A story is told by Doug Connelly in his book, ANGELS
AROUND US.  In the early 1950s, a missionary group in
Kenya learned of an imminent attack on their mission
by Mau Mau warriors.  To defend their families as well
as they could, the men put up a barbed wire barricade,
and turned on the few floodlights.  With the few
weapons they had they stood guard along the mission
perimeter while their wives and children prayed
inside.

They waited, but no attack came.  Months later a
converted Mau Mau explained that just as he and his
fellow warriors prepared to attack the mission from
all sides, large fiery figures appeared from out of
the night.  They stood between the Mau Mau and the
missionaries, racing in a circle around the barricade.
 Frightened by the sight of these creatures, the Mau
Mau fled. "The missionaries may not have seen them,"
Connelly writes, "but God opened the warriors' eyes to
what normally would have been invisible-His band of
Holy Angels."


Sometimes when angels intervene on the field of human
conflict, God opens the eyes of both sides to see His
heavenly beings at work.  In her book "ANGELS" Hope
Price records two hopeless situations in World War I
related by a British captain.  The first occurred
early in the war near Mons, France, where outnumbered
British troops had been fighting for days without
relief. 

They had lost many men and guns, and defeat looked
inevitable.  Captain Cecil W. Hayward was there and
tells how suddenly in the midst of a gun battle,
firing on both sides stopped.  To their astonishment,
the British troops saw "four or five wonderful beings,
much bigger than men," between themselves and the
Germans.  These "men" were bare-headed, wore white
robes and seemed to float rather than stand.  At that
moment, the horses ridden by British cavalrymen became
terribly frightened and stampeded off in every
direction.

Hayward also told of another battle sometime later in
World War I when matters again seemed hopeless for
British soldiers who were surrounded by German troops.
 Suddenly the heavy enemy fire stopped completely, and
everything seemed strangely quiet.  "Then "the sky
opened with a bright shining light, and figures of
luminous beings appeared floating between British and
German lines."  German troops retreated in disorder,
allowing the Allied forces to reform and fall back on
a line of defense farther to the west.  German
prisoners were taken that day, and when they were
asked why they surrendered when they had the British
troops surrounded, they looked amazed, saying, "But
there were hosts and hosts of you!"

Hope Price comments in her book that the British
government officially sponsored national days of
prayer during the conflict.  She believes the
government's commitment to prayer played a role in the
angelic intervention on behalf of the British
soldiers.  Many a godly teacher has reminded us that
all that the Lord does in our behalf is in answer to
someone's prayer.  There must be quite a lot of
intervening angels around that we never notice-but
sometimes, when the time is right, God takes the
scales off our eyes so we can see them.
                    

On June 7, 2002, I received this most interesting
story from old-time friends:

"I have been reading your angel messages.  I've always
liked angels and really appreciate their ministry.  I
have read several books about angels.  We don't
worship angels but we really love them.  I want to
tell you an angel story, and see what you think:"

When Elise was about five years old we were sitting in
church one Sunday morning. Brother Gafford had just
gotten up to preach. Elise looked over to me and
whispered, "Mother, what was that?" I said "I don't
see anything."    "Mother, but  what was it.  It was
white."  I said, "ssh,"  When we got home from church
she said again, "Mother, what was it that I saw in
church?  It was white.  It came in the east door
behind the orchestra and ran up on the platform.  It
stood behind Brother Gafford, and went up through the
ceiling." A couple days later she was sitting on her
little red chair looking at a Bible story book while I
combed her hair.  She turned a page that had a picture
of an angel on it.  She said, "This is what I saw."

I wonder if Brother Gafford was feeling need of
strength to preach his message, and an angel touched
him.  None of us know how many times an angel has
protected or helped us.

Gilbert and Florence Cadwell


(Allow me, Erwin Bourne, to add my part of this story.
 In those days in the mid-fifties, I played a sousaphone in that church orchestra and sat right by the door through which the angel entered to go onto the platform.  I did not perceive the angel' entering, though a five-year-old child did.  I dearly love this
story.) 

by Erwin Bourne