All Saints’ Day
Sermon preached by the Revd Olga Fabrikant-Burke
A young man once came to an eminent rabbi and asked him to make him a rabbi too. It was the depths of winter then. The great rabbi stood at the window looking out upon the bleak winter horizon while the wannabe rabbinical candidate was droning into his ears a glowing account of his piety and learning.
The young man said, “You see, Rabbi, I always go dressed in spotless white like the sages of old. I never drink any alcoholic beverages; only water ever passes my lips. Also, I practise severe austerities. I have sharp-edged nails inside my shoes to mortify me. Even in the coldest weather, I lie naked in the snow to torment my flesh. Also daily, the caretaker of the synagogue gives me forty lashes on my bare back to complete my perpetual penance.”
And as the young man spoke, a white horse was led into the yard and to the water trough. It drank, and then it rolled in the snow, as horses are sometimes wont to do.
“Just look!” cried the great rabbi all of a sudden. “That animal, too, is dressed in white. It also drinks nothing but water, has nails in its shoes and rolls naked in the snow. Also, rest assured, it gets its daily ration of forty lashes on the rump from its master. Now, I ask you, is it a horse, or is it a saint?” [1]
We come together today to celebrate the Feast of All Saints. But what does it mean to be a saint? What does it mean to be a saint rather than a horse? What lies at the heart of today’s celebration? Whom are we celebrating, and what for?
By many popular reckonings, to be a saint is to have never sinned, or at least to have sinned only very, very occasionally. However, it was only a few Sundays ago that we heard Jesus say resolutely to the rich young ruler, “No one is good but God alone.” So perhaps we can swiftly dispense with this popular perception of what it means to be a saint. Perhaps, then, granted that blamelessness and sinlessness are unachievable on earth, to be a saint is to have embarked on the road towards moral perfection. A saint is not someone who never sins, but someone who makes a valiant effort to rise from a life of sin to a life of purity and holiness. Well, as commendable as it is to work on one’s moral improvement, I think this view of sainthood likewise misses the mark. Our readings this morning, in fact, point us in an entirely direction.
A saint is not someone who never sins, nor is it someone who is on the path to a pure and unsullied existence. A saint is simply a sinner who knows how absolute our need for Jesus is; a saint is someone who has scaled the depths and heights of God’s grace, God’s free and unmerited favour towards us. A saint is someone who has felt forgiven, and someone who has come to a new faith in the transforming power of God. A saint is on fire with a fresh sense of our utter dependence on God. According to St Augustine, God is glorified in his saints, and when God rewards his saints and crowns their merits, It is His own gifts that God crowns—the lavish gifts of grace which he himself has put in their hearts—not their merits. A saint knows that his or her bitter and hard heart, despite constant resistance, is being captured by God’s love and grace. And even that knowledge of our utter dependence on God ultimately comes from God himself. Today we are celebrating God in his saints.
Take our Gospel this morning. Martha, Mary, and Lazarus are all celebrated as saints by the Church, and the trio of siblings undoubtedly have many admirable qualities well worth praising. Neither is there any doubt that they have rendered great service to our Lord in his earthly life. But it is when they fall at the feet of Jesus that their sainthood shines through most clearly. That is what makes a saint a saint. “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died,” says Mary. Nothing encapsulates our utter need of God more powerfully than resurrection. Resurrection which Lazarus receives is the act of pure grace par excellence. We cannot will ourselves to life everlasting; nor can resurrection be earned. Rather, it is received. Resurrection comes to us as an undeserved and incomprehensible divine gift.
With Jesus, Mary, Martha, and Lazarus have nothing to fear, including death itself. May they rest in peace and rise in glory, we say. We rest in the sure and safe mercies of our Lord. In fact, the name Lazarus is the Greek form of the Hebrew name “Eleazar,” which literally means “helped by God.” A perfect name for a saint; to be a saint is to be helped by God; to be a saint is to be dead—literally dead or as good as dead—and then raised to new life by God. Martha, Mary, Lazarus know, and all the saints know, that our calling is not to earn eternal life or cajole God into resurrecting us, but to spread the good news about it. Today we are celebrating the God of Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, his saints—the God of resurrection, the God not of the dead, but of the living.
That was our Gospel. But what makes a saint a saint according to the book of Revelation? Surely this is where no sinning comes in. The holy city, the new Jerusalem, is often regarded as a fitting heavenly reward for the holy and pious saints wearing white robes—a sort of prize you get in exchange for forty lashes on the rump and sharp-edged nails in your shoes that you endure in your earthly existence. Well, the mysterious figure seated on the throne proclaims, “To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life.” To be a saint is simply to be thirsty. To be a saint is to live in utter and radical dependence on God. The water is a gift; no payment is required for this water from the spring of the water of life. Are you thirsty for the new heaven and the new earth? They are free; they come free to us from the grace of God—free to us, that is, though costly to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. To be a saint is to be thirsty, to know the poverty of one’s own resources and instead to rely on the overwhelming generosity of God. To be a saint is to come before God with open hands and open hearts, ready to receive from him. Today we are celebrating God in his extraordinary generosity to us. The loud voice proclaims that God himself descends to make his home among mortals. We do not go up to him, but rather he comes down to us—to live with us for ever.
James K. A. Smith, a Christian philosopher, says of Saint Augustine: “He was no saint. That is why he made salvation seem possible.”[2] In truth, the same can be said about every saint. No saint is a saint. That is why they made salvation seem possible. To be a saint is not to be perfect, but to long for God’s mercy and salvation. It is to hunger and thirst for that living water that only God can provide. It is to fall, with Mary, at the feet of Jesus as he alone has the power to give life and to take it, to save and to destroy. Above all, saints are those who seek to be part of what God is doing—part of God’s story rather than their own. In the end, this is a story—a story about God’s grace—that is far more interesting and a lot more satisfying. And it is open to all who will receive it.
Amen.
[1] Adapted from Joanna Cole, Best-loved Folk Tales of the World, p. 461.
[2] Adapted from James K. A. Smith, On the Road with Saint Augustine: A Real- World Spirituality for Restless Hearts.