THE EXTRAORDINARY ORDINARINESS OF BEING A SAINT

If you are reading this today, you know that Halloween has come and gone. The jack-o-lantern that I brought to worship last Sunday is still smiling on our front step where it greeted trick-or-treaters last night. The bowl by our front door is still half-full of tempting mini chocolate bars.

Today, November 1st, is the day after Halloween and it hardly earns a footnote on the calendar. But in the church’s liturgical calendar it is an important holy day – All Saint’s Day. When we think of “saints” we usually think of Christians who have done extraordinary things. St. Patrick who drove snakes out of Ireland; St. Francis who preached to geese and told a wolf to stop threatening some villagers; or St. Thomas More who was beheaded by Henry VIII.

We typically think that being a saint demands something almost super-human of us. Again and again, however, the scriptures burst this bubble. In 2 Kings 5:1-27, Naaman the Syrian general comes to be healed by Elisha and is told, ‘Go and jump into the river.” That’s it. Just go bathe in the Jordan River. And Naaman thinks, ‘Surely there was something special I ought to have been doing? I didn’t travel all this way to be told just to take a bath.” And his servants have to persuade him that doing something absolutely ordinary is exactly how God will heal him. When the rich young man comes to Jesus and wants to know what he’s got to do to be saved, Jesus tells him, “You could start by keeping the commandments.” And he says that he already does those things. “Tell me to do something extraordinary,” he almost demands of Jesus. Jesus’ only response is to tell him, “Well, then, just stay in my company.” (Matthew 19:16-31)

Like Naaman and the rich young ruler, we want to be distinctive, to be known for doing something special or unusual. Jesus, however, tells us that just doing the ordinary things with integrity and authenticity, with extraordinary attention to where God is present in the ordinary moments of life is enough to be included among the saints of God.

All Saints Sunday is an opportunity to recall how utterly ordinary holiness or saintliness really is. The rather ordinary lives to which Jesus calls us only seem extraordinary because behaviors like humble caring, attentive presence to those around us, behaving justly, and being mindful of our words and actions can seem like extraordinary practices in a world where we witness so much cruelty, indifference, and selfishness.

The gospel reading for All Saints’ Day is always the Beatitudes. What they ask of us as the saints of God is amazingly ordinary behavior: a humble spirit, a desire for peace, a hunger for justice, extending mercy, standing with those who mourn. All these responses ought to be wholly ordinary human conduct. They are extraordinary demonstrations of saintliness, of holiness, only because of how endangered they are in our contemporary world. We are all called to be the saints of God not by casting out snakes or speaking to wolves, not by being torn apart by wild beasts in a stadium but by simply living our lives with compassion, humility, and a passion for justice.

Pastor Thomas

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