Saint Michael - the Archangel

by Scott Zambelli 

For a long time, I have had a desire to draw a picture of the Archangel, Michael.  At first, it was not nearly as easy as I thought it would be.

When I first began, I had Michael in "heroic" poses that dipicted him in mortal combat with Satan as described in the Book of Revelation.  The various renditions I came up with were okay, but none of them had the right "feel" for Michael.

So, I decided to place it aside and let the concept brew until it was ready for another try.  This is one area I have been finding out for myself in how I interact with God.  Many times, I will receive an initial inspiration or desire that may not necessarily be for a complete project.  In fact, I have been descovering that my initial inspirations are things that I need to place in my heart until God has given me the experience and spiritual maturity to properly discern what it is that God wants the inspirational seed to sprout into.

It was this way with Saint Michael.

Over the last many months, I have found myself focusing on a few different concepts that have recently begun to tie together. These concepts have to do with; 1) Justice and Mercy, 2) The Beatitudes (Blessings) in Matthew 5:1-12, 3) Casting the First Stone in John 8:1-11, and 4) Casting out a demon in Luke 11:24-26.

I will not go indepth on these things, but I will let you know that these various concepts have been converging within me and I know that God has been granting me sight in this area.  With these things now known, I felt it was time to start over with Michael.  What I realized is that in my previous attempts to capture the likeness of Michael, I was going for some sort of character that embraced his role as "warrior".  He was screaming out some sort of glorious cry as he enacted Justice to those who opposed the Lord.

However, with my recent insights, I felt that the Archangel was not someone who experienced great joy in his role as God's hand of judgement.  Instead, I now pictured him as a being who is battle-hardened and committed to his duty, but also sad that there is even a need for his role.  I picture him as an angel who once knew joy and has almost forgotten what it is like to be happy.  He does his job...not because he wants to, but because he knows it must be done and he doesn't want any of his brethren to have to endure to spiritual scars that one must receive when battling Satan.

It was with this mindset that I came up with the following picture.

I feel I was able to capture the grim determination that I wanted to portray.  In addition to his personality, I also wanted to imply a little about his advisary through the darkening sky behind Michael.  I felt this did a better job of portraying his battle better than an actual depiction of the enemy coming up from behind.

Here is the official prayer to Saint Michael.  I included this on the inside of the cards I have available in my e-store.

I hope you like the artwork of Saint Michael and have found this to be helpful in your own quest for God's word in your life.  Feel free to click on any of the above pictures of Saint Michael to visit our e-store and browse our selection of merchandise featuring this artwork.