Monday, September 29, 2014
Daniel 12:1-3 (St. Michael and All Angels)
Today’s reading is part of a cryptic vision recorded in Daniel 11-12. Daniel did not understand it himself, and he was told to seal it up until the end of time, so it’s no surprise if we can’t understand it either. The extract for today mentions Michael, who had charge of Daniel’s people, but it doesn’t say anything further about him, not even that he is an angel (as the Bible tells us elsewhere). Sadly, some people have for centuries run off into far-fetched imaginary fairy tales about angels while paying no attention to the tiny bit that the Bible does tell us. Doesn’t this lack of information mean that we really don’t need to know much about angels? Instead, we should trust God, learn more about God from the Bible, and follow our Lord Jesus Christ, who reveals God to us.
Even in its cryptic context, today’s reading tells us something important, confirmed by other Bible teaching. This is that there will be a resurrection of the dead at the time of the end, when (verse 2) “many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.”
The discernment that Day will be on the basis (verse 1) of “who is found written in the book.” Even this is mysterious, but three similar references in the Bible can help us understand.
First, in Exodus 32:32-33, Moses pleads for God’s mercy to the people who have sinned greatly with the golden calf. Moses asks the Lord, if the people cannot be forgiven, to “blot me out of the book that you have written.” The Lord says no, only those who have sinned against the Lord will be blotted out.
Second is Luke 10:20. Jesus sent out 70 disciples to cure the sick and proclaim the kingdom of God, and they returned rejoicing that the demons submitted to them. Jesus told them, “Do not rejoice at this, that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.” Remember that angels are spirits and the devil has his angels too, against whom Michael’s angels will fight; see Rev. 12:7-9. Jesus lets us know what is important: our salvation recorded in heaven, not any dominance over angels.
Third is Rev. 20:11-15, which talks clearly about the resurrection of the dead and the final judgment. This passage gives a picture of the final judgment as a scene in which books are opened and all people are judged according to their deeds recorded in the books. Another book is opened, the book of life, “and anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.”
Somber words indeed these are (as is our reading from Daniel 12). Dislike it as much as we do, we must acknowledge the Bible teaches this. But this teaching must always be tempered with the Gospel. Hebrews 9:27-28 does so succinctly: “And just as it is appointed for mortals to die once, and after that the judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.”
Sadly, our usual pictures of the final judgment and the condemnation of evil are based more on fanciful medieval art and poetry than on the Bible. They mean to terrify us, not to inspire and encourage us. Thus we learn to run from what the Bible does teach, and that is a tragedy.
Let me conclude with a word picture of the final judgment, one that is fully based on the Bible, and one I find encouraging. A courtroom scene has four principal participants: the defendant on trial, the judge (who, with no jury, makes the decision), the prosecutor (who accuses the defendant of wrongdoing), and the defense counsel (who represents and helps the defendant refute the prosecutor). At the end of the age, we are told that you and I and all people will be on trial, the defendants. Let’s see what the Bible says about the other three participants.
Our culture often portrays the judge as God the Creator (or St. Peter as a joke), sometimes as a sleepy old man, sometimes as austere, cold, and distant, with no care at all for us. Not so: John 5:21-29 (especially v. 22) tells us exactly what Jesus taught about the final judgment: “The Father judges no one but has given all judgment to the Son.” No, our judge is not distant and austere; our judge is the Lord Jesus, who as a human being is one of us and understands us, who loves sinners so much, who forgives people before they ask, who extends mercy to everyone in trouble, who never asks for anything in return, but who shows love at all times. There’s not a hint in the Bible that the character of Jesus has changed since he walked this earth (the medieval artists are scandalously wrong), and at the final judgment we shall meet exactly the same gracious, loving, and forgiving Lord Jesus the Bible presents.
The prosecutor will be as the Bible presents him, too. He accuses the defendant of crime and evil, and there is one character in the Bible whose very name, Satan, means accuser. Revelation 12:7-11 spells it out: He is called the great dragon (against whom Michael and his angels fight), that ancient serpent, the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. A loud voice in heaven proclaims, “The accuser of the brothers and sisters has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God.” That’s the prosecutor, and he has been thrown down; his power is broken.
Finally, we have our defense attorney, the one who stands beside us on trial, the one who represents us, our advocate, the one who helps and speaks for us. In John 14:15, 15:26, and 16:7, Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit with the Greek word parakletos, which means an advocate or a helper. Some years ago I was told that parakletos in Koine Greek was the usual term for the defense attorney in a trial. So the picture is complete, summed up in Romans 8:26-27: “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”
Could we ask for a better defense attorney than that, God’s own Holy Spirit?
- Robert Kruse
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