Throughout history, and across religions, angels have been depicted in one form or another. Sometimes perceived as ethereal, they almost always have the purpose of conveying comfort and the presence of God.
They are that—and so much more. Mary Baker Eddy begins her definition of angels as “God’s thoughts passing to man; spiritual intuitions, pure and perfect …” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 581). This definition continues by describing angels as “the inspiration of goodness, purity, and immortality, counteracting all evil, sensuality, and mortality.”
These communications need no prompting from man. Angels are described elsewhere in Science and Health as incorporeal impartations of “divine Love to man” (pp. 308–309), helping us to behold and experience spiritual reality—right at hand—manifested by practical blessings that meet every human need.
God’s angel messages come to all. They come to the doubter, the uninitiated in religion, and the person so caught up in a material sense of life that spirituality seems remote—if not an impossibility. They come, too, to those praying earnestly for divine guidance. What helps us to tune in? The “white noise” of matter-based thinking can be loud and distracting, and can prevent us from hearing the only voice we need to hear—God’s.
We can be assured that God can speak through the “white noise,” but we hear that guidance better as we develop greater receptivity. Receptivity is born of humility, and is the open mind that acknowledges all is not as it appears to be, and that there is more to be gleaned.
One beautiful summer day in the Colorado Rocky Mountains I had an experience that deepened my understanding of angels. Family and friends gathered to go white-water rafting on the scenic Cache la Poudre River. Heavy snows had fallen in the mountains that winter, and the river was flowing higher and faster than it had in years. Some rafting incidents had been reported in the local paper, raising my concern about safety. Although some members of our group were visiting from out of state for the outing, I didn’t want that reason to trump wisdom. After I prayed about this, the morning of the trip arrived and all signs pointed for us to proceed, so the 12 of us set off.
I was in a raft with seven others, including an experienced guide. Shortly into the trip we came upon a Class IV rapid. Failing to maneuver around a large rock, we went over a waterfall into the churning waters below. Despite our intense paddling efforts, the raft was sucked backward into a “hole.” Moments later I tumbled out of the raft and was caught underneath the falls. I found myself unable to get to the surface, and as the moments passed, the horror grew. Quickly, however, I heard the clear, divine message, “God is right here!” It came so firmly and with such authority that I knew it was true, and it snapped me to attention.
We can wonder, “Why?”—or we can “get on with it” and turn to God.
I at once felt the presence of God enveloping me and calming fear. Seconds later I popped to the surface and became a “swimmer”—the guides’ word for a rafter who’s fallen overboard. The river carried me swiftly downstream, while every rock and branch I reached out for slipped from my grasp. Exhaustion was taking over.
Right then, through the blur of water washing over my face, I saw a kayak directly in front of me, and heard the kayaker yelling, “Grab on—now!” referring to a handle on the side of his boat. My arm, feeling much like cement, wouldn’t cooperate. Unwilling to accept this, I declared that God is the source of my strength. Within moments I was able to grab on to the handle.
Looking upstream, I saw the beached raft and people standing around. Seven of us had been ejected from the raft, one jumped out and swam, and all were safe. One of my sons told me later that as he was falling backward out of the raft, he heard the clear directive to “be calm.” He obeyed, even as he tried to surface, but was blocked by the raft above him three times. Listening for God’s direction, he was guided to breast stroke under the water, which brought him out from underneath the raft, and he quickly surfaced. Another son was trapped in the “hole,” and when his efforts to come up to the surface proved futile, the inspiration came strongly to go down to the riverbed and shove off from there. He obeyed—and was lifted to the surface. My third son, the first one ejected from the raft, was inspired to release his safety line—the paddle extended to him by a brother—and swam safely to shore.
God’s angel messages are always at hand to deliver us and to communicate God’s loving presence. They come to us in the form we most need at the time, directing our steps, comforting our hearts, and dispelling fear. We saw this, too, in the bus driver who was positioned precisely where he needed to be onshore to throw out a rope to capture and pull in four swimmers at once—a record we were told. We also saw it in the safety kayaker accompanying our group, who quickly maneuvered into place and captured two of us on our “swim” downriver toward a large rapid.
We can expect to live our lives protected from danger, but occasionally we find ourselves in situations needing healing, protection, and wise direction. We can wonder, “Why?”—especially when we’ve prayed about a situation—or we can choose instead to immediately “get on with it” and turn to God. The long-ago experience of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (see Daniel 3) shows us they chose the latter. There is no doubt as to their spiritual preparedness, but that didn’t keep them from the fiery furnace. What it did was to allow them to feel and know the presence of God right while they were in the middle of it!
The human experience is the outward expression of the belief that we are combined spirit and matter—good and evil—and it is only within this line of thinking that we find peril. The Christ—the true idea of God appearing in its healing light—comes to transform thought, and, by so doing, transforms our experience as well. This is when we discern the divine—the spiritual and absolute—as a present reality.
God’s angel messages are the great communicators of Truth. They are present in our moments of greatest need and in our quiet times, too. Sometimes coming as “a still small voice” (I Kings 19:12), and at other times as a booming call, they are God’s imparting of right ideas to our thought, comforting us and showing us the way forward.
