Reformed Churchmen

We are Confessional Calvinists and a Prayer Book Church-people. In 2012, we remembered the 350th anniversary of the 1662 Book of Common Prayer; also, we remembered the 450th anniversary of John Jewel's sober, scholarly, and Reformed "An Apology of the Church of England." In 2013, we remembered the publication of the "Heidelberg Catechism" and the influence of Reformed theologians in England, including Heinrich Bullinger's Decades. For 2014: Tyndale's NT translation. For 2015, John Roger, Rowland Taylor and Bishop John Hooper's martyrdom, burned at the stakes. Books of the month. December 2014: Alan Jacob's "Book of Common Prayer" at: http://www.amazon.com/Book-Common-Prayer-Biography-Religious/dp/0691154813/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1417814005&sr=8-1&keywords=jacobs+book+of+common+prayer. January 2015: A.F. Pollard's "Thomas Cranmer and the English Reformation: 1489-1556" at: http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Cranmer-English-Reformation-1489-1556/dp/1592448658/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1420055574&sr=8-1&keywords=A.F.+Pollard+Cranmer. February 2015: Jaspar Ridley's "Thomas Cranmer" at: http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Cranmer-Jasper-Ridley/dp/0198212879/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1422892154&sr=8-1&keywords=jasper+ridley+cranmer&pebp=1422892151110&peasin=198212879

Monday, September 29, 2014

29 September. St. Michael and All Angels. 1662 Book of Common Prayer.


29 September.  St. Michael and All Angels. Book of Common Prayer.


The Collect.

 

O EVERLASTING God, who hast ordained and constituted the services of Angels and men in a wonderful order; Mercifully grant, that as thy holy Angels alway do thee service in heaven, so by thy appointment they may succour and defend us on earth; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
 
 
 

For old Prayer Book Churchmen at Morning and Evening Prayers, the lections for 29 Sept are:

Genesis 32: Esau comes to meet Jacob and Jacob’s wrestles with God

Acts 12.5-18: Peter freed from prison by an Angel of the Lord

Daniel 10.4: Daniel’s vision of the “Glorious Man” in a vision

Rev.14.14:  Glorious angels involved in the earth’s final harvest

For Holy Communion:

Eph. 4.17-32:  (1) The sovereignly elect and regeneration new man in Christ and (2) “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit”

Matt.9.1-8:  Jesus Alone Directly, Immediately and with any other Mediators (other Jewish priests or high priests) Forgives and Heals a Paralytic Man

A note on Michael and All Angels from:


St. Michael and All Angels. This Festival (kept in the Eastern Church on November 8th) is naturally of ancient observance. For, although the nature of angels is but little revealed to us, their ministration is clearly described, first, to the chosen family and to the chosen nation in the Old Testament, and then to Our Lord Himself, and to the Church and to individual souls for His sake, in the New. While, therefore, worship of them is an idolatry (Col. ii. 18), which they indignantly refuse (Rev. xxii. 8, 9), yet thankfulness and reverence for them as "fellow servants," higher in the one Communion of Saints, whose service is the pattern of our own, are most natural and seemly. St. Michael is described in the Old Testament (Dan. x. 13, 21; xii. 1; comp. Jude 9) as the guardian angel of the Jewish people; in the New Testament he is the great archangel, the type of the warrior angel, fighting for God and His Church against the power of the devil. Beyond this, though fancy has created a mass of legend, we cannot be said to know anything of him. -- September 29th.

This day reminds us of the dreary emptiness of secular Western assumptions about ontology and reality, to wit, no providence, no spiritual beings, and a broken god. 

Angels:  (Zechariah)

Desultory notes and musings:

  1. Innumerable
  2. Intelligent
  3. Moral agents
  4. Not ordinarily visible but have, variously, appeared to humans (Gen. 18.2-19.22; Jn. 20.36,36)
  5. Move from one finite, specific place to another finite, specific place
  6. Probation, like humans.  Some angels were “elect and holy” and other fell; they were confirmed in their status\
  7. Heaven is their dwelling (Mt. 18.10; 22.30; Rev. 5.11)
  8. Offer constant worship (Ps. 103. 20, 21; 148.2)
  9. Go out at God’s command to serve God’s people (Heb.1. 14)
  10.  Again, there is “election” of “holy” angels (Mt. 25.31; Mk. 8.38; Lk. 9.26; Acts 10.22; 1 Tim. 5.21; Rev. 14.10)
  11. Protect believers (Ps. 34.7; 91.11)
  12. Protect, especially, little believers and children (Mt. 18.10)
  13. Constantly watch the church (1 Cor. 11.10)
  14. Special ministry indicated with the death of saints (Lk. 16.22)
  15. Despite what is given in the Scripture, we never worship them and we never invoke or pray to them;  rather, we pray ONLY to and in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.
  16. The Angel of the LORD is often identified as God and yet, like Jn. 1.1ff, distinguished from God.  (Gen. 16.7-13; 18.1-33; 22.11-18; 24. 7, 40; 31.11-13; 32.24-30; 48. 15-16; Ex. 3.2-6; 14.19; 23.30-23; 32.34-33.5; Num. 22.22-35; Josh. 5.13-15; Judg. 2.1-5; 6.11-23; 9.13-23
  17. The Angel of the LORD is God’s special Messenger.  He is often viewed as the “Pre-incarnate appearance of God the Son.” That is this scribe’s view amongst many Churchmen in the catholic (=Reformed) faith.
  18. Angels appear at all major turning points in redemptive history: Creation, Patriarchs, Exodus, Sinai, Exile, Restoration from Exile, and the Birth, Resurrection and Ascension of God the Son.  Angels will appear in glory at the Second Coming.

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