How would you like to have an angel touch you gently and say, “O Chieko (or O Maryanne, or O Harold), I am now come to give thee skill and understanding... for thou art greatly beloved: therefore understand the matter, and consider the vision.”
We say that we believe that God “will yet reveal many great and important things pertaining to the Kingdom of God.” (Articles of Faith 9.) Revelation to the Church will come through the prophet, but doesn’t that article of faith make you ask questions? What are those great and important things? And who will he reveal them to? Could you be one of those who is struggling to “understand the matter, and consider the vision”? If you are, then you’re one of those worthy to receive an angelic visitor. Furthermore, the promise of Joseph Smith to the Nauvoo Relief Society on 28 April 1844 was this: “Angels cannot be restrained from being your associates.” (History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2d ed. rev., ed. B. H. Roberts [Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1932–51], 4:605.) Has this promise come true for you? Both Joseph Smith and Alma promise the ministration of angels to women. Yet such is the respect of our Heavenly Father for our agency that he will very rarely give us something for which we have not asked. What would happen, do you think, if we prayed for revelation, for knowledge, for the comfort of the ministration of angels?
But maybe there’s another question rising up to loom over you. Something like this: “Oh, isn’t it wrong to pray for such things, or even to think of such things? Aren’t these things just for the prophets? Aren’t we likely to go astray out of pride or ignorance?” Listen to the words of Moses, when Joshua heard that two men were prophesying in the camp of Israel and cried out to Moses to forbid them. Moses answered, “Would God that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirit upon them!” (Numbers 11:29.) Is it possible that we’re asking the wrong questions and limiting the operation of the Holy Ghost, cutting off the spiritual gifts that the Father wants to bestow upon us, and feeling fear rather than faith?
[Pp. 177–78 in Okazaki, Chieko N. 1995. Aloha! Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book Co.]