When a son is promised to Abraham in Genesis 18:1-3 (NRSV), three men suddenly appear. “The Lord appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre as he sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day. He looked up and saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them, and bowed to the ground. He said, ‘My Lord, if I find favour with you, do not pass by your servant.’”
Saint Thomas Aquinas was a great medieval theologian who was often referred to as the Angelic Doctor because he spent a lot of time talking and writing about angels. He believed that not only were angels spiritual beings who could take on any form but that they were also highly intellectual beings.
We all have angels who are there to help us and lead us in the right direction so that our soul can learn and grow in love. However, he also said that for this to happen we have to want to be led. So, in other words, they are there to assist us at any time as long as we desire their assistance because we still have free will.
In the 1998 film City of Angels, an angel named Seth (Nicholas Cage) falls in love with a beautiful heart surgeon (Meg Ryan) and must choose between his heavenly duties or his earthly desires. In one of the scenes from the movie, Dr. Maggie Rice is upset about the death of her patient and says, “He should have lived.” To this Seth says, “He is living. Just not the way you think.” The doctor then replies, “I don't…believe in…that.”
The angel then looks at the doctor and says, “Some things are true whether you believe them or not.” That line has stayed with me ever since. So true! Think of it this way, say you consider yourself to be an agnostic or an atheist, does this affect whether God or angels are or aren't a reality? No, it does not. The truth is the truth regardless of what you believe.
More than half of all Americans believe in the existence of angels according to a 2008 survey conducted by Baylor University's Institute for Studies of Religion which polled 1,700 respondents. I have no doubt that the percentage is much higher these days. What I find particularly interesting is that one in five of those surveyed who claimed that they were not religious still believed that they were protected in some way and at some point in life by angels.
St. Thomas held that the failure of some to believe in angels was due to the fact that many people are quick to write off the presence of spirits or angels as mere imagination. They can't, he noted, tell the difference between what they are imagining and what they are truly sensing. If we could tell the difference, then we would know without a doubt that we are always in the presence of angels.
Angels, he also believed, influence mankind by putting thoughts in our head and giving us ideas. We may not even realize it at the time, but our very thoughts may be divinely guided.
In addition to putting thoughts in our head, angels can also posit pictures in our mind. I can say without hesitation that this is true because I was lucky enough to experience a divine intervention like this myself. On Memorial Day 2011, I decided to go to the local Target store and run some errands.
After about an hour, I exited the store with my full cart and headed to my car. All of a sudden in a quick instant I saw a vision of myself getting hit by a car and felt all of the emotions of my family and friends. I knew I was killed by this car though I didn't see myself dead. It was so powerful and immediate that I stopped in my tracks and sort of did a double take wondering what the heck had just happened. I stopped for about five seconds trying to shake it off and then proceeded to push my cart to my car.
All of a sudden a man, driving a pickup truck, backed up out of a spot directly in front of me without looking. He pulled out so fast that I quickly reached forward and pulled my cart back. If I hadn't, he would have hit my cart full on. I stood there, out of breath, clutching my cart, and staring at the man in the truck who looked at me in shock, knowing he had come so close to killing me. He looked at me apologetically, put his truck back in drive, and pulled back into his spot. My heart was still racing as I watched him put his truck in park and then bury his face in his hands.
Looking back I don't know why I didn't go up to this man; perhaps it was the shock of the whole ordeal. As he sat there, I'm sure contemplating how he could have killed me; I was actually thinking, OH MY GOD, I saw this happen before it happened. I felt no anger for this stranger, only compassion sensing how bad he felt.
When I finally got back to my car and drove home, I was numb and shell shocked wondering how I was going to tell my husband what had just transpired. When I did, his eyes watered thinking of the unthinkable. But I couldn't help but wonder why this had happened to me. Why had I been shown this vision? Why had my life been spared?
The following week I was talking to a friend of mine (who is a medium) and told him what happened. “Josie,” he said, “that was your spirit guide sending you that message. Had you not listened and stopped, you would have been killed. I am so glad you listened.” Although intuitively I already knew this, it was hard to hear.
Had I not listened, I would not be here today to share this story with you (at least not in the physical). But the truth is I would not be here even more so had it not been for the spirit who sent me that message or vision in the first place. My friend called this spirit a spirit guide. To me, in addition to being my spirit guide, this spirit was also an angel.
People have often asked me what I think the difference is between an angel and a spirit guide. And before I can answer this, I need to first mention Saint Augustine, the Catholic saint and mystic. According to this extraordinary man, “Angels are spirits, but it is not because they are spirits that they are angels. They become angels when they are sent. For the name angel refers to their office, not their nature. You ask the name of this nature, it is spirit; you ask its office, it is that of an Angel.”1
As I said earlier, the word angel is of Greek origin meaning messenger. So I find St. Augustine's explanation of angels to be very interesting. For one thing we are all spirit. Spirit is our true nature; we are not the body. But St. Augustine pointed out that it is not this nature that makes them angels but their office, which another way of saying what they do or the message they portray.
I believe that a person is an angel because of his deeds and not his nature. Having said this, I believe that spirit guides are different levels of angels. You have the highest level which includes the Archangels Gabriel and Michael all the way to spirits who once walked among us on this earth and now work to help people still in human form. All are sent to us to help us with our journey or purpose here on earth.
They help us, for example, by sending us signs. You see someone's name or hear it on four different occasions on the same day. They may be putting this person in your mind so that you contact him. Other times we may have a feeling about something or even hear a voice in our head. When I was about twenty-one, I was driving home as an icy mist covered the roadways. I found myself on a normally busy street in my hometown of Elizabeth, New Jersey when without warning I lost control of my car as it began to skid on the ice. My initial thought was to try to turn my steering wheel away from the direction of the parked cars and the utility pole, but suddenly I heard a voice say, “Let go of the wheel.” I quickly let go and just sat in my vehicle as the car continued to skid as if it had a mind of its own. I think I must have said a bunch of “Hail Mary's” and “Our Fathers” in mere seconds before my car came to a halt within about a foot from the utility pole.
We've all heard this little intuitive voice at one time or another during our lives; however most of us just dismiss it as a figure of our imagination. The angels and spirit guides can guide us by bringing certain people into our lives. How many times have you met someone and had the feeling that you were meant to meet him? Chances are you were.
Part of the Nicene Creed reads:
We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty
maker of heaven and earth,
of all