This article was originally printed and distributed in 1996. It contains Harry’s testimony of his conversion in 1954. The preached message on which it is based is our featured sermon for Christmas 2025 and can be found on the Home Page.
THE SONG OF THE ANGELS
Several years ago, a friend in America gave us some CDs. One Sunday morning I played one of them. It featured a 250 strong choir of young people singing traditional hymns but with just a modicum of contemporary style. The music was originally recorded live at a concert in Glasgow, Scotland.
The recording began with, “How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds” – one of my favourite hymns. Immediately my soul was deeply moved and my heart lifted to Heaven. When my wife June came downstairs to see from where came this heavenly sound she found a husband with disintegrating emotions. I stuttered, “They sound like angels.” June thought so too and, as favourite followed favourite, all speaking of Jesus, we worshipped and sang along with the “angels”.
Do you believe in angels? Angels are not the product of mythology, they really exist. Angels are spirit beings. They are God’s messengers, and the protectors and servants of God’s people, “Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?” (Hebrews 1:14). They are also God’s choristers.
Do you sing with the angels? You may not have been gifted with a very beautiful voice but if you sing with your heart for the same reasons as the angels sing, it will be beautiful to God.
Let us consider what the angels sang about – and sing about.
First:
They Sang at the CREATION
God said to Job, “Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? When the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?” (Job 38:4,7)
When God made the world and all the stars the angels sang for joy. It is not surprising.
Think of the immensity of it.
With the naked eye we can see only an infinitesimal portion of all that God has created, can we not?
I am fascinated by the facts and figures of astronomy that are just mind-boggling. For example, did you know that if the Sun was hollow, we could fit one million earths inside it? Do you know that the Sun is a star and our galaxy contains a hundred billion other stars besides the Sun? One of them is called Antares and it could contain our solar system, including the Sun, out as far as Mars inside it. And our galaxy is only one of a billion known other galaxies in the Universe which seems to have no end. No wonder the angels sang. Think of the immensity of it.
Think of the intricacy of it.
These celestial spheres travel and spin with an amazing precision so that all other time pieces are set by the astronomical clock. But what about the world of tiny things – the atom and the molecule? The most powerful microscope only probes the surface of the reality of things.
What about the migratory systems of birds? People use the term “bird-brain” as a derogatory term. On the contrary, it seems to me that birds have very smart brains. They certainly know where to go in the winter to get out of the cold. When I lived in southern Florida we even described the thousands and thousands of retired people who flock there from the north every winter as “snow birds.” The birds also know when to return north in the summer to escape the unbearable heat and humidity! Some birds can find tiny islands right in the middle of the ocean. I get lost even with a map, but they have amazing built-in navigational systems.
Or, what about the hibernation systems of animals? If you cannot fly to Florida for the winter then sleep through it!
Think about DNA which, we are told, controls a million factors about us in just a drop? I read somewhere that the basic building blocks of the human brain are called neurons and we have as many of these as there are trees in the Amazon forest. There are as many electrical impulses interacting between these neurons as there are leaves on those trees.
Do any readers remember the “Fact and Faith” films made by the Moody Institute of Science way back in the 1950s? In my pastorates in England we showed them all. I remember films about the marvels of blood, bees, bats, water, and other things. When I learn about the amazing discoveries of science, I say to myself, “Little wonder the angels sang at the Creation.” Not only because of the immensity of it, but because of the intricacy of it.
But then:
Think of the beauty of it.
From the grandeur of the Colorado Rockies or the Swiss Alps to the symmetry and diversity of the snowflake or the colors of the flower.
When our children were young, we had two memorable camping holidays in the mountains of Switzerland. The very first time we were heading for the Bernese Oberland planning to camp with our four children in the beautiful Lauterbrunnen valley. As we drove along the road which winds along the shores of Lake Thun we rounded a bend, and there before us was the spectacular panorama of the glistening, snowcapped peaks of the Eiger, the Mönch, and the Jungfrau. I think we all gasped in awesome wonder at the sight. But then we noticed the tears rolling down the cheeks of our six-year-old.
“Nicola,” we said, “why are you crying?”
“Because,” she replied, “I just can’t believe it’s real.”
How many, I wonder, marvel at the creation but never worship the Creator? In many places on the trails in those Alps some organization has placed plaques, tastefully set into the rocks. They seek to remind the hikers or skiers that the author of such beauty is Divine. I recall one that, quoted the Scripture, “Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord.”
Do you praise the Lord at the wonders of creation? The angels do.
God as Creator
Will you not agree with me that the doctrine of God as Creator is often neglected, perhaps because of the almost universal and uncritical acceptance of Darwinian Evolution.
Let us not be brainwashed by the modern pantheistic fashion of deifying the creation itself or even the processes. Whatever you may believe about the processes of nature, do not deify them. We hear statements such as, “Nature is kind… nature is cruel… nature has done this, nature has done that…” until eventually nature has a capital N, and God is replaced as if there is a personal mind somehow inherent within the creation itself.
Some feminize it . . . “Mother Nature.” I once heard a zoo keeper on a television show describe a remarkable feature of a small animal in this way, “Mother Nature gave him this for self-protection.”
All that is idolatry. God’s wrath, says the Scripture, is against those who, “…(have) exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things rather than the Creator–who is for ever praised. Amen” (Romans 1:25).
We should declare over and over again, “In the beginning GOD created the heavens and the earth”… and…“The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands” (Genesis 1:1, Psalm 19:1).
God is transcendent. Before ever there was anything there was God. There has always been God. God spoke a word and said, “Let there be light” (Genesis 1:3), and there was light. In the darkness he brought light, and in the chaos he brought cosmos. In the emptiness he brought fullness and the angels sang. They did not deify how it was done, they deified the One who did it.
We are not only endowed by our Creator with the right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, we are endowed by our Creator with the responsibility to worship him as Creator, and to praise him with the angels.
Worries? Anxieties? Begin here
This is not just a matter of theory or doctrine. It affects the way we view everything including our difficulties and fears.
When the Apostles Peter and John were told they must not preach or teach in the name of Jesus any more or lose their lives, we are told they went back “to their own people…” (Isn’t that a lovely expression for the church ?) “…and called a prayer meeting.” This is how they began their prayer, “Sovereign Lord, you made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them.” That is the way to pray when you face trouble. Begin with the great deeds of God. Praise before petition helps to get our perspective right.
Sometimes instead of “magnifying the Lord” – that is, seeing him large in our vision – we allow him to be small to us. On my computer I can “maximize” a window and make it completely fill the screen, or I can so reduce it that it becomes a tiny icon in the bottom corner. Just a little picture.
Is there someone reading this who is troubled and downcast? Are you afraid? May I ask you, who or what is God to you? Is he the Lord God Almighty who fills your “screen?” Or, have other things so dominated your vision that your sovereign God is just an icon: a verbal or visual image; a symbol? Perhaps for one hour each Sunday morning you “maximize” him as you sing “Our God is an Awesome God,” or “How Great Thou Art,” but then he is reduced again to the usual, insignificant, bottom corner of your life. Just a little picture!
The Apostles’ Creed begins, “I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth…” Do you really believe that? If you don’t, no wonder you are troubled and afraid. There is no God. You have become – for all practical purposes – an atheist. But I am sure you do believe it. Perhaps you just forgot. It is easily done.
Remember: Your Father in Heaven can still the storm, part the waters, crumble the walls, close the mouth of the lion, liquidate the enemy. He is THE LORD. Nothing is too hard for the Lord. Furthermore, his love is as great as his power. He will see you through. My brother or sister: Lift up your eyes – and your heart.
So, the angels sang at the Creation. I am sure they still do so. Let us make sure we join them.
Secondly:
They Sang at the INCARNATION
Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests” (Luke 2:13-14).
I wonder if you have noticed how prominently angels feature in the Christmas carols. Almost all carols or Christmas hymns that we sing seem to have a reference to angels, and some feature them very strongly.
“Angels from the realms of glory, wing your flight o’er all the earth,
Ye who sang Creation’s story, now proclaim Messiah’s birth…”
also:
“Hark the herald angels sing, glory to the newborn king…”
“Angels we have heard on high…”
“Sing choirs of angels, sing in exultation…”
“Sing all ye bright hosts of heaven above…”
“It came upon a midnight clear…” ends almost every line with “…to hear the angels sing.”
What is Christmas ultimately about for Christians? Why do we sing? Why are the angels singing? It is not about the beauty of motherhood, though motherhood is beautiful. It is not about the wonder of birth, though birth is wonderful. It is not about the awesomeness of a tiny baby, though a tiny baby is awesome. They are singing, and we are singing, because of WHO THIS BABY IS….
Mark’s Gospel begins the life story of Jesus at the baptism of Jesus and his public ministry. Matthew and Luke in their Gospels go further back than that, and begin with the birth of Jesus. John goes back to the beginning.
“In the beginning was the Word (the Logos), and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him, all things were made” (John 1:1).
John is speaking of Jesus Christ. How do we know that? Because he says in verse 14, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
We have the same thing at the beginning of the Epistle to the Hebrews. “In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe” (Hebrews 1:1-2).
Thus, the composers of our Christmas carols not only tell us that the angels sang but why they sang:
“Lo within a manger lies, he who built the starry skies…”
“Veiled in flesh, the Godhead see, Hail the incarnate deity…”
“Let earth and heaven combine. Angels and men agree, to praise in songs divine, the incarnate deity…”
“Our God contracted to a span, incomprehensibly made man…”
Seen By Angels
Consider I Timothy 3:16: “Beyond all question, the mystery of Godliness is great: He appeared in a body, was vindicated by the Spirit, was seen by angels, was preached among the nations, was believed on in the world, was taken up in glory.”
“Was seen by angels”. Now, why does Paul not say, “was seen by men and women” or “was seen by the shepherds” or “was seen by Magi from the East?”? Why “seen by angels”? Answer: Because they had never seen him before. Before the Incarnation the angels in Heaven needed to veil their faces from the glory of the Son, S-O-N.
Do you remember the vision of the prophet Isaiah recorded in Isaiah chapter 6 in which he saw the Lord and the seraphim around the throne shielding their faces from the glory? (See Isaiah 6:1-3)
“Just a moment” you say, “Was that the Son of God, the Second Person of the Triune God?”
Yes, it was, because when we turn to John chapter 12 and verse 41 John declares, referring to Isaiah 6:10, “Isaiah said this because he saw Jesus’ glory, and spoke about him.” So, you see, the angels had not seen him before. Not in the fullness of his glory. Now they look on in amazement that he who had that glory and who made all things – the stars and the galaxies; the atoms and the molecules; the mountains and the flowers and the trees – is born of a woman and lying in a manger…
God had come, the angels announced it, the stars signaled it, the shepherds saw it, the wise men wondered at it, religious leaders rejected it, Herod hated it.
God had come. He left the holiness of heaven for the dustiness of earth; he exchanged a mansion for a manger. Hands that had molded worlds and cast stars across the sky now reached out to grasp his mother’s finger. The voice that had called creation into being now cries out in the darkness of the stable, and the love that created life now spills over the edge of heaven to light the way to everlasting life.
God has come. He is ever-trying to break into our presence, burning bushes, clouds, calamities. Prophets, preachers. He uses every way humanly possible to get our attention. We so often misunderstand, misinterpret, miss the One who calls. The bustle of business can cloud out the star above. The rush to get and get ahead can cause us to hurry and miss the holiest of events.
The angels have never stopped singing at the wonder of the Incarnation because when our Lord Jesus ascended into Heaven he took his humanity with him. The Man, Christ Jesus, is seated at the right hand of God surrounded by adoring angels.
Let us ponder with the angels and sing with them, not only at the Creation, but also at the Incarnation.
Thirdly:
They Sang at the CORONATION.
When the Lord Jesus, having been crucified, rose from the dead and ascended in triumph to Heaven, he was welcomed home by an innumerable throng of angels – “ten thousand times ten thousand”. What a Homecoming that must have been.
The Son of God, the Prince of Heaven, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, returning in triumph. My, how the angels sang!
We do not read of the angels singing at the Crucifixion. Oh, they were there. Over seventy-two-thousand of them were watching and waiting. Their hands were on their swords and but one glance from his eye would have brought them swooping down to rescue him. The glance never came for love kept him on the Cross. The Cross was his destiny.
One of the thieves dying beside him said, “Aren’t you the Christ? Save yourself and us!” (Luke 23:39). But he knew not what he said for if Jesus had gone down from the Cross to save himself then he could never have saved anybody else.
Perhaps at the Cross even the angels did not fully understand what was taking place. The Apostle Peter, discussing the wonder of the Cross and our salvation states, “Even angels long to look into these things” (1 Peter 1:12). Why O, why, they must have wondered, does the Prince of Glory have to die?
No, they did not sing at the cross but after his Coronation they sang about the Cross and rejoiced in it. “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain…” (Revelation 5:12). In fact, the Coronation song of Heaven is called “the Song of the Lamb” (Revelation 15:3).
The Apostle John was privileged to be given a glimpse into Heaven in a vision. This is how he reports it:
Then I looked and heard the voice of many angels, numbering thousands upon thousands, and ten thousand times ten thousand. They encircled the throne and the living creatures and the elders. In a loud voice they sang: “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise!
…To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power, for ever and ever!” (Rev 5:11-13).
We join in with the angels and all the redeemed in Heaven in many of our songs of worship.
Two examples:
“Crown Him with many crowns, The Lamb upon His throne;
Hark, how the heavenly anthem drowns All music but its own.”
and:
“‘Tis the Church triumphant singing. Worthy the Lamb!
Heaven throughout with praises ringing, Worthy the Lamb!
Thrones and powers before Him bending, Odours sweet with voice ascending
Swell the chorus never ending, Worthy the Lamb!”
The Lamb upon His Throne
Now we must address this question: Why all these references to Jesus as “the Lamb?”
In the book of Revelation twenty-eight times he is given this title. Why did John the Baptist call attention to the Lord Jesus with these words: “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29)
I recall how a young Muslim once asked me this question. “A lamb,” he remarked, “is such a dumb animal.”
Some people think it is because Jesus was meek and gentle and lovable. That is not the answer. They forget that the same Book of Revelation speaks frighteningly of “the wrath of the Lamb” (6:16).
If you have absolutely no idea why Jesus is designated “the Lamb of God,” you certainly cannot join in the song of Heaven. In fact, you may not even be a Christian at all. For Christians, we are told, are those whose names are written in “The Lamb‘s Book of Life” (Revelation 21:27).
The designation, “Lamb of God” has to do with the death of the Lord Jesus on the Cross. Do you know that the CROSS is the central message of the Bible and of the Gospel? One third of the Gospel narrative is given over to describing it, and a large proportion of the Epistles to explaining it. That is why the Cross is the emblem of Christianity. It is a strange emblem when you think about it. A gibbet on which a man died. A very gruesome and cruel death
at that. Yet that is our emblem. Many churches have a large cross at the front of the sanctuary. Some people wear one round their neck. The tragedy is however, the Cross is absent from far too many of our pulpits. Sadly, today many Church-goers do not hear it preached. Even Evangelical preachers have wandered away from preaching the Cross.
Sacrifice and Substitution
From the Garden of Eden onwards God made it clear to sinful mankind that,“without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness“(Hebrews 9:22). You recall how Adam and Eve, after they sinned, sought to cover their shame by the work of their own hands. God showed them that their own works could never atone for what they had done, for God had said that the sentence for sin would be death. In grace God provided a substitute. An animal had to die. God covered their shame with the animal skin.
The death of a lamb or a goat could never take away sin or adequately pay its awful and eternal penalty. God continued to graciously accept the substitute, when offered with repentance and faith, and through the ritual of constant sacrifices God’s people found forgiveness.
However, from the beginning, even in the Garden, God promised that one day there would come a Sacrifice that would, once for all, provide full atonement for sin. But since man had sinned a man must die. The problem was that the man must be without blemish and no such man could be found for “there are none righteous, no not one …all have sinned and come short of the glory of God…” (Rom 3:10 and 23). What could be done?
When man was lost, God’s pity looked about
To see what help in the earth or sky,
But there was none
The help did in God’s bosom lie
There lay His Son.
As Abraham once put it to his son, Isaac, “God himself will provide the lamb…” (Genesis 22:8).
To die as a sacrifice and substitute for sinners the Son of God must become a man – for God cannot die. Do you know that Jesus was born into this world so that he could die?
Yes: Jesus also came to live a perfect life so that he would be “a lamb without blemish or defect” (1 Peter 1:19). That righteous life is put to the account of all who trust in him.
Yes: Jesus also came to show us God and to teach us God’s truth.
But, I say again, he came primarily to die. His destiny was the Cross. Just as John the Baptist said. Just as Jesus himself said. On the eve of his crucifixion Jesus said this, “Now my heart is troubled, and what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour?’ No, it was for this very reason I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name!” (John 12:27-28)
Just as the Scripture says in a thousand texts.
The Lord Jesus took our nature when he was born, and our sins when he died.
When his work on the Cross was completed, accomplished, Jesus cried “It is finished!” (John 19:30), and laid down his life. On the third day God raised him from the dead and forty days later exalted him to the highest place in Heaven
“…he humbled himself and became obedient to death — even death on a cross. Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil 2:8-11).
The Cradle, the Cross and the Crown are inextricably linked together in God’s great redemptive act.
Jesus is the Lamb of God because he is God’s sacrifice and substitute for sin. He is God’s Passover Lamb, whose blood was shed and by which we are covered that death shall not harm us. Like that lamb, Jesus was pure and not a bone was broken (Exodus 12:46 and 1 Corinthians 5:7). Like that lamb he delivered us from slavery, for Satan is a harder taskmaster than the Egyptians ever were.
There is another important thing which is meant by “the Lamb.”
Propitiation
This is a long word but a very significant one.
Theologian Dr J.I. Packer asks, “Has the word “propitiation” any place in your Christianity? In the faith of the New Testament it is central. Of the Lord Jesus Christ the Scripture says:
“Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God…” (Rom 3:25 KJV).
“And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John 2:2 KJV)
What does it mean? Answer: it refers to the offering of a sacrifice to placate the wrath of God. The Greek word (hilasterion) has to do with the Mercy Seat in the Temple and the making of atonement. There is no Temple now but when there was, once each year, on the most sacred day in the Jewish calendar (then and now) called Yom Kippur, or, The Day of Atonement, the High Priest went beyond the Veil into the Most Holy Place. There he sprinkled the blood of the sacrificial lamb to make atonement for his own sins and for all the sins of God’s people. If he emerged alive the people knew that God’s wrath had been turned away – propitiated.
Do you know that sin not only incurs God’s judgment but also his wrath? His is not “the cold hand of justice” – somehow impersonal and dispassionate. Like a judge passing sentence who, in judging the crime, has nothing personal against the criminal. God has indeed something personal against the sinner. He is angry with the sinner. We have offended God. “The wrath of God is revealed from Heaven against all godlessness and wickedness of men…” (Rom 1:18). “But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God‘s wrath” (Rom 2:5).
Perhaps you think it somehow unworthy of God to be angry – even though the Scripture plainly says that he is. That may be because when we are angry it is usually for the wrong things against the wrong people and is as uncontrolled as it is misplaced. Not always however. How do you feel when you read of some monster who has abducted a little girl, molested her, tortured her, and then murdered her. Do you not feel anger? Of course you do. You are not dispassionate concerning such hideous crimes declaring simply that it is a great pity. You are revolted; offended; angry. If not, you should be!
Well, God is angry at every sin. Sin is revolting to his holy Nature. What can a sinner do to turn away God’s anger? Nothing! What can a sinner do to make atonement for his sin? Absolutely nothing!
Yet, though God is angry with sinners, HE LOVES THEM TOO. We can sum it up with two verses from John 3:
“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (v16).
“Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on him (v36).
Are any words more fearful and yet more wonderfully gracious? We MUST return to the message of the Cross
I know that some preachers read my articles. Preacher, if you have departed from making the Cross the centre of your message may I make a plea that you return to it.
We should never forget the Cross. The Cross is the very heart of the Gospel.
The Apostle Paul said, “For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified...” (1 Cor 2:2) and “…May I never glory, save in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Gal 6:14).
There may be several reasons why the Cross is no longer central in our preaching or, for that matter, in our songs and our worship.
Few today preach the seriousness of sin. The first requirement before sinners will see the need for a Saviour from sin is to have brought home to their consciences how serious sin is. It is their greatest problem and salvation from it is their deepest need. Sin has eternal consequences. Sin not only brings problems in this life but will keep sinners out of heaven. The road to the Cross of Christ begins when the conscience is awakened by the preaching of the Moral Law of God and his righteous demands before which we all fail.
Is that what we hear today? I don’t think so. We allow the world to set the agenda. The unconverted are asked to diagnose their needs and Christ is then offered as the cure-all. Few will identify their need as salvation from sin but rather emptiness of life, depression, marital problems, ill health, or any of a multitude of troubles that beset humanity in this short pilgrimage from the cradle to the grave.
We no longer ask the unsaved if they are guilty (and show them how guilty they are), we ask them if they are unhappy, or empty, unfulfilled or confused. We no longer teach people the Way to Heaven but the way to overcome low self-esteem; cope with stress; shake off depression; enrich their marriages; raise their children; and I don’t know what else besides.
If we do not preach the seriousness of sin, we will have no reason to preach the Cross.
Few today preach the reality of Hell. In our great desire to present an inoffensive message to the unsaved we have so watered down the Gospel that it can hardly be recognized as the Gospel of the New Testament.
We are told we must be “seeker-sensitive”. All truth should be presented sensitively, but we have no right to change it. Would you like your doctor to spare your feelings if you were diagnosed as being terminally ill if he had the cure to offer you?
We hear that we must be positive. There is nothing more positive than to tell men and women, unaware of life-threatening danger, of the peril they face and to urge them to seek a remedy with all earnestness. Of course they may not want to hear it. That is not the point. If we believe it to be true and we withhold the news for fear of offending them we are nothing short of criminal.
We are told we must be “relevant”. What, I ask, is more relevant to drowning persons than a life-belt? And what is more positive and relevant to Hell-bound sinners than the offer of eternal salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. Or perhaps the truth is that we don’t believe any more in Judgment to come and Hell for the impenitent. Such beliefs are certainly unfashionable. But Jesus believed them. Can we deny them and still call ourselves his ambassadors? I think not.
We are bidden to pray for Revival. We should do so. A Heaven-sent outpouring of the Spirit of God is our most desperate need. But if we want God to hear our heart-cry and bless our message then we must return to preaching God‘s Gospel and abandon our men-pleasing sugar-coated substitute, which is a fake.
If there is no Judgment then, I ask, why did Jesus have to die? If there is no Hell then why need we the Cross?
One caution: just let us be sure we preach such truths with love and with tears. Jesus wept over Jerusalem.
Few today preach the wonders of Grace. This follows from the previous two. Unless we appreciate the awful offence which sin is to our Maker, we shall never appreciate the wonder of his grace in providing a way whereby he can forgive that sin.
Unless we are convinced that as sinners we were under the righteous wrath of God and headed for Hell, we shall never know the wonder of the Love of God and say of Jesus “who loved ME and gave himself for ME” (Gal 2:20). Those who are forgiven little love little.
I don’t know about you, but when I hear the “songs of the angels” extolling the Cross of Christ, the sacrifice of the Lamb, and the wonders of the Sovereign Grace of God, it frequently causes me to weep. For I know I have been forgiven much.
The angels sang at the Creation, they sang at the Incarnation, they sang at the Coronation and:
fourthly:
They Sing at SALVATION
Jesus said, “there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents” (Luke:15:10).
May I share with you something of the story of how the Lord in his grace saved me.
I was born and raised in England. My mother died when I was seven years old but I had the immense privilege of being raised in a Christian home by a Godly father who was also a pastor. Although I made a sincere profession of faith when I was eleven, I can only conclude that no deep work of grace was wrought in my heart because my teen-age life was anything but Christian.
Whatever was available I wished to sample and I brought great grief to my father’s heart by my rebellious ways. It was not so much that I rejected the beliefs that I had been taught – I never remember a time when I ever consciously did that – but rather that they were totally irrelevant to the kind of hedonistic life I wanted to live. I am very thankful that drugs were not an option (except tobacco and alcohol). I left school at sixteen a failure and a disgrace.
At age eighteen I was conscripted into the Royal Air Force. Since I resented authority and, as frequently as I dare, broke the rules, I had a hard time. I was drifting at the bottom of the ranking scale, I had no ambition and I was also very miserable. My sins gave me fleeting pleasure but left an empty aching heart.
In the spring of 1954 I found myself in London, on leave from Germany where my squadron was stationed. I was going around with my cousin, Donald, who had been like a brother to me as we grew up. We had followed a very similar course. His mother also had died when he was young; his father – my dad’s brother – was also a pastor; and Donald also rebelled and lived a dissolute life. He was slightly older than me and I thought he was just wonderful and followed him in all his ways – especially bad ones.
On March 2, 1954 we decided to go to the Harringay Arena in north London. Not to see a boxing match which was the usual fare on offer at Harringay but to hear an evangelist, Billy Graham. For one thing it was free and for another, the British papers were full of accounts of his visit and the forthcoming Crusade. Most of the coverage was hostile and some of it, derisive. Why, it was doubtful if Winston Churchill could fill this 13,000-seat arena for even one night and Graham had booked it for three months! We were intrigued; besides our girl-friends wanted to go.
Donald drove the four of us crammed tightly into his tiny Austin 7, and we were in a party mood. Kisses and cuddles, jokes and laughter were the order of the day – or evening. From the moment the meeting started God began surgery on my heart. I fought back tears through the singing and was mesmerized by the message. I do not know what Billy preached that night but I do know that it was just for me. Like an arrow so the Word of God penetrated to the deepest recesses of my heart. I did not “go forward” at the invitation. I was too rooted to the spot by what the Lord was doing to me and with me. I tried to pray as I silently stumbled over my repentance for the miserable, Godless life I was leading and I begged Jesus to please save my shriveled-up soul.
As we made our way to some late-night cafe my companions, seemingly unaffected by our experience, were in the same frame as before. I sat still and pensive.
“Whatever is the matter with you?” asked my girl-friend.
“Nothing’s the matter,” I replied.
But she persisted. “Yes, there is. You certainly are a lot different going home than you were coming.”
Feeling rather awkward and embarrassed I simply said, “Well if you must know, something has happened to me tonight. In fact, I don’t believe I will ever be the same again.”
That put a bit of a damper on the party! My companions did not refer to it further.
To the astonishment of my cousin, before I got into bed I knelt to pray and did so again the next night. I waited three days wondering if my experience would prove to have been ephemeral. Perhaps to be explained by the emotional atmosphere, or the dynamic preaching, or some such thing. That being not the case I telephoned my father at his home in Yorkshire some two hundred or so miles away.
“Dad,” I said, “I believe I have been saved.”
“Have you son,” he replied, “what makes you say that?”
I told him I had been to hear Billy Graham. I knew he supported the evangelist because for weeks he had been sending me information about the Crusade. He was always sending me stuff, no doubt in the hope that a seed would be planted. As I recounted to him the whole story and asked him to forgive me the pain I had caused him, I heard my dad begin to cry.
He tried several times to speak but all he could say between his sobs was, “Praise the Lord! O, praise the Lord!”
You see these were tears of joy. His eyes were crying but his heart was singing. And my heart was singing. And the angels were singing.
They were singing because not only would this saved sinner now spend eternity in Heaven instead of in Hell but also because this God-given life would now be spent in fruitful service for the Savior – as every life was meant to be. I was indeed a “new creation” as the Scripture says. I had at last been born again.
I began to study, take, and pass exams, and was soon in college. I became a high-school teacher and then a college professor. Then the Lord called me to be a pastor and a preacher.
My dear father had prayed every day of his life that Harry, his only son, would be saved. Now the Lord, with his typical bounty, had done more abundantly than even my dad dared ask or imagine (see Ephesians 3:20). His joy overflowed.
Let me ask you, have the angels ever sung at your salvation?
If not, let me tell you, they long to do so.
Fifthly and finally:
They Will Sing at the CONSUMMATION.
What is that? It is when Jesus comes again. Do you know that Jesus is coming again? In Scripture there are as many, if not more, references to his second coming as to his first coming. Over three hundred prophesies and statements, many of them by our Lord himself, declare that he will return in power and great glory. He is coming with all his holy angels “…when the heavens shall ring and the angels sing at thy coming for victory…” as the old hymn puts it
He is coming, the Bible says, personally, physically, visibly, and gloriously.
Acts 1:11, “This same Jesus who has been taken from you into heaven will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.”
Matthew 24:30, “Jesus said, ‘They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky.'”
Revelation 1:7, “Look, he is coming with the clouds and every eye will see him.”
God has a plan for history. The “mystery of history” is no mystery to him. Some people believe that history just repeats itself, going round in circles. No, history is not cyclic, it is linear. All the time we are headed for the climax of history. Do you not sense that? The Bible teaches that when God has brought all his elect into the church; when the last stone is in place in the great edifice the Lord Jesus is building, God’s Son will return.
Some people say, “Surely you do not believe this kind of thing. Everything continues as it was from the beginning.” That is just what they were saying in the days of Noah the very day before the flood came, which Noah had been preaching about for 120 years. There were weddings and funerals; people making their plans and arrangements for the years of life to come, but they were not going to see it. And Jesus said that is how it will be the day before he comes (Matthew 24:36-42). Millions will be unready because they just will not take him seriously.
He is coming to judge and to reign. And he will put an end to all suffering and sin and wipe away every tear from every eye forever and forever. He will come and abolish war. Contrary to what you would think from a great deal that is said around Christmas time Jesus did not come the first time to abolish war. If he did, then he has been an abysmal failure for the history of the world has sadly been a history of wars.
The Bible says there will be wars until the Prince of Peace comes to reign.
My friends, Jesus never fails in anything he sets out to do. And when he comes again it will be then that nations will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks, or if you like, their cannons into combines, and their bombs into bread.
He will have a redeemed people with redeemed bodies in a redeemed universe to dwell with their Redeemer and enjoy him forever.
“Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb” (Revelation 19:9).
Some of us have reason to think that the coming of the Lord may not be far off. We are hurtling with break-neck speed to the end of this decade, and to the end of this millennium. Are you ready if the Lord should come tomorrow to sing with the angels and welcome him in his glory? He said, “So you also must be ready. The Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him” (Matthew 24:44).
Jesus said the signs of his Coming would be like the birth pangs of an expectant mother, which quicken as the time draws near. That is just what is happening today. One of those is the evangelization of the world. Jesus said, “And this Gospel of the Kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come” (Matt 24:14).
We watch for his Coming, not by “gazing up into Heaven” doing nothing. When Jesus said, “Occupy, until I come” (Luke 19:13 KJV) he meant us to get on with the job he had given us to do which is to make him known to all the nations of the world. I sometimes think that had we been more faithful at that and spent less time and energy arguing and speculating about prophetic details Christ might have already come!
Said Augustine,“That Day lies hid that every day we might be on the watch. He who loves the Coming of the Lord is not he who says it is far off; nor he who says it is near; but rather he who, whether it be near or far, awaits it with sincere faith, steadfast hope, and fervent love.”
“Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.”