On the Ninth day of Christmas....

On the 9th Day of Christmas my true love gave to me, nine ladies dancing…
Wishing you all a very merry ninth day of Christmas as we head back to our nativity story just for a while, as the nine ladies dancing remind us of the jubilant Angels who sang and announced Christ’s birth.
The Nine Ladies Dancing is possibly to symbolize the nine choirs of angels: (in ascending order)
1. Angels 2. Archangels 3. Principalities 4. Powers 5. Virtues 6. Dominations 7. Thrones 8. Cherubim 9. Seraphim.
Now, if you are anything like me you’ll be looking at this list and saying, “Angels, Archangels, Cherubim and seraphim… maybe Powers and Principalities… but what are these others?”

The other possible symbol for the nine ladies dancing is the nine fruit of the Holy Spirit.
Galatians 5:22-23 (NIV) “22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.”

I’d like to spend just a little time reflecting on both of these. I suspect that the Angels may be more the traditional symbol because back in the 16th century, around about when the 12 days were potentially celebrated, many church traditions seemed to stem from the Roman Catholic tradition, and the Catholics had re-defined the fruit of the Spirit into twelve, rather than nine. However there had been the split between Eastern orthodox and Roman Catholics way back in 1054 and the formation of the Anglican, Lutheran and other protestant churches seemed to emerge in the 16th century. It matters not what we choose to reflect on, but more importantly, that whatever we look at, are the things of God.

In Speaking of the Church and the churches; the ninth article of our creed states that we believe In One Holy catholic and apostolic Church. We profess this same creed whether we are Roman Catholic or other denominations and many are confused as to what it means.
“Catholic” means “universal”. We believe that the true church has no denominations but that it consists of all who are Christians, accepting the sacrifice of Jesus, believing in his divinity and humanity and indwelt by the Holy Spirit. This is regardless of one’s culture, background and geographical location.
“Apostolic” is a word that means “sent”. The first to be sent were the apostles who were there with Christ and then those who have accepted him. It implies an adhesion to the early Church and a mission to continue Christ’s work and the commission given to receive the Holy Spirit and to go and make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

The proclamation of God’s word is what those Angels declared when Christ was born, “Peace to all on Earth”!

The word angel means, “Messenger of God”. Angels are spoken of throughout the Bible and only very occasionally named. Gabriel visited Zechariah about the pregnancy of Elizabeth and then to Mary.
I don’t want to go into depth about the Angels and the ranks of Archangels etc., but certainly these exist and the purpose is to serve God and they have a part to play in his plan which means supporting God’s creation – ie. Humans, with protection and guidance.
There are no direct references to Guardian Angels, in the way that people think each person has one assigned to them, but there are references to suggest that Angels (Plural) look out for us.

It would appear that both humans and Angels have been given free will, and can choose Good or evil. As we know, Satan is an Angel who went against God and fights against those who follow him. We also know fallen Angels who follow Satan, as demons.

According to Baruch S. Davidson from the website: http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/692875/jewish/What-Are-Angels.htm
“According to Jewish tradition, an angel is a spiritual being and does not have any physical characteristics. The angelic descriptions provided by the prophets – such as wings, arms etc. – are anthropomorphic, referring to their spiritual abilities and tasks.”

However we know that Angels can appear to look just like humans. In the story of Lot from Genesis 19, two Angels came and stayed with Lot and the men of the town demanded that Lot send the men out so that they could have sex with them. The men of the township didn’t recognize anything divine about them and it is not clear that Lot realized until these Angels gave them the message from the Lord.

In the New Testament we are urged to act with hospitality towards strangers. Hebrew 13:2 “Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it.”

Angels are not to be worshiped. Revelations 19:10 and 22:9 describes occasions when John fell prostrate to worship and Angel and the Angel quickly reprimanded him for doing so. Also we have a warning from Colossians 2:18 “Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you. Such a person also goes into great detail about what they have seen; they are puffed up with idle notions by their unspiritual mind.”

And on that note, there are many who claim to have superior knowledge and when we are eager to know about God, we actively look for someone we can respect and whose knowledge we can drink in. Please remember our message from previous days, where we are all given the Holy Spirit and we all can know God and his ways… we need to respect each other and know that each of us carries God, but each of us is just as fallible. “There but for the Grace of God go I”. Any of us can fall, given the circumstances and any of us can become strong given the encouragement and gifts of God… so “let us consider how we might spur one another on toward love and good deeds.” (Hebrews 10:24)

Other Angelic beings listed, which I find interesting are the Powers and Principalities. The reason these caught my eye is that these are spoken of in the Bible, but in a negative way. Remember that all Angels can be those who follow God or those who follow Satan.
The verse that lists these is Ephesians 6:12 KJV “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”
This is speaking of a spiritual force that is behind things that happen in the physical world. Those familiar with Spiritual warfare will know more about this than me. But let us not kid ourselves into thinking we don’t want to be involved in Spiritual warfare; if you follow Christ and you are actively doing his work, you will encounter these powers and principalities. We are, thankfully given the tools to combat and this is listed in the surrounding verses of Ephesians 6:13-18
“Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.
Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.
In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people”

These things that are listed as the armour of God are about knowing who we are in Christ. We are clothed in Christ and belong to him… it is TRUTH. Through Christ we have righteousness and not through anything that we are or do in ourselves. We know the Gospel of peace – the Gospel that brings us into peace with God – a completely uninhibited relationship and we are ready to declare it. Our faith in God is a Shield and our Salvation is what protects us. All these are our protection and defense. Our offensive tools are also in these, but particularly with the sword of the Spirit… which is the word of God.

I have this image in my head of someone being knighted… God holds the sword and touches their shoulders and says “arise knights”…. Our readiness for the battle begins and ends with the word of God- both the living and the written.

Much of our power stems from the Holy Spirit. As I’ve said before, this involves many facets, but this being the ninth day, we look at the fruit; love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. These fruit are not separate, but a description of what the effect of the Holy Spirit in us is.
These are things that grow in us because of the working of the Holy Spirit in our lives and not something that we “Paint” on. I watched the original Alice in Wonderland last night and they were painting the white roses red. They were not authentically red. It is the same with the fruit of the Spirit… you can look at these and “paint” them onto your lives, but people will eventually feel like something is not right about you.
So, what is the solution? There is none. It is a reality of your life that if you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit and remaining connected to God, that this fruit will be produced in your life. You will most probably be completely unaware of its production. If the fruit is not being produced you may need to look at your “soil”, your influences and other aspects of your life that may be impeding on God’s plan for your life.
An orange tree doesn’t groan and strive to produce fruit and neither do we in producing the fruit of the Spirit, It will happen naturally. But just as an orange tree need soil nutrients and water, so do we need the encouragement of other Christians, the word of God in our lives and a focus on all that is good and wholesome to guard us against the poison of things that may harm. And remember the “solution to pollution is dilution”… which I’ll parallel to mean that we live in a world full of sinful and potentially harmful things… we can’t avoid these, but we dilute their effect on us by having a whole lot of God stuff to water that which could poison could harm.

The purpose for the fruit in our lives is to be a blessing to others and to proclaim that same message of the Angels on that Holy Night, “Glory to God in the Highest and Peace to all on earth”.