How To Partner With Your Angels

I recently listened to an audio message by Dan Duval about angels on his podcast program Discovering Truth With Dan Duval. This particular message confirmed something for me that I have thought about but never clearly formulated into words—that angels grow and develop over time like we do, and that in fact they are always growing in maturity. Furthermore, Dan pointed out that we can empower angels by praying for them and by praying to God about things so that we can engage and release their various functions and abilities.

The idea that we empower angels with our prayers isn’t really a new concept, nor is it new to me, but I don’t think that people typically word it that way. In fact, I don’t recall that Dan specifically phrased it that way either, but I certainly am right now. We empower angels with our prayers.

To some this might not seem important or significant, but I think this subject has immense value not only for our spiritual growth, but for every aspect of our lives. Consider that God has assigned angels to each one of us for our protection, but also for destroying works of darkness and advancing against the enemy (Psalm 91:11-13). If God sees fit to assign angels to us as messengers, protectors, and fellow servants-in-arms against the enemy, then it seems prudent to me that we should understand not just that God uses angels (read Why Does God Use Angels?), but how we can partner with them to manifest God’s Kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven.

Before going further, I tend to get a lot of kickback when I say things like “let’s partner with our angels”, so let me explain what I mean. It should already be incredibly apparent I’m not talking about worshipping them—only an idiot or someone intentionally misinterpreting what I am saying would think that. The Bible prohibits it in multiple places (Exodus 20:2-3, Deuteronomy 5:6-7, 1 Corinthians 10:14, Colossians 2:8, Romans. 1:24–25, Revelation 1:8-9, Revelation 22:8-9). What I am saying is that God has given angels certain spheres of authority and assignments, and that their jobs include a number of things that are helpful for us as we walk out everything God has for us. Some of the more obviously scriptural functions of angels include giving us messages from God, protecting us physically and spiritually, delivering us from bad situations, guiding us, and even delivering objects such as food from time to time. With such a wide range of potential functions (my list of which is by no means exhaustive of their full abilities), it would be downright foolish for us to ignore the things that God has sent angels to partner with us to accomplish in the earth.

Some people say we can command angels directly. Others believe we are supposed to pray to God and ask Him to command the angels. Others still believe we don’t address angels in any way and simply pray to God and let Him work out the details of how that happens. Regardless of which method(s) one chooses, prayer is a vital part of this process. Psalm 103:20 says, “Praise the LORD, you his angels, you mighty ones who do his bidding, who obey his word.” Angels perform God’s word, so whether that is us declaring His word or Him speaking His words to them in response to our prayers, the more we engage heaven in prayer, the more that angels are empowered and released to do things.

If we recall back to Daniel 10, we find Daniel concerned about some things the Lord revealed to him, so in verses 2-3 he spends time fasting and praying for understanding. In verses 12-13, twenty one days after he began, an angel appears to Daniel and explains, “Do not be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to them. But the prince of the Persian kingdom resisted me twenty-one days. Then Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, because I was detained there with the king of Persia.” The key point of relevance here is that the first day Daniel began fasting and praying, the angel was sent to him with a message. However, it was another full twenty days before the angel actually arrived with the message, and it took an angelic prince, Michael, getting involved in a battle against a demonic prince for the other angel to finally get through. If the answer was sent on the first day, what the heck was Daniel doing fasting and praying for almost three more weeks??  Simple: His prayers were either directly or indirectly empowering the angelic host to win the battle and get the message through to him.

Why do I say this? There is an important principle outlined in Psalm 115:16 having to do with authority in the heavens and the earth. The passage says, “The highest heavens belong to the Lord, but the earth he has given to mankind.” For whatever reason God chose to set it up so that things related to planet earth require our prayers. I don’t think it was coincidental that Jesus told his disciples in Matthew 6:10 to pray what I call a blank check prayer to God: “your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” What Jesus prayed in common vernacular was “God, do whatever you want here on earth.” The entire purpose of this prayer was so that God can manifest His will in His way, not being limited in any manner by limiting prayers. When we pray for God to do things in the earth, He often chooses to use angels to do it, and when He does, the power released when we pray is used in some inexplicable way to help them do their jobs better.

I see two primary ways to partner with angels to perform God’s will. The first and most basic method is to look at the needs in our own lives, and those of our family, friends, churches, cities, nations, and the world as a whole and pray to God and/or decree God’s will to the heavens and the earth based on our understanding of those needs.

A second way to partner with angels is to attempt to discern what angels are actually present nearby and either in talking to them directly or asking the Holy Spirit, find out what they need to accomplish their heavenly assignments, and then pray accordingly. While it still involves prayer, this method is more focused on helping specific angels with specific needs that they identify, whereas the first is focused on generally helping some angels out there somewhere with needs that we identify (And yes, talking to angels is incredibly scriptural. The majority of times we see an angel in scripture, they are having a conversation with a human.).

Neither method is more correct; both are simply different but equally viable means of engaging angels to accomplish God’s will in the earth. The method or methods one chooses to employ will usually have a lot to do with one’s belief system, which often has a lot to do with what religious system one was raised in, and what rules or regulations that particular religious system imposed on the individual.

For example, my dad is an Episcopal priest, and while my parents are charismatic-leaning to a certain degree, and even though I know my dad has had conversations with angels on more than one occasion, I have good reasons to believe that this idea the way I am presenting it would make them both pretty uncomfortable. Years ago, if someone had told me this same thing, I probably would have been uncomfortable with it too, but largely only because I had learned a lot of dumb rules and regulations from religious systems (not just from the Episcopal church, but from other denominations too) that limited and prohibited a lot of things based on their own fears and traditions (which are often developed out of fear and control). As I began to prayerfully and intentionally reason through what I believed and why, I started to see that some of the things we have been taught are incredibly stupid, such as the idea that we shouldn’t talk to angels. If we aren’t supposed to talk to angels, then neither should have Abraham, Jacob, Isaiah, Elijah, Mary, Joseph, Zechariah, nor the apostles John, Peter, and Paul.

In the end, it all really comes down to prayer, plain and simple. If we want to partner with our angels to see God’s will manifest in our lives to a greater degree, we must develop lifestyles of prayer.

If you want to hear more about this subject, I strongly encourage you to give a listen to the podcast that sparked this article, a free message by Dan Duval called “Angels: Our Brothers in Arms”