Behold,
what manner of love
the
Father hath bestowed upon us,
that
we should be called the sons of God:
therefore
the world knoweth us not,
because
it knew him not.
Beloved,
now are we the sons of God,
and
it doth not yet appear what we shall be:
but
we know that, when he shall appear,
we
shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.
And
every man that hath this hope in him
purifieth
himself, even as he is pure.
In the third chapter of St.
John’s first epistle, he reflects on a central lived reality of all the
followers of Christ: that we are the
children of God. Because of who Jesus is
and the work He accomplished on Calvary in His Vicarious Atonement, the love of
God could be poured out on all mankind through His Word and Spirit, raising up
children unto Himself by grace through faith.
The righteousness man could not achieve on his own, Jesus accomplished
via His Incarnation; the satisfaction for sin man could not make on his own,
Jesus accomplished by His Cross; the eternal life man could not acquire by His
own power, Jesus gave out freely after His own resurrection from the dead. Thus faith in Christ becomes the fundamental
means by which man receives forgiveness, life, and salvation—which is grace—so that
he might be raised up to new life, walking in the Word and Spirit of his
Savior. These are the children of God,
whom Jesus refers to in Matthew 5 as the blessed, and everyone who finds
themselves alive in this blessed hope, continuously purify themselves through
repentance and faith all the days of their lives.
This is a different kind
of definition than many Christians hold today.
In popular culture, saints are often reflected as exceptionally pious or
holy, such as monastics and clerics, who regular people hope will pray for them
because they think holy people will get God’s attention more regularly. This idea extends even into the afterlife,
where some people were thought to be so holy and blessed in this world, that
they must have special privileges in heaven—like the power to impose upon God
and bend Him to their will on behalf of lowly mortals who properly petition
them. When the idea of sainthood and
holiness are separated from the Doctrine of Justification by Grace through
Faith in Jesus Christ alone, the result always seems to be that men judge each
other in relation to their own standards of holiness, and bestow sainthood on
those whom they most admire. In history
this has been used to bolster political and ecclesiastical claims to power and
authority, while also keeping the average parishioner frightfully chasing
patron saints to somehow intercede for them and avert the punishment of a
vengeful God.
But look again at the
Apostle John’s description of the unfathomable love God pours out on the whole
world through His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. The world did not know God by their own powers,
because their own powers are irredeemably fallen and corrupted. Instead, as John recorded Jesus’ teaching in
His Gospel, For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son,
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
For God sent not his Son
into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be
saved. Jesus
did not come to bring destruction upon men, because men had already achieved
their own destruction by enslaving themselves to sin, death, hell, and the
devil. On the contrary, Jesus is the
love of God made manifest to the world—a sacrificial, selfless love that seeks
the good of men, rather than their judgment.
Or as Luther would note, those who see God as vengeful and angry, do not
see Him rightly, because they are not looking at Him through the Cross of
Jesus. God’s revealed disposition toward
man is that of saving love, not desiring to see one soul lost to perdition, but
that all might come to a saving knowledge of His Truth.
This disposition of
divine love permeates not only life in this world, but throughout eternity in
His Kingdom. All the saints on earth are
saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone, just all the saints in
heaven are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone, for as the
author of Hebrews describes and St. Paul writes to St. Timothy, there is only one
true mediator between God and men: the
Lord Jesus Christ. Most certainly all
the saints pray for each other and for the world in which we live, asking for
the Lord of Glory to bestow upon His children His good and gracious will, for
God Himself teaches us to pray to Him and seek the good of our neighbors in a
love that reflects His own. But no saint
has power over God, in this world or the next, for every saint is saved by
Grace and not by their own holiness or righteousness according to the Law—for as
St. Paul would note in his letter to the church at Rome, by the deeds of the
Law no flesh shall be saved. There is no
place for boasting among the children of God, because they are all saved by
Jesus, and together work and serve as beneficiaries of His grace. The communion of the saints we confess in the
Creed each week is not an affirmation of some holy choir far distant from us,
but of the whole family of faith wrapped around us, and extending with us into
eternity.
On this Feast of All
Saints, take courage and hope, dear Christian, for the Father has so loved you
that He has called you His child, all by grace through faith in His only
begotten Son. Your place in His Kingdom
is secure by His work and His power, as the life, death, and resurrection of
Jesus stands in testimony to the whole cosmos of His love and grace poured out
to you. Though we pray for each other, even
as the saints in heaven pray for the saints on earth, we do not approach the
throne of God in fear, but in hope, for the perfect love of God in Christ Jesus
casts out all fear from the fellowship of His saints. And all we who hold such hope, given faith
and repentance unto eternal life by God’s good and gracious gift, are purified
in the Word and Spirit of Jesus, turning from the dark things of the world and
toward His Light and life and grace.
Soli Deo Gloria! Amen.
