# 23 Bible Verses About Angels

Source: https://christianpure.com/learn/bible-verses-angels/
Publisher: Christian Pure (https://christianpure.com/)
Published: 2024-05-24
Updated: 2026-09-28

In the Bible, angels are spirits who serve God and are sent out on his errands. Hebrews 1:14 calls them "ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation." They bring messages (Luke 1:26-28), rescue (Acts 12:7), worship (Revelation 5:11-12), and gather the elect at the end of the age (Matthew 24:31).

Three passages set limits on angels: Hebrews 1 ranks them below the Son, an angel refuses John's worship in Revelation 22:8-9, and Revelation 12:7-9 describes angels who fought on the dragon's side and were thrown down. Two angels are named in the Protestant Old and New Testaments: Gabriel (Luke 1:19) and Michael (Daniel 10:13, Jude 1:9, Revelation 12:7). Catholic and Orthodox Bibles, which include the Book of Tobit, add Raphael (Tobit 12:15).

## What angels are and whom they serve

### Hebrews 1:14

> "Are they not all ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation?"

**Reflection:** The question closes a chapter-long comparison between the Son and the angels. Hebrews 1:6 quotes "Let all God's angels worship him," and verse 13 asks to which of the angels God ever said "Sit at my right hand." The question in verse 14 expects the answer yes: angels are servants, sent out for those who will inherit salvation.

### Job 38:4-7

> "Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?"

**Reflection:** The LORD answers Job "out of the whirlwind" (Job 38:1) by asking where Job was when the earth's foundation was laid. The morning stars and "the sons of God" were there, singing and shouting for joy as its cornerstone went down. The book uses the same phrase in Job 1:6 for the company that came "to present themselves before the LORD," with Satan among them.

### Revelation 22:8-9

> "I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who showed them to me, but he said to me, 'You must not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.'"

**Reflection:** John falls at the feet of the angel who showed him the visions, and the angel stops him, calling himself "a fellow servant" of John and the prophets. The same thing happened in Revelation 19:10, with the same answer: "Worship God." Paul warns the Colossians against anyone "insisting on asceticism and worship of angels" (Colossians 2:18).

### 1 Peter 1:12

> "It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look."

**Reflection:** Peter writes that the prophets searched into the salvation they foretold and learned that they were serving later believers. The good news now preached is something "angels long to look" into, so the angels appear as onlookers. Hebrews 2:16 draws a related line: "it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham."

## Angels in heaven

### Psalm 103:20

> "Bless the LORD, O you his angels, you mighty ones who do his word, obeying the voice of his word!"

**Reflection:** Psalm 103 ends by calling on everything to bless the LORD, and the angels come first in that call. Verse 21 adds "all his hosts, his ministers, who do his will," verse 22 all his works, and the psalm closes where it began: "Bless the LORD, O my soul!"

### Revelation 5:11-12

> "Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, 'Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!'"

**Reflection:** The Lamb has taken the scroll, and the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders have sung to him, "Worthy are you to take the scroll." Then John hears the angels, too many to count, speak of him in the third person: "Worthy is the Lamb who was slain." After them "every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea" joins in (Revelation 5:13).

### Luke 15:10

> "Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents."

**Reflection:** Jesus tells the parables of the lost sheep and the lost coin because the Pharisees and scribes grumbled, "This man receives sinners and eats with them" (Luke 15:2). Each parable ends with a line about joy: "more joy in heaven" over one repentant sinner (verse 7), and here, joy "before the angels of God."

## Angels who come to people

### Luke 1:26-28

> "In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, 'Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!'"

**Reflection:** Gabriel had already appeared to Zechariah in the temple and introduced himself there: "I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God" (Luke 1:19). He comes to Mary in the sixth month of her relative Elizabeth's pregnancy (Luke 1:36). The greeting troubles Mary, and his next words to her are the ones he spoke to Zechariah: "Do not be afraid."

### Luke 2:13-14

> "And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!'"

**Reflection:** One angel of the Lord has already announced the birth to shepherds keeping watch over their flock by night, and they are "filled with great fear." The multitude then joins him in praise. When "the angels went away from them into heaven," the shepherds set off for Bethlehem to see what the Lord had made known to them (Luke 2:15).

### Acts 8:26

> "Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, 'Rise and go toward the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.' This is a desert place."

**Reflection:** The angel gives Philip a direction and nothing more: the desert road from Jerusalem to Gaza. On that road Philip meets an Ethiopian court official reading the prophet Isaiah in his chariot, and the next instruction comes from the Spirit: "Go over and join this chariot" (Acts 8:29).

### Acts 27:23-24

> "For this very night there stood before me an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I worship, and he said, 'Do not be afraid, Paul; you must stand before Caesar. And behold, God has granted you all those who sail with you.'"

**Reflection:** Paul says this on board a ship in a storm, after "all hope of our being saved was at last abandoned" (Acts 27:20). The angel's message covers Paul's own future, a hearing before Caesar, and the lives of everyone sailing with him. Paul adds that the ship will be lost and that "we must run aground on some island" (verses 22 and 26).

### Hebrews 13:2

> "Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares."

**Reflection:** The command sits between "Let brotherly love continue" and a call to remember prisoners. Hebrews does not say who the hosts were or when it happened. The instruction is to welcome strangers, and angels are the reason given for it.

## Angels who guard and rescue

### Exodus 23:20

> "Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared."

**Reflection:** God speaks to Israel in the laws given at Sinai. The angel goes ahead of the people to bring them to the land, and verse 21 tells them to obey his voice, "for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him." Verse 23 names the peoples the angel will bring them to: the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites and Jebusites.

### Psalm 91:11-12

> "For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone."

**Reflection:** The promise is made to the one who has "made the LORD your dwelling place" (Psalm 91:9). In Matthew 4:6 the devil quotes these two verses to Jesus on the pinnacle of the temple, urging him to throw himself down. Jesus answers, "Again it is written, 'You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.'"

### Acts 12:7

> "And behold, an angel of the Lord stood next to him, and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him, saying, 'Get up quickly.' And the chains fell off his hands."

**Reflection:** Herod means to bring Peter out to the people after the Passover (Acts 12:4), and "earnest prayer for him was made to God by the church" (Acts 12:5). Peter sleeps between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and he thinks he is seeing a vision until he is standing in the street. Then he says, "Now I am sure that the Lord has sent his angel and rescued me from the hand of Herod" (Acts 12:11).

### Matthew 18:10

> "See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven."

**Reflection:** Jesus has set a child among the disciples and is speaking of "these little ones who believe in me" (Matthew 18:6). Their angels "always see the face of my Father," and the parable of the lost sheep follows, ending "it is not the will of my Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish" (verse 14). The Catechism of the Catholic Church cites this verse in paragraph 336, which teaches guardian angels and quotes St Basil: "Beside each believer stands an angel as protector and shepherd leading him to life."

## Angels with Jesus

### Genesis 28:12

> "And he dreamed, and behold, there was a ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven. And behold, the angels of God were ascending and descending on it!"

**Reflection:** Jacob has left Beersheba for Haran and sleeps with a stone under his head. Above the ladder the LORD repeats the promises made to Abraham: the land, offspring like the dust of the earth, and a blessing for "all the families of the earth." In John 1:51 Jesus tells Nathanael he will see "the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man," where Genesis has them ascending and descending on the ladder.

### Matthew 4:11

> "Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him."

**Reflection:** Jesus had fasted "forty days and forty nights" in the wilderness before the devil came to him (Matthew 4:2). The angels come after the devil has left, at the end of the third temptation. Mark's shorter account says that Jesus "was with the wild animals, and the angels were ministering to him" (Mark 1:13).

### Luke 22:43

> "And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him."

**Reflection:** On the Mount of Olives Jesus prays, "not my will, but yours, be done," and the angel appears. The agony continues after the angel comes: "being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood" (Luke 22:44). The ESV notes that some manuscripts omit verses 43 and 44.

## Michael, the fallen angels and the end of the age

### Jude 1:9

> "But when the archangel Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, 'The Lord rebuke you.'"

**Reflection:** Jude sets the archangel against false teachers who "reject authority, and blaspheme the glorious ones" (Jude 1:8). Even Michael, disputing with the devil, left the judgment to God, using the words the LORD speaks to Satan in Zechariah 3:2. Second Peter 2:11 says the same of angels in general: they "do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment."

### Revelation 12:7-9

> "Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back, but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him."

**Reflection:** Michael and his angels fight the dragon and his angels, and verse 9 names the dragon: "that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan." He and his angels are thrown down to the earth. The loud voice that follows calls him "the accuser of our brothers" and says they conquered him "by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony" (Revelation 12:10-11).

### 1 Thessalonians 4:16

> "For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and with the sound of the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first."

**Reflection:** Paul writes to believers grieving over those who had died, "that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope" (1 Thessalonians 4:13). The archangel's voice sounds when the Lord descends; the dead in Christ rise first, and the living are caught up with them. Paul does not name the archangel, and he ends, "Therefore encourage one another with these words."

### Matthew 24:31

> "And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other."

**Reflection:** Jesus is answering the disciples on the Mount of Olives, who asked about "the sign of your coming and of the end of the age" (Matthew 24:3). After the tribulation, the Son of Man comes on the clouds and sends out "his angels," who gather his elect from the four winds. A trumpet sounds here too, as in 1 Thessalonians 4:16.

## Whether people become angels

Luke 20:34-36 answers a question about marriage at the resurrection. Jesus says those raised "neither marry nor are given in marriage, for they cannot die anymore, because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection." The likeness he names is that they cannot die, and he calls them sons of God, not angels.

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