We just finished watching a movie.  The main character was a medical doctor who saved lives.  There was some debate in the movie about whether he saved lives for selfish or altruistic reasons.  When he was faced with the choice to fight in a battle to help save the world, he said he only wanted to help people not kill anyone, another character suggested that perhaps he was only trying to save himself and too scared to fight. He said there must be another way, but when his friend’s life was endangered, we saw he had the courage to defend him, even though it put his own life in danger.  In the end, he did find another way to save the world.  Yet, by many standards, you might say “he was no saint.”  He was arrogant, proud, stubborn and insensitive for much of the movie.

When we think of saints we often think of people who have done many good works.  Is that what makes a saint?  What is a saint anyway? Simply put, a saint is a child of God– someone made holy and acceptable by God– not through anything they have or have not done, but by what God has done because of who God is.  Martin Luther reminds us that we are both saints and sinners simultaneously.

Tomorrow we will remember the saints who have gone before us.  We often choose to remember their best qualities, but if you recall their less-than-perfect qualities it doesn’t mean they’re any less of a saint.  Tomorrow, take a look around you and see the church packed with saints- both here with us now and here with us in memory.

Read Hebrews 11:1-12:2, and remember: God loves YOU unconditionally.

Annie

Today’s reading: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Hebrews+11%3A1-12%3A2&version=NRSV