Fallen Angel

Jesus addresses seven letters to seven “angels” of the churches (Revelation 2-3). Commentators differ on whether the angels are spiritual beings, ecclesial guardian angels, or human beings, “messengers.”

The letter to Ephesus seems decisive. There, Jesus charges that the angel has left his first love (Revelation 2:4), “fallen” from his earlier position (v. 5), and needs to repent (2x in v. 5).

Many Christians have held the Miltonesque view that angels fell before or at the beginning of creation. Few or none have believed that angels continue to fall. Few or none have believed that angels, once fallen, might repent and be restored. Perhaps our angelology requires radical revision, but the letter to the Ephesian angel requires that, if it is address to a spiritual angel.

Jesus threatens to remove the lampstand (the church, 1:20) from Ephesus if the angel fails to repent. That makes the future of the Ephesian church dependent not on the repentance of the community or its leader, but on the repentance of his spiritual guardian, on whom the community has no influence. 

That leaves the church at the mercy of angels, and seems to be the very sort of enslavement to principalities and powers from which Jesus delivered us.