Saintly people

Colossians 1:1-14

            What is a saint? In the Roman Catholic church there are seemingly thousands, their lives examples of living the life of Christ, of showing us how it actually can be done, models of good living, faith and love.  I believe in the Episcopal church the remembrance of a 'saint' is a bit less formal. But what of this line from Colossians, we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints? Were there saints then too?  Certainly there was no formal analysis as there is today, no "devils advocate" and no hugely enormous bureaucratic formula to be fulfilled. Life was not so complex in the early church. What was their standard?

              As we mature in life, we know that we must live our lives to our own beat. We have a conscience and we answer to no one save our creator. No one knows what is in our heart. No one knows our pains, sufferings and reasons for how we live and make decisions. We certainly cannot say with any certainty at all what someone else's motivations are.  We live a faithful life as best we can. Some who might be judged less than perfect may have in fact achieved greatness in the eyes of God because we are not privy to what they live with, what that person sees, feels and has experienced.

             Perhaps in our own way, we are all saints. As faithful people we walk the walk, each in our own way. Respect for each others' journey yields the premise that we perhaps are all saints in God's eyes. 

             I once knew a woman I known as "Miss Anna". She was a schoolteacher of some import, having been recognized by Fiorello LaGuardia (Mayor of New York City and the namesake of LaGuardia airport). Miss Anna lived a good life and a holy life. She was a convert to Catholicism in a family that likely did not appreciate it. Still that family cared for her when she became an invalid and was bed bound for many, many years. Miss Anna prayed and journaled every day. She was faithful and did not put her sufferings on display to induce sympathy from others. She was a true suffering servant. She was in my eyes and without hesitation, a saint. Certainly not canonized, she went through no lengthy process of examination but she was, none the less, a saint. 

               Saying someone is a saint may elicit visions of martyrdom or miracles but life itself is a miracle. Life lived faithfully is all God asks and is itself a sign and example of God's love. Are we not all saints in our own way?

             I trust I may never know the silent sufferings of so many people but I know that God loves each and every one of us and lives through each and every one of us, uses each and every one of us to reveal His love and compassion.  Let us be mindful of our journeys and know we are all trying to live a holy life with the tools given us. We are all saintly people.

            

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

To the saints and faithful brothers and sisters in Christ in Colossae:

Grace to you and peace from God our Father. 

In our prayers for you we always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. You have heard of this hope before in the word of the truth, the gospel that has come to you. Just as it is bearing fruit and growing in the whole world, so it has been bearing fruit among yourselves from the day you heard it and truly comprehended the grace of God. This you learned from Epaphras, our beloved fellow-servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf, and he has made known to us your love in the Spirit.

For this reason, since the day we heard it, we have not ceased praying for you and asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of God’s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so that you may lead lives worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, as you bear fruit in every good work and as you grow in the knowledge of God. May you be made strong with all the strength that comes from his glorious power, and may you be prepared to endure everything with patience, while joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has enabled you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has rescued us from the power of darkness and transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.