What Do Angels Look Like?

Very few of us failed to see some kind of Christmas pageant during the past month. Our five-year old granddaughter, Amelia, was in a children’s dramatic musical presentation at our church recently. She was a star—and a comical one. When the “stars” lifted their hands in sync with the music, their costumes covered their faces. But, of course, it was a magnificent program.

During Christmas programs, my attention usually turns to the angels because they always look the same. Dressed in glittering white, they have a halo and wings, and they are usually smiling, right? At least that is what they look like in all the pageants that I have seen.

How do we know what an angel looks like? For sure it is not a western cultural thing as the Sumerian, Assyrians, Babylonians and ancient Egyptians have left us carved images of angles that look just like the ones in our Christmas pageants. So it looks like our notion of what an angel looks like has been passed down from generation to generation.

It strikes me that when an angel is introduced in The Word, the people to whom they appeared must have been afraid. Matthew 29:5 states: "But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified." So, what did the angel look like if the first thing it said to the women at Jesus' tomb was "Don't be afraid?" Probably not what our stereotyped notion of pageant angels is.

Then, there is I Chronicles 21:30 where the angel carried a sword: "but David could not go before it to inquire of God, for he was afraid of the sword of the angel of the LORD." How many pageants have you seen with an angel carrying a sword?!

Many times in our lives our minds are set -- on what something is supposed to look like, on what you think something tastes like, on what someone believes, on where someone fits in the societal rankings, on how we are going to like someone -- before we ever get an opportunity to see, experience and understand for ourselves.

Perhaps you are guilty as I have been of forming an opinion of someone based on what others tell you before you ever meet the person or before you get to know her or him. I really do not want to allow someone else to choose my friends for me by accepting their opinion before I have the opportunity to make up my own mind.

"Do not speak evil against one another, brothers. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge." James 4:11