Saturday, April 25, 2015

Guardian Angels

Question: Please explain Matthew 18:10: "Take heed that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that in heaven their angels always see the face of My Father who is in heaven." Does every child have a guardian angel?


This seems to be the plain teaching of the text. Some explain the text in another way. They say that the angels of the children that are spoken of here are the departed spirits of the children in the glory. However, there is not a hint anywhere in the Bible that the departed spirits of human beings are angels. All through the Bible, the clearest distinction is kept between angels and men. The old hymn, " I Want to Be an Angel," has no warrant whatsoever in Scripture.

The angels of the children that are spoken of here are the angels who watch over the children. It is the office of angels to minister on behalf of those who will be heirs of salvation (Hebrews 1:14). According to the Bible, each child seems to have a guardian angel, and these angels occupy a position of special favor and opportunity before God. They stand in His very presence and always behold the face of the Father.

The Heathen

Question: How is God going to judge the heathen? Can the heathen be saved by following the best spiritual light they have?

God will judge the heathen in righteousness, according to the light they have had. Those who have sinned without knowing the law revealed to Moses will also perish without the law, and those who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law (Romans 2:12).

The heathen are not without spiritual light. The fact that they do by nature the things required in the law shows that they have a law, though not the law revealed to Moses (Romans 2:14-16). If any heathen were to perfectly live up to the light he has, he would undoubtedly be saved by doing so, but no heathen has ever done this. The twelfth through sixteenth verses of Romans 2 are often taken as teaching that the heathen are to be saved by the light of nature. However, anyone who will read the passage carefully in its context will see that Paul's whole purpose was not to show how the heathen are saved by keeping the law written in their hearts but to show that all are under condemnation - the Jew because he has not lived up to the law given by revelation, and the Gentile because he has not lived up to the law written in his heart. The conclusion of the matter is given in Romans 3:22-23: "For there is no difference; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."

The verses that follow this passage point out the only way of salvation: free justification by God's grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus on the basis of His atoning death. Each person secures for himself this justification by faith in Christ (vv. 24-25). No one will be saved except through personal acceptance of Jesus Christ as his personal Saviour. There is not a line of Scripture that holds out a ray of hope to anyone who dies without accepting Jesus Christ.

There are those who believe that people who die without hearing of Jesus Christ in this world will have an opportunity to hear of Him and to accept or reject Him in some future state. However, the Bible does not say so; this is pure speculation without a word of Scripture to support it. There are also those who believe that the heathen who would have accepted Christ if He had been presented to them will be treated as if He had been presented to them and they had accepted Him, but this is all pure speculation.

All that the Bible teaches is that no one can be saved without personal acceptance of Christ, and it is wisdom on our part to do everything in our power to see that the heathen have the opportunity to accept Christ in this present life. We do not have one word of Scripture to support us in the hope that if we neglect our duty here, the heathen will have an opportunity to accept Christ in some future age or state.

~R. A. Torrey~

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