Luke 2: 13-14 Angels We Have Heard On High

Posted on Thursday, December 25, 2014 in Bible Commentary | 0 comments

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

//In a google hangout a few days ago, I mentioned that I have a manger scene in my home, next to the Christmas tree. I admitted that I love manger scenes, the baby Jesus, angels with halos and wings and trumpets.

Is this scriptural? Of course not. I like our angels today better than the angels in the Bible, which were often fearsome creatures. The “angels on high” in today’s verse were not winged girls with golden hair and flowing white dresses, and they certainly weren’t cherubs strumming harps. They weren’t “on high” at all, but were the armies of heaven, come down to earth to worship. The first mention you’ll see in Jewish literature about angels flying occurs in Revelation.

Our manger scenes today are a merger of two honorific stories–Luke’s stable birth with shepherds and Matthew’s house birth with traveling magicians–and for good measure we throw in some adorable singing cherubs floating in the sky. We mash them all together and add a drummer boy. I like it. We take the Bible’s honorific stories (which are only conflicting if you try to read them as history) and find a contemporary, preferred way of welcoming the King to earth.

The Messiah has come!