Life Celebrated

How many times have you heard a non-Christian comment on a Christian holiday or feast day only to announce that our day of celebration is merely the incorporation of a some pagan holiday. The insinuation is that we hold to a copycat faith that Christianity is some form of ritualistic parasite feeding on the beliefs, stories, and festivals of other religions. The underlying assumption, of course, is that we serve a false religion, a made up Christ, a misunderstood, largely misinterpreted Palestinian guru who only later was deified by those who sought power and riches through the ruthless and cruel manipulation of the gullible and uneducated.

You don't have to go far to hear such things. In fact, you don't even have to go anywhere at all. Just turn on the television, read the newspaper, the right magazine, or even browse the internet to hear this view of our faith.

Today is all Saints' Day, and many will say that this is the Christian answer to Halloween, or Samain, just one more pagan holiday co-opted by the Christians. These people are wrong, but interestingly enough, they are also absolutely correct although they did not mean to be.

They are wrong because All Saints' Day did not derive from some ancient Celtic holiday. Historically, it wasn't even celebrated in November until the 9th century. It was celebrated for almost 700 years on May 13th with some occasional celebrations being held on the Friday of Easter Week. All Saints' Day is neither the co-opting nor the adaptation of a pagan festival.

The detractors are wrong also because our feast day expresses a theology in direct opposition to the world's day. So much so that one is left wondering if the day were not moved in the ninth century particularly to oppose the festival of the ungodly, not to assume it. All Saints' Day is as in contrast to being a celebration of the macabre, of death, of mutation, and decay as is the modern Halloween, is rather a celebration of life, hope, resurrection, and restoration to a new and better life — a life where one is more human, not less. Our feast day celebrates those redeemed who have passed into a state which is even more truly alive than that which they left, instead of some torturous existence as those less than fully alive, the animated dead as it were, or some state where those passed are less than fully human which is the exact theology embodied in the modern Halloween.

So, in these things our detractors are wrong. They are mistaken. Yet they are absolutely right in a fashion that they never intended. All Saints' Day is the answer to their "celebration" for All Saints' Day does not honor the dead, but the living. All Saints' celebrates not those who wander the earth always hungry, eternally searching — but responds by celebrating those who have a place, a true home, and are fed by the Saviour of Creation. All Saints' is not a celebration of death, but rather of participation of the saints through Christ in its defeat. It is the Gospel, and that is always the answer to death, its sure and effective cure. The only death we can be said to celebrate on this day is the death of Death itself by the hand of the Life Giver, Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the Saints.

Our readings today work together to paint a picture of the distinctions between the two theologies, that of life and that of death. The theologies are distinct in their endpoint as we shall see, but are also different in their application in this life. We are, in the readings handed down to us by the Church, shown clear distinctions in the godly man who follows one, and the ungodly man who follows the other.

In order to illustrate an important distinction shown to us in our reading from the book of Wisdom, I wish to share with you a story of a man, and his two daughters. This man spent most of his life enslaved to alcohol. He functioned, as alcoholics are prone to do, sometimes better and sometimes worse. He was not a good husband, nor was he a good father, in fact, when his older daughter asked why the younger children were neglected in favor of his addiction, he stated that he would rather feel good, and alcohol made him feel good. Didn't she want him to feel good? If we think about it he was really not so different than many others in our culture today, pursuers of pleasure, perpetual chases of the next good feeling that we are. The only difference was that his pleasure was more obviously damaging than that of many others whose pleasures are just as deadly in the end, but oh so wickedly subtle. Idolatry is idolatry after all.

But God, in His infinite mercy, was not content to let this man remain as he was and through a series of events God seized this man's attention. God claimed this man as his own and the man responded to the grace of our Saviour and joined with His Saints. Change came upon the man and although he had only a couple more years as the ravages of his former life caught up with his body, he lived those years as a servant of the Lord and was a good husband — and a good father — and the Lord used him to reach others who were enslaved as he had been. This man passed a few years ago and I have no doubt that He will be raised to glory at the Judgment. As our passage from the book of Wisdom states, "the Lord hath care for His elect".

His two oldest daughters took his death very different fashions and these two girls illustrate the passage in Wisdom very clearly. The eldest had been living on her own for quite some time and was not a Christian. There were unresolved issues there regarding her father. Not being a Christian, the notion that her father could be a new creature at conversion was foolishness to her. She could not understand it. So she spent his remaining time blaming and being angry at the man that was. His death to her means simply that her father is gone. He is no more. Although there may be a thought somewhere that his spirit continues there is no hope for a better existence, no redemption, no reunion. In her sight, the sight of the unwise as Wisdom tells us, her father is truly dead and that death is misery.

The other daughter, the younger, is a Christian. For her the whole scene, though same scene, looks totally different because she perceives that landscape with spiritual eyes. Upon seeing her father after conversion, she witnessed the new man. The old man was dead and those things were gone. She was able to understand what had happened and look upon his failing health in a totally different way than her sister. And when he passed from this life she was sad to not see him again for a while, but she rejoiced in confidence that she would see him again one day. It was not a "goodbye" with eternal darkness looming, but a "see ya later" in confidence of a better existence for him, and eventual reunion with him in glory. Because she possesses the vision of the saints and trusts in the promises of the Lord to those saints, she rests comfortably in the knowledge that "the Lord hath care for His elect".

Like these two sisters, we and the world have differing theologies regarding death. Christianity, like the younger sister, has theology of life, hope, resurrection and reunion.

But our All Saints' readings, although pointing us to those who have departed in faith and fear, do not only encompass those who have passed. This feast day is not a just some annual eulogy to those past although we are to remember and honor them, learning from the examples and lives of the godly saints which have gone on ahead of us. This day is a day which highlights the unity of the one body of Christ, the Church Universal. We are one communion and fellowship, the communion of the saints. The Church Universal is ultimately one body made up of all of Christ's saints. Those who have departed this life, as well as those still in it, are separated only by circumstance. Our Collect asks for those who are here now, the saints of the Church Militant, grace that we may follow those blessed Saints who have passed before us. As saints of the Church Militant this day is a day for us to reflect on our present and future in light of our brothers past.

So we are saints then? Yes. Paul, in addressing the Church at Corinth called the people he wrote saints though many were in sin. Being a saint is not achieving perfection, but being in Christ, part of the people of God. Look around you. You are surrounded by saints. Do you doubt it? If you are saying to yourself, "I'm no saint, I've done plenty of bad stuff in my life." Or if you are confident in your own sainthood, you're just not so sure about the other guy sitting beside you. If either of these is you consider a listing of saints that is not in our reading today, it is found in Hebrews 11. Take note, and take heart. Going back through the Old Testament Paul lists some of the saints of old, many of whom we would not question were the greats of Scripture in regard to their faith. Such were Abraham, Moses, Samson, Gideon, Rahab, and David, all of great faith, and not a one of them perfect. All had fallen short and all were distinguished by a faith in one who had promised a deliverer, our Saviour Jesus Christ, to crush the head of the serpent. They were each and every one, sinners saved just like you, just like the people sitting next to you.

So having sin what are we to do about it? We are told in Scripture that when Jesus first preached his message was, "Repent, for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand." These words are as applicable to those who are saints — who have as the 39 Articles say "received the Holy Ghost and departed from the grace falling into sin", as they are to those of you here who have never called upon the name of the Lord and are now called to repentance and to come into the communion of His saints. The call of Christ goes out to godly and ungodly alike, "Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand". For those who may be present and have never called upon the name of the Lord in faith, Christ calls to you. The life and hope that you have heard and have yet to hear preached today is for you as well if you but come to Him in faith and fear.

"But what is expected of me?" you ask. This question that is applicable to all men. Our readings answer us in this making even further distinction between the life of the saint versus the life of the worldly.

Our readings from the first Psalm and the fifth chapter of Matthew are sound instruction for how we as saints are to conduct ourselves in the here and now. We see a stark contrast placed between the godly and the ungodly in the Psalter reading that echoes the views of life and death found in the Wisdom reading. The Psalm begins on a positive note describing the godly man in respect to his aversion to traveling the path of ungodliness and his delight in the law of the Lord. After all of the description of the godly verse 4 begins with the ominous words, "The ungodly are not so" and continues to tell us that the ungodly will be unable to withstand the judgment, a grim end indeed.

As well as in the Psalter there are implied distinctions made in the Beatitudes of the Matthew passage. Distinctions that are explicitly stated in Luke where the other account of the Sermon on the Mount is found. Although all of the distinctions are important, given the neo-pagan state of our society and the light in which Christians and Gospel are held in our day, I wish to highlight one in particular for you giving both the positive from Matthew and its distinguishing negative from the Gospel according to Luke. The godly and the ungodly in stark contrast.

Matthew 5:11-12 states: Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.

In Luke 6:26, its negative states simply: Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets.

We know from the rest of Scripture how well the false prophet fares and it is nothing to rejoice and be glad about. The saints have Christ in their hearts, in their minds and in their lives. The saints know that men can kill the body, but there is one more powerful than they. The history of saints past, especially that of the martyrs shows us that at the time of need God is generous with His grace to equip His saints. As saints, the words of both instruction and encouragement in our Psalter and Gospel readings are for you. They are the words of the Christ, instructing his saints in virtuous and godly living and encouraging them in this life, admonishing them to be conscious of the life to come. We are not living only for the future, for we indeed live in the here and now, but we do not live for the here and now.

What about the future? Well, the future of the saints has been spoken of in all the readings for today. In Wisdom we had that wonderful illustration of the great reward of His saints. We will be received into His presence. We shall shine like sparks among the stubble. Our Lord will reign forever. In our Psalter reading we are told that we shall not wither and we shall prosper in the Lord. In our Gospel reading we are promised that we shall receive mercy and be filled, our reward being great. Our Collect prays for us to have the grace to follow thy Blessed Saints so "that we may come to those unspeakable joys". But one reading in particular takes this future and sums it up neatly and that is our epistle reading from Revelation. It is here that the martyrs are spoken of, those who have died in the great tribulation. But though these are martyrs they share in something that we will also partake in. Here is a mere hint of those unspeakable joys. The martyrs have their robes washed white in the blood of the Lamb, that great cleansing blood. These martyrs serve God day and night and dwell with God. They do not hunger, nor thirst nor does the sun light on them nor heat. The question is begged: Do we have to be martyred to enjoy these things in heaven? Are our dear departed who did not die a martyr's death missing out on something? Are they just out of luck? If we die quietly in our beds what awaits us?

Well, although what is spoken of in this passage from early in Revelation is in direct relation to the martyrs we can rest in the confidence that all saints will partake of these things. Revelation 21 in speaking of the New Heaven and New Earth and Revelation 22 in speaking of the River of Life echo what is presented in our reading and extends it to all the saints, all of those whose names are written in the Book of Life. So have no doubt, the future of the saints is bright, and again like in the 1st Psalm not so the ungodly.

When we come to the end of our epistle reading we find that there is an important passage for us today as saints, and not just because it is All Saints' Day. It encompasses a special activity that is sacramental and relational and once again a distinctive of the people of God. Revelation 7:17 reads: For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.

As we come to Holy Communion we get to glimpse at that future and partake of that feeding. As the service of Holy Communion continues, as we take this journey upward to the throne of God together to participate in the Supper which he has prepared for us, we partake in His presence and His grace. He has promised that when two or three are together in His name He is there. He has told us that when we partake of the bread and wine, we are partaking of His most precious body and blood. He has told us that He is the Living Water and Bread of Life. As his saints, we get to share in that today. Be glad for your distinction as his saints. We live in a world that worships death, hold fast to the Theology of Life which points to resurrection, reunion, and restoration. Live it out, live it out loud so the world can see the clear distinction that our readings show us today.

In just a few moments the call will go out. "Our fellow Christians of other branches of Christ's Church, and all who love our Divine Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in sincerity and truth", that is the call to all saints. It continues "are affectionately invited to the Lord's Table" — the Lord loves you and is asking His saints to come and dine at His table, partake of Him, of His grace, to celebrate life, and the answer for the theology of the world. My brothers and sisters in Christ, saints of the Lord, the Lamb, your Lord, the Lord and Giver of Life awaits.
Amen.

The Rev'd Mr. Lawrence Jones was ordained to the diaconate on October 16, 2009 in the Diocese of Mid-America of the Reformed Episcopal Church. He is a 2009 Graduate of Cranmer Theological House and is assigned to St. Francis Church in The Woodlands, Texas.