The Rev. Noah Van Niel
Christ and St. Luke’s
November 6th, 2022
All Saints’ Sunday (C): Daniel 7:1-3, 15-18; Ps 149; Ephesians 1:11-23; Luke 6:20-31
To listen to audio of this sermon click here.
A couple weeks after we had celebrated the Feast of St. Luke, I was talking to a parishioner who is relatively new to the Episcopal Church and she said that, while she was very much enjoying becoming familiar with some of our particular ways of doing things, we had to stop talking about all these “feasts” because, “Honey, I was raised Baptist, and if you say ‘feast’ I’m saying, ‘where’s the food?’” It’s a fair point. Especially because today, we celebrate another feast day, and not just any feast day: The Feast of All Saints which is, after Christmas and Easter, one of the principal feasts in the Church year. This conversation is a good reminder that not all of us come from traditions that venerate the Saints with special days of celebration, and in fact many of us may even come from traditions that actively discourage doing so.
This skepticism of the Saints is not without good reason. In the New Testament all faithful Christians were referred to by the Greek word, “hagios” or “holy ones,” which is translated as, “saints,” with a lower-case ‘s.’ Thus the differentiation of “Saints” with a capital S—the distinguishment of certain holy people as especially worthy of veneration over and above all the typical followers of Jesus—is not scriptural; it is an invention of the Church as it evolved over time. And while it can be helpful to have heroes in the faith, people to look up to and to inspire you, things did get a little out of hand. Over the years, Saints became something like demigods, serving as intermediaries in the faith, assigned certain tasks or things that they were the patron of, as if Heaven had a highly complicated org chart with the Godhead at the top and all the Saints functioning as middle management. And then there are the elaborate stories that evolved around some of these holy women and men. These hagiographies, as they are called, can stretch the credulity of even the staunchest of believers. One of my favorites is St. Denis, the renowned 3rd century preacher who was so committed to spreading the Gospel of Christ that, it is said, even after he was decapitated, he walked for miles, carrying his head in his hands, preaching all the way. I believe God can do some amazing things, but that story is a little hard for me to swallow. But then again, what do I know, for despite the dubious biography, beloved St. Denis, became the patron saint for all of France, and, not ironically, headaches.
So, given all these complicating aspects surrounding the Saints, it is fair to ask, why do we celebrate them at all? What good –for you, for me, for Christians living in the 21st century—is a Saint?
I believe Saints are worthy of our attention and adulation not because of the miraculous things they may (or may not) have done, but because they are people who heard the words of Jesus and somehow caught the fever of faith, from which they never recovered. When they heard words like we just heard today from Jesus’ sermon on the plane in Luke Chapter 6, it caused them to dream strange dreams, and have bizarre visions. Visions of a world…upside down, and inside out. Like Daniel did in days of old, they caught a glimpse not of what is, but what could be; and that made them wonder things like…what if the poor were blessed, rather than wretched? What if the hungry were filled and not left empty? What if those who were hated, and excluded and reviled were beloved, included and respected? And what if those who were powerful or proud decided that their comfort was nothing so long as so many others were suffering? What if we loved our enemies? What if we blessed those who cursed us? What if we didn’t retaliate? What if we shared everything we had? What if….what if…we actually did unto others as we would have them do unto us? What would that mean? Wouldn’t that mean a world of generosity and justice? Wouldn’t that mean a life of fullness and goodness? Wouldn’t that put an end to anger and violence? Wouldn’t that bring a sense of personal peace and collective prosperity to all people? And might that just be what God intended for the state of this world to begin with? Saints are people who found those questions so infectious, that they could not stop asking them and could not stop living them. They found the potency of this possibility so compelling they gave their life to it…completely. For a Saint is really just a human being who had a vision of what this world could be if we actually took seriously the teachings of our Lord and sought to live them here and now.
It is this completeness of their commitment to their life of faith that remains the most important legacy of the Saints and why they are worthy of our special veneration. For while the New Testament may have referred to all Christians as “saints” the truth is few of us ever achieve the level of follow-through on our beliefs that the Saints with a capital ‘S’ did. Their examples make clear how far we still have to go in our faith and grow in our hearts. But they also remind us that despite the deficiencies of our discipleship, we have, each of us, been given all the makings of sainthood. Yes, each of us. For the diversity of the Saints makes clear that there is no saintly gene; they come in all shapes and sizes. Saints are made, not born. And you, each of you, has what it takes to become one.
How do I know you have the makings of a Saint? Baptism. For in your baptism, you have been granted the assurance, in no uncertain terms, that your fundamental identity is as a beloved child of God and you are marked as Christ’s own forever. And we can do all things through Christ, who strengthens us; even become a Saint. But the baptismal service doesn’t just establish our identity as a beloved child of God, it then goes on to ask us, “What are you going to do about it? What difference is it going to make?” The answer to which is our baptismal covenant, which we will soon recite together. Those words are a sainthood schematic. They outline visible, active ways in which we can participate in bringing about God’s Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. Those words are the promises of Saints in the making, whether that Saint is beautiful baby Catherine who we will baptize this morning, or any of us who stand and proclaim those words for ourselves.
In baptism we’ve been given everything we need to become Saints. So what’s stopping us? Maybe it’s doubt; maybe it’s fear; maybe it’s inertia; maybe it’s not believing that one person can actually make a difference. If any of those reasons are yours and keeping you from giving your life completely to the way of Jesus, then you are just the person the Saints are for. Because they are people who made difficult sacrifices in their lives but received great joys from them; people who challenged the world to change with enough conviction that their message long outlasted their earthly life; people whose individual witness did measurably transform the world. And above all they are people whose legacy of faith has proven so persistent that they stand as their own testament to the reality of God and the eternal truth of the teachings of Jesus Christ. The Saints are worthy of our celebration this day, and every day, because they show us that with Jesus at the center our world could heavenly, and our lives could legendary.
So what good are the Saints? They are good because they teach us this: that you are not yet a Saint….but you could be.