the night sky with praise to God that Christ, the Saviour, had been born.
After Jesus was tested in the wilderness, Matthew and Mark tell us angels came to minister to the Lord (Matthew 4:11). When the grace of God was demonstrated to Jacob, in Genesis 28, he saw a vision of angels ascending and descending on a ladder set up on earth. Jesus tells Nathaniel, “Most assuredly, I say to you, hereafter you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man” (John 1:51). God’s grace was perfectly revealed in His Son. That grace opened heaven to see the activity of angels subject to the Person of Christ. This will be seen again on earth during the Lord’s millennial reign, but its evidence was demonstrated in the earthly ministry of the Lord Jesus.
That ministry led to the Garden of Gethsemane. It is in that garden we behold the agony of the Saviour as He faced the cross and all that it meant to save us. In that solemn hour, the disciples fell asleep. But angels did not. And in all the tenderness of heaven, one comes to strengthen the Lord (Luke 22:43). A little later in Matthew 26, when Peter raises his sword to defend the Lord, the Lord says, “Do you think that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He will provide Me with more than twelve legions of angels?” (Matthew 26:53). But there was a place where angels could not go: they could not speak, and they could not act. Their activity was to watch in holy amazement as their Lord suffered and died.
For centuries the cherubim of solid pure gold had stood motionless, looking down on the blood sprinkled on the mercy seat, blood which could never take away sin. On the resurrection day, an angel rolled the stone away from Lord’s tomb, not to let the Lord come out, but to show it was empty. And the angel sat down upon the great stone. When Mary looked into the Lord’s tomb, “she saw two angels in white sitting, one at the head and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain” (John 20:12). Angels bear witness to the deity, manhood, ministry, suffering, resurrection, ascension and return of the Lord Jesus. And there was a day when angels ceased from their activity and sat down. They sat down to remind us of the Saviour’s glorious, perfect and eternal work of salvation. And to remind us to worship the One they never cease to serve.
