Entertaining an Angel

"Let brotherly love continue. Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some have unwittingly entertained angels." Hebrews 13:1-2

On February 27, 2011, my pastor, Aaron Budjen, was about to start his message when he took a moment to share something about his testimony.

"I got saved back in 1989 ... I was part of a military unit and I called the chapel and I said, "I want to talk to somebody." So somebody came over and they only had a few minutes and I only had a few minutes. I don't remember a whole lot of what he told me. His name was Chaplain Bulla (sp). There were a couple of things that really stuck with me. The first thing he said was, "What I am going to tell you you're not going to understand now, but you will understand later." And I remember now I understand what he was trying to tell me. He was trying to tell me about salvation being the restoration of the Holy Spirit. I didn't have any idea of what he was talking about back then. I can only say that today I can remember that is what he had communicated. He led me in a prayer to be saved and I prayed sincerely that I wanted to be saved. That I wanted to know my God for who He was and that I didn't know really who He was, what He was about or whether it was about ... in Judaism or in Christianity or where, but I knew that he knew this God and I wanted to know the God that he knew and that's how I got started.  And for many years I have tried to find him. I have tried multiple times. I contacted the military. I contacted the base. I talked to everybody and had them go through all the records for every chaplain in the entire base for all history to find Chaplain Bulla. And there has never been any way that anybody's been able to find his existence. There is no record of him anywhere. And so yesterday morning I conceded that it is probably that the Lord sent an angel so that I could be saved. I don't like to concede things like that too quickly or too easily because I could be wrong. I don't want to say that I am somebody special because He decided to send somebody, one of His angels, to come talk to me for a couple of minutes because I am definitely not. I am sure He would do that for anyone and He wouldn't do that just for me. But, on the other hand, I am pretty confident that that is all He had available. I have never spoken about that ever. I have never told anybody about that so I thought I'd go ahead and do that now because I don't think it is possible for me to deny that anymore. I am really thankful that He was merciful."

Sometimes I think that Christians over-spiritualize events in their life; thinking that every odd occurrence or hard to explain circumstance is supernatural. There are even those that only seem to focus on these supposed encounters with angels. But, knowing my pastor as I do, he is not one to quickly give into all of this as he mentions in his story. It took him 22 years to conclude that he may have had an encounter with an angel. No doubt people have had encounters with angels, even fallen angels (demons), within the pages of scripture and throughout world history. Many times in scripture there was little doubt that an angel was making an appearance as often times the first words out of their mouth was, "Do not be afraid," indicating that their appearance was quite impressive and intimidating. However, assuming my pastor's experience was legitimately an encounter with an angel, they can also be disguised like regular human beings. This, obviously, can make recognizing them more difficult, if not impossible. But, perhaps, that is the point. It allows the message they are bringing to us to be the focus instead of us focusing on the messenger. I am also inclined to believe my pastor encountered an angel because of the uniqueness of the message Chaplain Bulla relayed to him. Salvation being the restoration of the Holy Spirit of God is, sadly, not something that one hears preached too often, if at all. Personally, I can count on one hand those teachers I know who I believe understand and teach this truth and I would have a finger or two to spare. I don't say that to be humorous, but out of sadness. Just like it took a direct encounter with Jesus to set the Apostle Paul on his path to writing the majority of the New Testament letters, perhaps the Lord sent an angel to my pastor to set him on his path to teach the fullness of the Gospel. Ultimately, I think all of us can take heart in the fact that the Lord does care enough about us to send angels to us or to talk to us directly; even if only for a couple of minutes. And, we may not know He did that for years after the encounter. After all, the Bible says in Hebrews 13:2 that we "unwittingly" entertain angels. What I do know is that as long as we are learning to trust and depend on Him, through our relationship with Jesus Christ and His indwelling Holy Spirit, we will be open to possibly entertaining an angel someday who will carry a message that will change our lives and, perhaps, our eternity.