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Angels

In Mormon discourse angels are usually heavenly messengers whose purpose is not just to give information to human beings but to teach and instruct them on how to build heavenly conditions on earth, culminating in the construction of heavenly cities, including the City of Enoch, Zion, or the New Jerusalem. These celestial habitations are characterized by immortality, sustainability, abundance, and the presence of God.

Joseph Smith taught that the angels who minister to this earth consist only of “those who do belong or have belonged to it” (D&C 130:5), thus implying that angelic roles are fulfilled by premortal or postmortal beings. Latter-day revelation teaches further that humans now on earth served angelic roles in the premortal existence. Of particular note among those angels mentioned in scripture, the angel Gabriel was a premortal angel, and the angel Moroni ministered to Joseph Smith as a postmortal resurrected being.

Angels often appear disguised as ordinary people, and are sometimes a means of testing one’s worthiness to receive special blessings. Reiterating the injunctions of the Mosaic law, the apostle Paul taught the importance of treating strangers with kindness.

“
Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.
”
Hebrews 13:2

Mormon teachings also emphasize our own ability to assume an angelic role as we minister in Christlike ways to others.

“
Do ye not remember that I said unto you that after ye had received the Holy Ghost ye could speak with the tongue of angels? And now, how could ye speak with the tongue of angels save it were by the Holy Ghost? Angels speak by the power of the Holy Ghost; wherefore, they speak the words of Christ. Wherefore, I said unto you, feast upon the words of Christ; for behold, the words of Christ will tell you all things what ye should do.
”
2 Nephi 32:2-3