Angels


Zaq33
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Have you, or have ever heard of someone seeing an angel? I read the other night that Joseph Smith had around 500 angelic manifestations, with about 130 different beings. Very interesting, please share.

 

If home teachers are included in the definition - then definitely yes!

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I know a handful of people that claim to have felt or seen good spirits/angels. As for my personal experience, I've had some interesting situations that I cannot explain, but I'm sceptical of spirits/angels - didn't always used to be that way - I used to be very superstitious and a believer in the supernatural.

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A few years after my dad died, I was visiting with an old family friend who asked me, "Do you think your dad ever visits your mom? Does she talk with him often?" I was floored at the question and replied, "If he has been ministering to her, she recognizes the sacredness of such visits and has kept them to herself."

 

I can understand sharing such experiences when prompted by the Spirit, or even when "induced" (to use Joseph Smith's word), but I cannot relate to asking fellow saints to share extremely sacred experiences especially when we don't even tell each other of the common sacred experience we have in the temple.

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I haven no experiences in visually seeing angels or sensing their specific presence.

 

However - I believe, generally speaking, it would be a very good idea to actively make a sustained and concentrated effort to pursue such experiences. Because why not? It would likely require a spiritual journey to obtain, and the reward would be faith solidifying and enhancing, and I see no reason why God would jealously prohibit those who earnestly seek such an experience from obtaining it.

 

And yes, I realize we are in a probationary state and that such sacred experiences are based upon need, due to the fact that we must walk by faith - BUT...."need" is a relative term, and it can be created....and the path to obtain such an experience is already a great walk of faith anyway.

 

I believe that God is not annoyed, angered or offended by the bold (but also humble and patient) seeker of spiritual experiences - but pleased. Surely some reward awaits those with the determination to seek.

 

In essence, it would be like a gift of the Spirit. And we are already told to seek those. How many of us actively seek the big ones, or actively seek any of them at all? As opposed to passively? How many of us ask for the gift of prophecy? Why not? Bring it on, I say.

 

And as a side-note - anyone with the Aaronic priesthood has the keys to the ministering of angels. I always took that promise very literally.

 

I also believe that angels (and demons) are involved in our lives much more than we realize.

Edited by Magus
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I have not seen an angel. But I have felt them around me. I have had impressions about who they were, and felt their comforting words/thoughts conveyed to me. I have also felt negative beings. To a greater or lesser extent I have felt them regularly over the last few years. Angels are of course all around us. The problem is we are not in tune. 

 

We often talk about receiving spiritual promptings. This is the first step. But there is obviously much more. We need to continue down that path. Calming our mind and learning to sense and understand on the spiritual plane. After being baptized by fire and the Holy Ghost one of the first blessings and directions Nephi gives us is to speak with the tongue of angels. He says, "then cometh the baptism of fire and the Holy Ghost; and then can ye speak with the tongue [ie. in the language] of angels, and shout praises unto the Holy One of Israel" (2 Ne 31:13). What is the language of angels? Nothing more nor less then spirit to spirit communication, as Nephi further states, "Angels speak by the power of the Holy Ghost" (2 Ne 32:3).

 

Communication comes directly to our spirit in the form of impressions, thoughts, and ultimately words. I have not experienced, but believe, that seeing angels on a regular basis is simply a further refinement of that process. I also believe there are rare occasions where angels communicate with those unprepared. But these are for specific purposes and with specific assignments. 

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Have you, or have ever heard of someone seeing an angel? I read the other night that Joseph Smith had around 500 angelic manifestations, with about 130 different beings. Very interesting, please share.

I've met 3 people who have. 2 were LDS, 1 was not, but the experience caused him to leave the christian sects he was attending before then, and investigate the LDS- due to how angels are represented in popular mainstream christian culture was significantly different than his experience.

Edited by Blackmarch
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I was concerned at the offset of this thread that sacred things could be cast as pearls before swine.  Some posters have already touched on this.  However, for the record, I will clearly state that I personally have several encounters – both with the clean and unclean personages.  In some cases I knew the personage as I recognized my brother that drowned shortly (within a few months) after returning from his mission.

 

As a general rule I would bring to light that a visitation of an angel is as likely or more likely to be for the reason of calling someone to repentance as it is to comfort, testify of something important or bring one’s righteousness to account.  In short – such a thing is highly unlikely to be something to brag about or share with others; for whatever the reason.

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When I was on my mission in France, one of my companions and I baptized a man from Brazzaville, Congo.  Hs name was Andre.  He was a student at a French university in the city of Pau.  After studying the gospel and attending meetings for several months, he was baptized after he began receiving revelatory inspiration through his dreams.

 

After Andre's baptism, he began sending copies of the Book of Mormon and various pamphlets home to his family and friends in Congo.  There were no missionaries in that country at the time (around 1981-82).  His mother and brother felt drawn to the gospel.  His uncle, who was sort of a family patriarch, began to try to undermine the gospel message.  There was no branch of the Church his mother and brother could attend. (Keep in mind that this was just a couple of years after the 1978 priesthood revelation and the work in English-speaking Africa was just beginning.  The work in French-speaking Africa began to develop much later.)  Essentially, my new convert's family had only the Book of Mormon and the prayer of faith on which to make any decisions about the gospel.  Even if they believed, there was no Church presence for them to receive baptism.

 

By this time, I had been transferred to another area of the mission and I learned of this experience by a letter.  After the uncle had troubled my investigator's mother about the enthusiasm Andre had communicated about the gospel, the mother prayed for guidance.    Andre related that an angel--his deceased grandmother--appeared to his mother in their home.  The grandmother told her that she should believe Andre and assist him in his work.  She said that doing so would help bring Zion to her people.  

 

I wish I knew the rest of the story, but there was no Internet back then and it was easy to lose touch with friends after the mission.  I have always hoped that Andre's family was able to receive baptism at some point.  It was always a confirmation to me of the gospel's power.

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I've never seen one but felt one wrap his arms around me for protection. I was riding my motorcycle home from work at dawn when a car in the oncoming traffic lane pulled out to pass. The car was so close I only had time to close my eyes and get killed. The impact didn't happen so I opened my eyes to find myself, still on the bike, out of harms way. I felt as though a warm blanket had been thrown around me and wasn't the least bit shaken up. That feeling lasted all the way home and I had the best days sleep I can ever remember having. 

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I've never seen one but felt one wrap his arms around me for protection. I was riding my motorcycle home from work at dawn when a car in the oncoming traffic lane pulled out to pass. The car was so close I only had time to close my eyes and get killed. The impact didn't happen so I opened my eyes to find myself, still on the bike, out of harms way. I felt as though a warm blanket had been thrown around me and wasn't the least bit shaken up. That feeling lasted all the way home and I had the best days sleep I can ever remember having. 

 

I have seen with my eyes a spirit of darkness or an angel of darkness.

 

I have seen in my minds eye, or more so sensed, the presence of spirits around me once when as a youth I attended the temple and was doing baptisms for the dead.

 

I did not see the angel but I was saved by an angel when I was 19 years old while climbing some rocks. I was about 50 feet above the ground. My little brother and I were exploring a quary. There were many large and small pieces and chucks of jagged rocks below us. On the face of the rocks were bore holes or impressions of what was left of bore holes. I was using one of these old bore holes to grasp on to while my feet were on a ledge that was about 6 inches wide. I wanted to cross it to get to another part of the rock. When I got about ten feet on the ledge I saw that the ledge dipped or sloped about five inches, and the face of the rock started to lean outward a bit. To continue across the ledge I needed to hold on to the sloping face and then drop down a few inches to the ledge. Not being experienced at all at rock climbing in this situation I should have turned around. But, in my bravado I continued and dropped my foot on the ledge below. When I did, I lost my balance due to the awkward slope, the precarious ledge, and my inexperience. I began to fall and my mind froze and I didn't know what to do. In an instant, however, both of my arms flew out in front of me kinda like I was getting ready to push down on a bike pump. I fell just far enough for my arms to catch on the slight ledge below and somehow I just stopped falling and regained my balance. I didn't do anything but act foolish and fall. My little brother couldn't believe it. He was certain that he was going to see his brother die, yet somehow I just stopped falling and was able to climb back up to the ledge and return back to where my brother was. I have no explanation for how I saved myself other than that an angel saved me. Had I continued to fall I would have hit the large jagged rocks below and would have probably died.

 

-Finrock

Edited by Finrock
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