When you think of the word “angel,” what comes to mind?

Maybe you remember curling up on the couch for an episode of Touched by an Angel in the 90s. Perhaps you hear the voice of little Zuzu from It’s A Wonderful Life, claiming that “every time a bell rings, an angel gets its wings.” It could be that the image of a baby on a cloud appears in your mind, or a felt board rendering of a serene, smiling figure whose wings emanate light.

In “The Cosmos Is More Crowded Than You Think,” Tish Harrison Warren encourages us toward a deeper, more profound view of angelic beings. She writes that Dionysius the Areopagite, a fifth-century theologian, described angels by saying, “so numerous indeed are the blessed armies of transcendent intelligent beings that they surpass the fragile and limited realm of our physical numbers.”

Believing in angels can feel a little out of touch with our modern world. Remembering that we believe in angels can seem like another hurdle altogether as we face physical, immediate challenges in our daily lives. But Warren, the saints of old, and Scripture itself bless us with the reminder that God really has surrounded us with “transcendent intelligent beings” who carry out His work even as we struggle, stumble, or simply sleep.

Next time you hear the word “angel,” may you picture not a distant caricature, but a nearby manifestation of the goodness of God.