All Saints' Day

Grace, Mercy and Peace to you from God our Father and His only Son, Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen.

      Today we remember all the saints, as the hymn written by William W. How and Ralph Vaughan Williams states, “…who from their labors rest”. Who are these saints we are to remember? For that matter, what is a saint?

      In this generation, we may picture in our minds the names of some well known Roman Catholic saints such as Christopher, Patrick or Valentine, or we may envision paintings or depictions of people with the glowing halo of light around their heads. This type of veneration may seem that sainthood is a special class of martyrs whom very few have obtained membership.

      In the Scriptures, both old and new testaments, the term ‘saint’ means holy. It is a term used to signify something or someone dedicated to God or consecrated to the service of God. When God declares Israel to be His people, He is consecrating them for His service and reserving them as His holy people.

      In St. Paul’s letter to the church in Colossae, he writes of “the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints.” [Colossians 1:24] What was the mystery? It was the making of God’s word fully known, that is, the good news of Jesus Christ. The Apostle was not referring to dead people, he was talking about those people of the present. He was speaking about “…the riches of the glory…which is Christ in you…”[Colossians 1:27b]

      In the ancient world, servants and/or slaves, soldiers and barbarian tribes would be marked in various ways as to show to whom they belonged. With clay or wax, seals would be made on writings, objects, and buildings. A special signate ring or medallion could be worn to show ownership and ranking. But for people, other forms of identification were used to ‘seal’ them in service to their master.

      With soldiers in the military, a tattoo or brand on the hand, forehead or neck, functioned as a sign of service, a mark of recognition, and a precaution against desertion.^[1] The Greeks used a brand or tattoo as a punishment or mark of disgrace. The Romans used them as marks of ownership. Some cults used them as a sacral rite.

      Like the ancient times, we still use branding and tattooing for our animals, be they cattle, sheep, horses, or dogs (although imbedding a microchip beneath the skin of the animal is now an option). With these marks, even in death, all would know whose property or servant they were.

      Ultimately, we too have been marked into servitude. Our sin marks us as slaves to Satan. He is the prince of this earthly realm which is why he is so freely able to attack us. This is not a good brand to have. Everyone can see this mark and we would be sentenced to a life of suffering and death if it were not for Our Savior, Jesus Christ.

      We cannot free ourselves from our enslavement to sin and the Devil. We need to be redeemed by one more powerful than Satan. We need our bodies and souls taken over by a new master. God knew this and sent His only Son to take rightful ownership of His people, once and for all time. Jesus Christ’s crucifixion, death and resurrection, paid the price for our enslavement. With Christ’s sacrifice, we became servants to God – but more than that, we became heirs to the kingdom of heaven.

“Then I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, saying, ‘Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.’” [ Revelation 7:2–3.]

What does this revelation mean? What is this seal of the servants of the living God? Quite simply, it is our baptism. Yes, our baptism is the mark of our king. St. Paul puts it this way in his letter to the church in Corinth:

“And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.” [2 Corinthians 1:21–22]

      This ‘seal’ has been placed upon our foreheads and our hearts as a sign that we belong to the living God, Christ Jesus. We have been declared holy to God through Christ Jesus by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. We have been dedicated to God and consecrated to the service of God. We are now literally ‘Saints’ under God. Now when Satan and his devils come upon us, they see the seal of Jesus Christ. When the angels of God see us, they see the seal of the Living God.

      We now belong to that special group,

“[the] great multitude which no one can number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”

[Revelation 7:9-10]

One martyr of the early Christian church was Maximilian of Tebessa in 295 A.D. Tebessa Province is a region of northeastern Algeria and was part of the Roman empire. He was brought before the proconsul Dion to be conscripted into the Roman army.

‘Dion said to Maximilianus, "Serve and accept the seal." He replied, "I will not accept the seal: I already have the seal of my Christ." Dion the proconsul said, "I will send you to your Christ right now." He replied, "I wish that you would do so. That is even my title to glory."’[2]

The 21-year-old Christian, Maximilian was executed for his confession of his true king and master, Jesus Christ.

      Through your baptism, you have been turned from sinners into saints. Christ has called you holy and therefore you are holy. You have been dedicated to serve the living God. You have been, for lack of a better word, “sainted”. There is nothing you can add and thanks be to God, no power of evil can take it away.

“In the year 304, in the small village of Abitene in what today is Tunisia in northern Africa, forty-nine Christians gathered for their usual Sunday worship service. It was the time when Christians were persecuted under Emperor Diocletian. Christians had been prohibited by threat of execution to assemble on Sundays. The forty-nine were found out while celebrating Holy Communion. When they were interrogated concerning why they disregarded the imperial prohibition of the Sunday assembly, they answered: “Sine dominico non possumus” (We cannot live without Sunday). What they meant, of course, is that Christians cannot continue to exist without Sunday worship. All forty-nine of these Christians were tortured and put to death.”[3]

      This day is a remembrance of all those who have died in the body of Christ Jesus our Lord. Although we celebrate with all the saints we do not know, we also remember and give thanks for all the saints we do know. These saints are your loved ones that were sealed in their baptism to be sons and daughters of God. They may be fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, friends, neighbors and all those who have been apart of your life under the seal of Christ Jesus.

      As we partake of the Holy Communion of Christ, know that you are not only communing with the person next to you, or even the whole congregation, but you are also communing with the saints that have gone before us in the name of Jesus Christ. His body and blood connect us all together with our loved ones who now dwell in the kingdom of heaven. We are surrounded by the multitude of saints, both visible to us now and in the presence of the Lamb of God, our King and Redeemer.

      Therefore, rejoice and be glad because you have been sealed in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

^[1] David E. Aune, Revelation 6–16, vol. 52B, Word Biblical Commentary (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 1998), 457.

[2] http://www.orderofcenturions.org/maximilian.html

[3] Rev. Wilhelm Torgerson, rector emeritus, International Lutheran Society of Wittenberg, Lutherstadt Wittenberg, Germany: November 4, 2012