The word angel comes from the Greek angelos, which means messenger or angel. Angelos occurs 179 times in the NT. It refers to human messengers ten times. John the Baptist was “My angel/messenger” (Matt 11:10; Mark 1:2; Luke 7:27). John the Baptist sent messengers (angelōn) to Jesus (Luke 7:24). The Lord Jesus sent messengers (angelous) before Him when He went to a Samaritan village (Luke 9:52). Rahab “received the messengers [angelous] and sent them out another way” (Jas 2:25).

Angels were probably God’s first creation. They were present during the seven days of creation (Job 38:4-7).

Before the creation, one-third of the angels followed an archangel named Lucifer and rebelled against God (Rev 12:4). We call those fallen angels.

The lake of fire is designed for fallen angels, not humans (Matt 25:41). Humans who reject the gift of everlasting life will join the angels who rejected eternal service to God. But God never wanted angels or humans to be separated from His kingdom.

There are different types of angels: seraphim, cherubim, and the four living creatures. Archangels (1 Thess 4:16; Jude 9) are ruling angels. They may be one of those types or a separate type of angel. The only archangel identified by name is Michael. However, another named angel is Gabriel. He appeared and spoke to Daniel (Dan 8:16; 9:21), John the Baptist’s father, Zacharias (Luke 1:19), and Mary (Luke 1:26-33). He clearly has great authority. He is likely another archangel.

Lucifer was probably an archangel as well.

“The Angel of the Lord” often refers to the preincarnate Lord Jesus Christ (e.g., Gen 16:7-11 [with Hagar]; 22:11, 15 [with Abraham when he offered up Isaac]; Exod 3:2 [with Moses at the burning bush]; Num 22:22-35 [with Balaam]; Judg 6:21-22 [with Gideon]; 13:13-22 [with Samson’s parents, Manoah and his wife]).

The Bible tells us that there are at least four purposes for angels.

First, some angels praise and worship God always (Rev 4:9-10), and all angels praise and worship Him sometimes (Rev 5:11).

Second, as their name suggests, angels bring messages to people. They serve as messengers (e.g., Gen 18:2-15; 19:1-22; Dan 10:13). Interestingly, angels do not proclaim the message of everlasting life. The Angel of the Lord does (e.g., Gen 3:15: 15:6). But God has tasked humans with proclaiming the message of everlasting life (e.g., Rom 10:10–15).

Third, they watch over and possibly protect some (overcomers) or all believers. Some angels help believing children (Matt 18:10-14; see v 6, “these little ones who believe in Me”). People call these guardian angels, but we don’t know what they do. Believers who are currently overcomers in their Christian experience are helped by angels (Heb 1:14).ⁱ

Fourth, unfallen angels fight. They battle with fallen angels over countries (e.g., Daniel 10:10-21). They sometimes aid human armies in battle (e.g., Rev 19:14; cf. Isa 37:36).

It should be noted that humans do all four of those things as well.

Angels have glory and honor today (Ps 8:4-5; Heb 2:7, 9).

When Christ returns, humans will be greater than angels in glory and honor.

Paul said that humans would judge angels (1 Cor 6:3). Most commentators think this refers to believers taking part, in some way, in the judgment of fallen and possibly unfallen angels. We may be part of a jury to judge particular angels who either aided or hindered us. While we can’t be sure, 1 Cor 6:3 suggests that there will be degrees of torment for fallen angels and possibly degrees of reward for unfallen angels.

We will have fellowship with angels in eternity. We do so in this life but are unaware they are angels (Heb 13:2).

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ⁱ Salvation in Heb 1:14 is a possible future salvation, unlike that described in Eph 2:8-9. Hebrews 1:14 refers to the possibility of being Christ’s partners (metachoi) in the life to come (Heb 1:9; cf. Rom 8:17). Angels are sent out to minister to and for those who are currently Christ’s partners.