<p>18:10&nbsp;<i>See you do not despise one of these little ones</i>- Paul uses the same word in one of his many allusions to the Gospels in 1 Cor. 11:22, where he warns that exclusive attitudes at the breaking of bread, even having &lsquo;another table&rsquo; to ones despised brethren, was in fact despising the entire church of Christ. Our attitude to the little ones is our attitude to Him and thereby to the entire church or body of Christ. Elsewhere, the Lord uses this word for &quot;despise&quot; as counterpoint to loving; the opposite of loving is to despise (Mt. 6:24; Lk. 16:13). He is forcing us to perceive that we either love little ones by accepting them, or we despise them. We of course would prefer to argue for some third way, whereby we are conveniently indifferent to some and accept others whom we consider on our moral and spiritual level. But those whom we do not love and accept, we effectively despise. That is the Lord's understanding. The Lord had warned His followers to &ldquo;despise not&rdquo; the &lsquo;little ones&rsquo; (Mt. 18:10). Paul picks up this phrase in 1 Tim. 6:2 in warning servants not to despise their masters who were brethren; the implication that they were to treat those wealthy but perhaps not very spiritually mature masters as &lsquo;little ones&rsquo;, with all the patience this would require.</p>
<p><i>For I say to you, that in heaven their angels do always see the presence of my Father who is in heaven</i>- The Greek could equally mean that they fully behold the face of the Father. The idea seems to be that the &ldquo;little ones&rdquo; are in fellowship with God, they are indeed represented in Heaven, they are &lsquo;before God&rsquo;, in His presence. And we should therefore not reject anyone who has relationship with God and in a spiritual sense is in His presence. This is the essence of John&rsquo;s teaching- that we cannot claim to have fellowship with the Father unless we fellowship His children, and if we do not fellowship His children, then we thereby break our relationship with the Father. It is seriously wrong, therefore, to admit on one hand that individuals are in fellowship with the Father, and yet refuse them fellowship.</p>
<p>The guardian Angels of Christ's &quot;little ones&quot;, &quot;do always behold the face of My Father in Heaven&quot;. There seem two options here:<br />
- The Angels may be physically present with us on earth but also maintain a presence in the 'court of Heaven', perhaps by means of another Angel there.&nbsp;<br />
- A more likely explanation lies in the meaning of the word &quot;behold&quot; - 'to look to, be aware of, perceive, take heed'. Although physically present with us, the Angels are intensely aware of the face of God which they behold when assembled in the court of Heaven awaiting God's words of command. The &quot;little ones&quot; in the context are the spiritually weak- does this have something to do with their Angels being physically absent from them in Heaven?</p>