GOD SENDS A PERSONAL ANGEL TO US

THE HOLY GUARDIAN ANGELS

Job 9:1-13,14-16; Ps 88:10-15; Mt 18:1-5,10

Our Nothingness and God’s unfathomable Greatness

We celebrate the holy guardian angels today with gratitude in our hearts, remembering that the gift of the guardian angels is one of the demonstrations of God's great love for us human beings. The scriptures bear witness to this doctrine of God giving his people an angel to guard them along their way to salvation he has promised. This gift loses its grandeur when placed alongside the Father’s gift of his Son to be our Saviour and the Holy Spirit to dwell in our souls. Nevertheless, it is a demonstration of God’s great power that he wields for our salvation and his love for us. Job considers the greatness of divine power in the first reading in the face of his afflictions and comes to understand his nothingness in contrast to the almighty power of God. “Indeed, I know it is as you say: how can man be in the right against God? If any were so rash as to challenge him for reasons, one in a thousand would be more than they could answer. His heart is wise, and his strength is great: who then can successfully defy him? He moves the mountains, though they do not know it; he throws them down when he is angry.” God moves rational and irrational creatures to do his bidding. All the angelic beings are his creatures, and they stand aghast in his presence, ever ready to do his will. Job recognises and acknowledges the handiwork of God in his afflictions.

Hence, prayer to God in our time of affliction is not to demonstrate our righteousness, for that is like a filthy rag before his divine Majesty; Rather, it is a profession of faith in his loving kindness and trust in his holy providence. “How dare I plead my cause, then, or choose arguments against him? Suppose I am in the right, what use is my defence? For he whom I must sue is judge as well.” Given our human ignorance and weakness before trials, difficulties, and afflictions of this present life, which the Lord permits on our way for his good and loving purpose, he gives us angels to guard and guide us on the way to salvation. Because the holy guardian angels are from God and come to us in his name, they wield the power of God over us. They work with us to accomplish the will of God in our respective lives. The proper reading of the memorial from Exodus says: “Give him reverence and listen to all that he says. Offer him no defiance; he would not pardon such a fault, for my name is in him. If you listen carefully to his voice and do all that I say, I shall be enemy to your enemies, foe to your foes.”

The heavenly beings sent as guardian angels are always with us to defend us. What a consoling thought in times of danger and afflictions. We must internalize this teaching as expressed also in Psalm 91. These angels can achieve the will of God in our lives when we abandon ourselves like children to the divine will and trust in God’s providential care. Our Lord makes this point in the gospel as follows. “See that you never despise any of these little ones, for I tell you that their angels in heaven are continually in the presence of my Father in heaven.” Hence, our guardian angels are more active in their work as assigned to them by God when we accept the will of the Father like little children. We are also made great in heaven by that total submission to the Father’s will in humility. The submission is how we come to the resemblance of the Son of God, who made us in his image. “So he called a child to him and set the child in front of them. Then he said, ‘I tell you solemnly, unless you change and become like little children you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. And so, the one who makes himself as little as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” It follows from these words of our Lord that the guardian angels ascend and descend on us when we humble ourselves like the Son of Man, Jesus Christ our Lord, who humbled himself to do the will of the Father in all things. This humility and childlike trust in God make our lives continuous prayers to God, which the angels take to God. They ascend with our prayers and descend with answers to our supplications.

Let us pray: O God, who in your unfathomable providence are pleased to send your holy Angels to guard us, hear our supplication as we cry to you, that we may always be defended by their protection and rejoice eternally in their company.