December | 2024 | Green Baggins

That Time When the Angels of Heaven Celebrated (Luke 2:8-14)

December 23, 2024 at 12:55 pm (Gospel, Jesus)

posted by R. Fowler White

Apart from the Holy Spirit Himself, they are the pivotal players in the drama that many know as the Christmas story, documented in the accounts the Evangelists gave us about the birth of Jesus our Lord. Matthew tells us that it was one of them who brought the announcement of the upcoming birth to Joseph. Luke tells us that it was one of them who brought the announcement of the upcoming birth to Mary. And Luke again tells us that it was a host of them who brought the birth announcement to shepherds.

I refer, of course, to angels. Their role in the Nativity drama has been practically immortalized by hymn writers. We sing of them in “Angels from the Realms of Glory,” “It Came upon a Midnight Clear,” “Angels We have heard on High,” “The First Noel,” “While Shepherds Watched their Flocks,” and, of course, “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing.” To hear the hymn writers tell it, the angels had a lot to say about Christ’s birth, and, biblically speaking, they’re right. In fact, it’s principally from angels that we learn the significance of Jesus’ birth. And we should care about what they say about Jesus’ birth because they came from the very presence of God in heaven with birth announcements patterned after those of the Caesars. In those proclamations, they declare to us on earth vital truths for us to know about Jesus’ birth. So, we should make sure that we have learned what these heavenly messengers have told us about Jesus and His birth. Consider four truths we learn about Christ’s birth from the angels.

Their birth announcements brought good news of great joy. Good news for those made fearful and joyless, those brought low and humbled, by sin, suffering, and death, by the world, the flesh, and the devil. Do you know anyone like that? Matthew the Evangelist did, and he mentions some of them in his genealogy of Jesus. He tells us of those weak in faith, swindlers and usurpers, Canaanites, prostitutes, daughters shamed and abused, adulterers, an accomplice to murder, exiles and prisoners. Among Jesus’ ancestors, there weren’t many wise, mighty, or noble, were there? No, they were sinful and mortal, every single one. It was to them that angels brought good news of great joy, news that’s good for those who know they’re in a bad way. People whom sin, suffering, and death have made fearful and joyless, lowly and humbled. To them the angels’ birth announcements brought, and still bring, good news of great joy.

Their birth announcements were sent to all the people. Let’s be clear: the angels are not saying here that the God of the Bible means to save all without exception. Only those who repent and believe in Christ will be saved; those sinners who don’t repent and believe in Christ will be judged. What the angels announced was that the God of the Bible shows no partiality in saving sinners. The one true God has revealed Himself as impartial to sinners from any and every social standing, without distinction of position or office in society. He saves governmental authorities and their subjects, rich and poor, powerful and powerless, male and female, adults and children, from any and all families of the earth. God has revealed Himself as impartial to sinners from any and every category into which we humans group people – Jews and Gentiles, Palestinians and Israelis, Chinese and Tibetans, Africans and Europeans, Native American Indians and South American Indians, Libertarians and Independents, Republicans and Democrats. No distinction made among sinners is excluded from God’s saving will or work. The God of the Bible was and is a God of outreach to all sorts of sinners. Those messengers from heaven who brought Christ’s birth announcements would teach us how to identify the people who need good news of great joy: they are those in bondage to their sins, from any and every social standing, from any and every grouping on earth.

The angels’ birth announcements also speak of Jesus’ person and work: He is Savior who is Christ the Lord. As Savior, He is our deliverer from our enemies: sin, suffering, and death; the world, the flesh, and the devil. He saves His people from the bondage of their sins. As Christ, He is the Anointed one, that son of David whom God anointed to wage holy war on sin and death to make God’s people secure and pure for worship. As the Lord, He is the absolute sovereign God over all, from whom, to whom, and through whom are all things, seen and unseen. The increase of His government and peace will never end. As Lord of all, He will both lift up the lowly and humbled through faith and bring down the proud and the mighty in their sins. So, do we find ourselves still in the darkness of sin, still under the shadow of death? Has the burden of our sins brought us so low that we can’t even touch bottom? Has the fear of death got us so scared that we’re afraid to close our eyes at night? If so, the angels bring good news of great joy: there’s a Savior who was born to save anyone weighed down by the burden of their sins, everyone terrified under the shadow of death. That Savior is Jesus, the Christ of God anointed to defeat sin and death and to make us secure and pure for life with God.

The angels’ birth announcements also celebrate glory to God and peace for man. They announce glory to God. In Jesus the fullness of the Godness of God, of His perfections and excellencies is revealed in flesh. In Him we see the sum of all desirable qualities in impeccable proportion, harmony, unity, and diversity, all in precise balance, stunning brilliance, and full integrity. Not only do the angels announce glory to God, they also announce peace for man. In Jesus full reconciliation with God is available to all those on whom His pleasure rests. Would we have God’s pleasure rest on us? Would we have our consciences at rest and assured before God? Then we must set our eyes on the beauty of the Lord as revealed to us in Christ the Lord. We must, by faith, look full in the face of Jesus. Through Him alone, we find acceptance to calm our trembling hearts. In Him alone, we find rest for our restless consciences, confident that, united with Him through faith, God’s pleasure rests on us.

As we reflect on the joy that the angels expressed in their birth announcements, we realize that their joy is more than an everyday garden variety joy. Remarkably, their joy is not in their own salvation: the joy they know is in our salvation. More than that, it’s a joy that has been welling up for literally millennia, since the very beginning of time. Yes, the holy angels who sang during the creation week–the cherubim, seraphim, archangels, and all the other ranks of angels–they were all there at the beginning. They witnessed both the creation and the fall of our first parents. In fact, those angels who remained obedient watched as God drove our first parents and the fallen-angel serpent out of the garden, and they then took their stations with the flaming sword to guard the way to the tree of life. Later, when the tabernacle and temple were built, they were present there too, as their likenesses were woven into the fabrics of the holy furnishings, emblematically still guarding the holy of holies against the defilement of sinners. There they would stay, looking … watching … longing to see the triumph of God’s grace come to pass in the birth of that Savior who would crush the serpent underfoot and deliver His people from sin and death. At long last, they were there in Bethlehem too, announcing to Joseph, to Mary, and to shepherds the birth of a Savior who is Christ the Lord.

To this day, the angels announce good news of great joy through their words recorded in Scripture. And still they are watching to see, and then to celebrate, the triumph of God’s grace in us who receive and rest in Jesus alone, the Savior who is Christ the Lord. Knowing these things, it’s timely for us to ponder the question: are the angels of heaven singing of the triumph of God’s grace in us?

John Mark, Paul, and Barnabas in Acts

December 3, 2024 at 9:00 am (Acts)

posted by R. Fowler White

The Spirit of God moved Luke to tell us why Paul and Barnabas separated when it came time for them to resume the Gentile mission after the Jerusalem church court’s ruling in Acts 15. Luke states it this way: “Paul kept insisting that they should not take [John Mark] along who had deserted them in Pamphylia and had not gone with them to the work” (15:38, NASB95). It’s worth asking, however, if we can’t say more about this “sharp disagreement” that led Paul and Barnabas to separate. Maybe the following will help.

First off, some elaborate the dispute by supposing that John Mark was the unnamed young man who fled in fear from the scene of Jesus’ arrest in Mark 14:52, and that he, therefore, left the mission in Pamphylia in a similar state of fear. This analysis is evocative but inconclusive. As a result, the search for greater clarity on the dispute between Paul and Barnabas turns to an arguably more credible connection with Jesus’ sayings about the cost of following Him in Luke 9:57-62. The point of that link would be, of course, that in Acts 13:13 John Mark is identifiable as a disciple who had “put his hand to the plow and [had] looked back” (Luke 9:62a). Moreover, by walking away from Paul and Barnabas in Pamphylia, he is also recognizable as one who was not suitably prepared for the demands of the kingdom of God (9:62b) as he was experiencing them in the Gentile mission.

We can add more to the picture. John Mark’s likeness to the man of Luke 9:62 is made still clearer by the episode in Acts 13:5-13, which immediately precedes his dropping out of the mission. Having joined up with Paul and Barnabas in Jerusalem (12:25) when they delivered the Syrian Antioch church’s famine relief gift to the saints there (11:27-30), John Mark had gone back with them to Antioch (cf. 12:25–13:5). From there they all traveled to and through Cyprus, reaching the island’s western city of Paphos. While in Paphos, the following events unfolded. Barnabas and Paul, assisted by John Mark (13:5), were ministering the gospel to two men (13:6-12), when one of the men—Elymas (Bar-Jesus), a false prophet-magician—opposed them and sought to turn the other—Sergius Paulus, the magistrate of Paphos—away from the faith. In response, Paul roundly cursed Elymas and the Lord blinded him, prompting an astounded Sergius Paulus to believe. It was just after this confrontation and the team’s arrival in Pamphylia (13:13) that John Mark left the mission and returned to Jerusalem. The question naturally arises: had Paul’s clash with Elymas prompted him to leave the mission? If so, John Mark’s response to adversity is similar to that of the man in Luke 9:62 (and perhaps even to that of Timothy as he is described by Paul in Second Timothy).

Picking up John Mark back in Jerusalem, it is no flight of fantasy to believe that, as part of the Jerusalem congregation (cf. 15:4, 22), he was reinvigorated for ministry by the church court’s proceedings in Acts 15. For example, during those proceedings, he would have been a witness to the “much debate” (15:7) that helped resolve the “no small dissension” in Antioch’s church (15:2) in favor of Paul and Barnabas and the Gentile mission. Moreover, he would also have been part of the congregation that unanimously supported the court’s plan to circulate news of its ruling to the churches (15:22). Indeed, what confidence would John Mark have gained overall not only from the decision rendered by the court, but also from the pertinent reports of Peter, Paul, and Barnabas (Acts 15:7-12) and the concluding judgment of James (15:19-21), and perhaps even from encouraging words spoken to him by his cousin Barnabas? From factors like these, we can well imagine that John Mark was emboldened to resume the Gentile mission with Paul and Barnabas.

Meanwhile, however, as Paul conferred with Barnabas about his desire to return to the churches in Pamphylia, Galatia, and Cyprus, they had their sharp disagreement over the prospect of John Mark’s participation in that trip. As we noted above, Luke tells us explicitly why Paul kept insisting that John Mark not be part of the mission’s second phase: he had deserted (i.e., withdrawn from, abandoned) Paul and Barnabas during the mission’s first phase. So, what more can we say about that “sharp disagreement”? The explanation that their quarrel involved a difference of approach (not of doctrine) between Paul and Barnabas seems to be creditable but needs to be developed. The following details are discernible in the text.

When John Mark walked out on Paul and Barnabas in Pamphylia, his choice meant that, though he had gone with them during the Cyprus phase of the Gentile mission, he had abandoned them just as the initial visits to Pamphylia and Galatia were to take place. In that light, serious questions would arise: how would his withdrawal in Pamphylia and his absence from Galatia be explained on the return visits to the Pamphylia-Galatia churches? More pointedly, why did he go AWOL the first time? Would he do it again? John Mark’s past action was a complication and disadvantage that the mission did not need for its return visits to Pamphylia and Galatia. That being said, Barnabas and especially Paul would, in all fairness, have to concede that John Mark had ably assisted them on the mission from Antioch through Cyprus. Bearing this in mind, it would make good sense for an arguably rejuvenated John Mark to go on a separate return visit to the disciples in Cyprus with his cousin and native Cyprian Barnabas. With these details before them, Barnabas and Paul split up the return visits to the churches into two assignments. Barnabas and John Mark would make the return visits to Cyprus, while Paul, teaming up with Silas, would head back to Pamphylia and Galatia (by way of Syria-Cilicia, Acts 15:41).

Paul’s choice of Silas as his ministry coworker was significant for the return to those churches where John Mark had not accompanied him and Barnabas. Unlike John Mark, Silas’s reputation in ministry was unchallenged. As a Jerusalem church leader and prophet (Acts 15:22, 25-27, 32), the church court had selected him, along with another of the same qualifications, Judas Barsabbas, to join the two apostles Paul and Barnabas (14:4, 14) as couriers who would deliver the court’s decision letter about the Gentile mission to Antioch. Once they arrived in Antioch, Silas not only had an edifying ministry to the church when he and the other couriers delivered the letter (15:30-31); he also continued that edifying ministry for “some time” (15:32-33) with Paul and Barnabas (15:30-32). By so much, Silas’s readiness to “put his hand to the plow and not look back” was not in doubt.

The separation of the Gentile mission into two assignments, then, was not merely a settlement of the disagreement between Paul and Barnabas. It was a strategic solution to two problems. It was a way to avoid the complication and disadvantage created by John Mark’s departure from the mission’s original phase, and it also laid out a path for John Mark to be restored to ministry with the apostles Paul (Col 4:10-11; 2 Tim. 4:11; Philem 24) and Peter (1 Pet 5:13).