All Saints Sunday (Year A)
– Sunday, November 6, 2011
Christ Evangelical
Lutheran Church, Lancaster, PA
Texts: Revelation 7:9-17,
1 John 3:1-3, Matthew 5:1-12
Alright,
saints. This is your day. Are you ready to, um, uh, do your saint
stuff? Because that's what you are – you are all saints, right?
That's what All Saints Day is all about. You're all saints. So, get
going!
What –
you don't know what I mean, do you? You're looking pretty confused.
Do I have to spell it all out for you? Ok. So – saints – you
know who they are, right? The blessed saints of God, whose lives of
faith and commitment have led them to the inexpressible joys God has
prepared for them? Here's some examples for you. St. Stephen, who
with his last words asked God's forgiveness for those who were
stoning him to death. St. Paul, who spent his entire adult life
traveling from city to city preaching the Word, all the while
narrowly escaping death until he finally was martyred in Rome. St.
Francis, who gave up his family fortune to live alongside the poor
and care for God's creation. Or modern examples, Martin Luther King,
who took on the powers that be to share his dream with our nation, a
dream that cost him his life. Mother Theresa, whose love cut across
cultures, race and languages to embrace the dying, the decaying and
the poorest of the poor.
Well,
you're one of those blessed saints too. Don't you feel blessed
enough to empty your bank account or put your life on the line for
God? Go on, then. Go transform society, go start an orphanage, go
be a martyr. Hmm. Something doesn't seem right. I suppose if we're
ALL saints, that means I'm a saint too. I'm kind of busy this week,
don't think I can fit martyrdom into my schedule...maybe I can
squeeze selling all my possessions in on Wednesday afternoon...eh.
I'm not so sure this saint thing is for me.
Well,
maybe Jesus can help us here. Matthew records a pretty neat story of
Jesus declaring people blessed. We call this speech the Beatitudes.
I'm sure you might have heard it before in Sunday School. But if you
back up a few verses in the story, you get a better idea of what was
going on. Here's how the story goes: Jesus went throughout Galilee,
teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the
kingdom and curing EVERY disease and EVERY sickness among the people.
So his fame spread throughout all Syria, and they brought to him ALL
the sick, those who were afflicted with various diseases and pains,
demoniacs, epileptics, and paralytics, and he cured them. And great
crowds followed him. Usually, we think, to get a moment of respite
from all this healing and curing, Jesus went up the mountain with his
disciples and started his great teachings that we call these
Beatitudes. Blessed are the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the
meek, those who hunger – who does he mean, though? I think we can
say he's talking about all those in the crowds below, those who are
suffering. Jesus is saying they're the ones who are blessed.
If
Jesus came instead here to Lancaster in 2011, the story might go like
this: Jesus went down Strawberry Street and then along South Prince
Street, curing the illnesses of everyone without health insurance and
setting free everyone addicted to drugs or alcohol. He went over
into the woods and comforted everyone living in tents outside. So
his fame spread up Duke Street to the General Hospital, and they
brought to him ALL the sick, those with terminal cancer or liver
failure and their families, and he cured them. And then he went over
to the castle at 625 E. King Street and spoke to those in prison,
healing whatever ailments of mind or spirit anyone had. And then
Jesus went up to Penn Square and sat down on the edge of the Civil
War statue, and taught us, saying:
Blessed
are those who don't know how they'll feed their families, for theirs
is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed
are those who've lost their parents, or their children, or their
siblings, or their best friend, for they will be comforted.
Blessed
are the abused, the left-out, the bullied, the so-called disabled,
for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed
are those who try their best to live the right way and play by the
rules, only to get laid off, evicted, arrested or cut off from their
pension, for one day justice will roll down like waters, and
righteousness like a mighty stream.
Blessed
are those who got caught up with drugs as a teenager and can't break
free, for God sees past their addiction.
Blessed
are those who have made mistakes that eat them up inside.
Blessed
are those who know what it is to fail.
Blessed
are the simple ones with small bank accounts, no influence in the
circles of government or business, who just try to live faithfully
and to love as much as they can.
Blessed
are all the saints of God, the children of God who we would call
anything but blessed. The ones who have all the bad luck or made
the wrong decisions or made the right decisions but still ended up
with the short end of the stick. Jesus is saying all these people
are blessed. Jesus is saying all these people are saints. You and
me. Blessed saints.
But
what does this mean? Jesus isn't idealizing suffering, here. You
don't have to be poor in spirit or have someone to mourn in order to
be blessed. Jesus isn't setting up hoops to jump through in order to
receive God's blessing. No, Jesus is radically expanding the circle
of those who are blessed by God. Jesus is saying that all these
people who we leave out, who we think clearly have earned God's anger
or have made the wrong choices or those who have suffered unjustly,
that these people are blessed by God. Jesus is saying that these
people are saints.
In the
brief reading from the first letter of John's community of disciples,
we're reminded, “see what love the Father has given us, that we
should be called children of God. Beloved, we are God's children
now.” Jesus died for YOU. Just think about that for a second.
Jesus, who is God, became human and suffered death on the cross for
YOU. God loves you in a way that is nearly impossible for us to
understand. Jesus died for you not because of anything you have
done, not because of who you are, but because of who God is. God's
love poured out for us on the cross doesn't so much reveal who we are
as it reveals God's unconditional, amazing love and grace for us all.
When you begin each day and when you lay down to sleep and you think
about what you have done well or not so well, those you have loved
and those you have hated or mistreated, remember that God's love for
you is bigger than all those things. God's love sets you free today
and every day from sin and death, and makes you a saint of God. Even
though you sin every day, you are a saint of God, free to live out
your saintly calling of loving your neighbor. And all those who
don't look very much like saints to you receive this same inheritance
through Christ, and join you at this table to receive the very same
body and blood of our Lord. Receiving the body, we are all
transformed into the Body of Christ in the world. We are made to be
the communion of saints out sharing God's love through actions and
also words.
Finally,
when we have reached the end of our baptismal journey, when our time
here on earth comes to an end and we return to the dust from which we
were made, God's love draws us even closer to him in death. John
says, “what we will be has not yet been revealed...when he is
revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.” We
have a hidden identity in God yet to be revealed. Greater things are
yet to come. We can trust with all certainty that those for whom we
light a candle this day are with our Lord, robed in white, standing
before the throne. You also will stand there alongside them where
you will hunger no more, and thirst no more. Where the sun does not
strike you nor any scorching heat; for the Lamb at the center of the
throne is your shepherd, and he will guide you to springs of the
water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from your eyes.”
Amen.
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