Homily for the Sunday of All Saints in the Orthodox Church

 

Hebrews 11:33-12:2; Matthew 10:32-33, 37-38; 19:27-30

           The word “saint” simply means “holy.”  On this first Sunday after Pentecost, we commemorate all those who are so filled with the Holy Spirit that they shine brightly with holiness.  They bear witness to the meaning of Pentecost, for it is by the power of the Holy Spirit that people fulfill their calling to become like God in holiness as they enter into the eternal communion of love shared by the Persons of the Holy Trinity. When our risen and ascended Lord sent the Holy Spirit upon His followers, He fulfilled the prophecy spoken by Jeremiah: “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.” (Jer. 31:33-34) The saints show us that everyone may embrace personally the transformation and healing of the Holy Spirit, for the “living water” of the Spirit flows in and through them as a sign of the salvation of the world. (Jn. 7:38) That is how they have become, as St. Paul wrote, “heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.” (Rom. 8:16)

We do not know the names of all the saints, but God certainly knows all who have entered into the blessedness of the heavenly kingdom.  As members together with them of the same Body of Christ, we ask for their prayers as we strive to follow their example of faithful witness to the Lord.  The root meaning of the word “martyr” is “witness,” and from the stoning of St. Stephen the Protomartyr to the present day those who have refused to deny Christ even to the point of death have provided powerful testimony to the Savior Who has liberated them from the fear of the grave.  Their shining example inspires us to take up our crosses in following our Lord as we seek first the Kingdom of God in the particular circumstances of our lives.  Christ said, “Everyone who acknowledges Me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father Who is in heaven; but whoever denies Me before men, I also will deny before My Father Who is in heaven.”  As the varied lives of the saints across the ages demonstrate, there are many ways of showing our faithfulness to Him, even as there are many ways of denying Him. 

 Sainthood and martyrdom are not reserved only for those who refuse to renounce Christ under threat of physical death.  They are the common calling of us all to die to our passions as we became “partakers of the divine nature” by our personal receptivity to the healing divine energies of our Lord.  Like all the saints, we must acquire the strength to say truthfully with Saint Paul, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” (Gal. 2:20) Regardless of whether we are called literally to shed our blood for Christ, we must all pursue the living martyrdom of refusing to allow love for anything or anyone to become a false god that we place before loyalty to our Lord.  When we endure the inevitable tension associated with purifying the desires of our hearts for their true fulfillment in God, we will know what it means to take up our crosses.  We will suffer, not because pain has any intrinsic significance, but because of the struggle required to turn away from deeply ingrained habits of self-indulgence that have marred the beauty of our souls.  Instead of romanticizing about some ideal spiritual path that we imagine would be either easier or more exalted, we should simply accept in humility that we must face the challenges that are before us today for our salvation.  Fantasizing about anything else is simply a distraction from making the particular offering of our lives that is necessary for our healing.  The path to salvation is never an escape from reality, for it requires us to do the hard work of learning to see ourselves more truthfully so that we may find healing for the given diseases of soul that we would prefer to ignore. We must refuse to be distracted by anything from pursuing healing for the spiritual maladies that we actually have.

 Holiness is not a reward for people who have never sinned, even as health is not a reward for people who have never been sick.  The common image of the ideal religious person as a self-righteous legalist who condemns others has nothing at all to do with a spiritually healthy understanding of sainthood.  As St. John wrote in his epistle, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 Jn. 1:8-9) True saints are people like King David (who had committed murder and adultery), Peter (the head disciple who had denied His Lord three times), and Mary of Egypt (who had lived a horribly depraved life as a sex addict).  They all found healing through repentance as they pursued the difficult struggle to reorient the desires of their hearts toward God and to live accordingly.  Likewise, Paul, formerly a harsh persecutor of Christians who referred to himself as the chief of sinners, wrote that the Lord showed him mercy “as a pattern to those who are going to believe on Him for everlasting life.”  (1 Tim. 1:16)  

That such broken people became glorious saints is not an exception to the rule, but the norm.  If we want to find healing for our souls, we will not do so by convincing ourselves that we have somehow already fulfilled the Lord’s command to “be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect” (Matt. 5:48) Neither, however, we will we share in the holiness of God by accepting the lie that anything we have said, thought, or done makes it impossible for us to be transformed by the Lord’s healing mercy.  Photini, the Samaritan woman at the well, and Zacchaeus, the corrupt tax-collector, were lost causes according to the conventional religious and moral standards of first-century Palestine, but they received Christ in ways that transformed them into glorious saints.   

 They remind us that everyone who shares in the blessed life of the Savior does so through their participation in His grace, not as a reward for good behavior.  Our reading from Hebrews teaches that the righteous of the Old Testament, “though well attested by their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had foreseen something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.”  It is impossible to become like God in holiness apart from sharing in Jesus Christ’s healing and fulfillment of the human person.  He enables both those who may appear to have never done anything wrong and those who may appear never to have done anything right to become His saints, if they will embrace the struggle to entrust themselves so fully to Him that they become living icons of His salvation.   That is the only way that anyone becomes a “partaker of the divine nature” by grace.

 Looking to the example of all those who have entered into the holiness of God, “since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfection of our faith.”  Let us take up the crosses that are obviously before us and acknowledge Him each day of our lives as we bear the inevitable tension of seeking first His Kingdom and loving Him with every ounce of our being and our neighbors as ourselves.  If we do so, we will become living martyrs who bear witness to the active presence of the Holy Spirit, sent by the risen and ascended Lord, for the salvation of the world, as do all the saints. Our calling is not to religious legalism in any form, but to receive the healing of our souls so that we may bear witness to the Lord’s healing and fulfillment of the human person in the divine image and likeness.

 

Homily for the Sunday of All Saints and the Synaxis of the Twelve Apostles in the Orthodox Church

 

Hebrews 11:33-12:2; Matthew 9:36-10:8

 

            Today we commemorate our Lord’s Twelve Apostles and all the Saints, looking to them as brilliant examples of faithfulness to the Savior.  We may, however, be tempted to think that such glorious persons have little to do with the humble and broken circumstances of our lives.  After all, the Apostles were our Lord’s closest followers during His earthly ministry. Though they did not fully understand Who He was until after His resurrection, He sent the Holy Spirit to empower them to shepherd the Church as they fulfilled His command to “preach…‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons.”  They all struggled and suffered greatly in faithfulness to the Lord in their ministries, with St. John the Theologian being the only one not dying as a martyr. 

 

            If we are ever tempted to think that we have achieved something great in the Christian life, we should look to their example of abandoning all the comfort and security of a conventional life to experience the uncertainty of following a Messiah Who Himself was rejected and condemned by respectable religious and political leaders.  The Savior’s message was such a threat to their power that they crucified Him as a public example of what happened to those who got in their way and threatened the interests of the powerful.  As Christ foretold, “the time is coming when anyone who kills you will think they are offering a service to God.” (Jn 16: 2) It is not surprising that the Apostles who continued our Lord’s ministry met deaths like His.  They obeyed literally the Savior’s teaching to deny themselves, take up their crosses, and follow Him.

 

The way of Christ was certainly not popular or celebrated during their lifetimes.  To the contrary, it was a path to persecution, imprisonment, torture, and death.  In contrast to false teachers who tried to use their position for self-glorification, true Apostles followed in the way of those in the Old Testament who looked forward in faith to the coming of the Messiah. As we read today from Hebrews: “Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life. Others suffered mocking and scourging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were killed with the sword; they went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, ill-treated—of whom the world was not worthy—wandering over deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.”

 

Christ fulfilled their hope not by setting up an earthly kingdom with geographical borders in which they or their descendants would rule, even though that is what the Apostles themselves had originally anticipated.  Instead, He offered Himself freely to the point of death on the Cross for the salvation of all in a Kingdom not of this world.  He then rose in glorious victory over the worst that the most powerful empire of the world could do.  Empowered by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, the Apostles were completely transformed and manifested the ways of heaven amidst the realities of a broken world.  They healed the sick, cast out demons, and raised the dead.  They did not respond in kind to their enemies, but embodied the merciful love of the Savior.  Even as He prayed for the forgiveness of those who killed Him, St. Paul wrote of the Apostles, “When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we try to conciliate.”  The Apostles are members of Christ’s Body, the Church, and chief shepherds of His flock. Their work is not their own, but Christ’s.  That is why St. Paul could say with integrity “I urge you, then, be imitators of me.” (1 Cor. 4:12-16) His life had become an enacted icon of the Savior.  As he wrote elsewhere, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ Who lives in me.”  (Gal. 2:20)

 

No matter what our particular calling in  life may be, we all have the same fundamental vocation to become radiant with the holiness of God.  People should be able to look at any one of us and see a vibrant image of the healing of the human person in God’s image and likeness that our Savior has worked for the salvation of the world.  The Apostles are examples for us all in this regard, as are all the Saints.   We do not know the names of all the Saints, but God certainly knows all who have entered into the blessedness of the heavenly kingdom, regardless of whether they have been formally recognized by the Church.  We have the benefit of the teachings, ministries, and prayers of countless people who have manifested the holiness of God, and we must not excuse ourselves from faithfully following their examples.  As today’s epistle reading exhorts us: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfection of our faith.”

 

Christ said to the Apostles, “You received without paying, give without pay.”  All the more does His admonition apply to us, who have benefited from the witness of countless generations of holy people in the Church, not as a reward for good behavior, but due to the mercy of our Lord Who was and is at work through them by the power of the Holy Spirit.  We must resist the strong temptation to make the pursuit of the Christian life all about ourselves, or about people who are superficially like us, as though God’s salvation were our personal possession to be used for our own comfort and satisfaction.  The Apostles and the Saints have rejected the temptation to distort the way of Christ into an exercise in serving themselves or seeking earthly glory. Had their religion been something they had invented, they could have done with it as they pleased.  Our Lord’s salvation, however, is not a product of this world or a commodity to be divided up or bought and sold according to conventional human designs.  He has conquered death, the wages of sin, by His own death and resurrection.  We share in His life by grace, which means that we are always in the position of those who have “received without paying.”  Consequently, we must “give without pay” as we offer our resources, time, and attention in support of the ministries of our parish and to bless the suffering, outcast, and needy neighbors with whom our Lord identified Himself.  If we are truly in Christ, then His life will become our own; our character will conform to His.  He is the vine and we are the branches.  (Jn. 15:5) Since He offered up Himself freely for our sake, we must offer ourselves to become channels of His blessing and healing for the world, as all His faithful servants have done. 

 

Across the centuries and to this very day in some parts of the world, countless Christians have followed the Apostles in literally dying as martyrs.  Such martyrdom is a particular calling that requires a God-given strength to make the ultimate witness for Christ.  By the power of the Holy Spirit, the Lord calls and enables us all to bear witness to Him as we take up the crosses we bear in our particular circumstances. In order to gain the spiritual strength to bear faithful witness to Him, we must make the most basic spiritual disciplines part of our daily lives as we pray, fast, share our resources, read the Scriptures, forgive our enemies, and keep a close watch on the thoughts and desires that we welcome into our hearts.  These practices are essential for gaining the spiritual clarity to discern how the Lord is calling us to serve Him in the Church and in the world.  Embracing them is an essential step in following in the way of all the Saints.   

 

By the power of the Holy Spirit, an unlikely group of Palestinian Jews became our Lord’s Apostles.  To this very day, people who face all the problems of life in our fallen world become radiant with the holiness of God as His Saints.  Let us take the small, faltering steps that we are capable of taking today as we follow in their path to the Kingdom.  We have no lack of opportunities to do so in our parish, our families, our workplaces, and our neighborhoods.  By responding to those opportunities as best we presently can, we will learn to take up our crosses and take our place among those who bear faithful witness to the saving mercy of our Lord.  We have received from Him without paying.  Let us give ourselves to Him and our neighbors in the same way. That is how, by His grace, we may all become Saints.