On the Feast of All Saints, Pastor Sorenson preaches from the Beatitudes and the throne room of Revelation, describing the saints in heaven and on earth gathered as one church around the throne of God and around the Lord’s altar. He explains that to be blessed is to be saved and redeemed, with sins paid for by Christ’s death on the cross, and that these blessings already belong to the baptized who are fed with Christ’s body and blood. Pointing to Moses, Mary, and the apostles as humble examples who looked to Christ alone, he tells the congregation that they too are the blessed of the Lord and have nothing on earth to fear.
Faith Lutheran Church in Pinellas County is located at 1620 Pinehurst Rd, Dunedin, FL 34698. It can be contacted at (727) 733-2657. https://faithdunedin.org
Transcript
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, there are two feast days on the liturgical calendar that are observed on a Sunday, regardless of the day of the week when they actually fall. This includes the Feast of the Reformation and the Feast of All Saints. Reformation, excuse me, the Feast of the Resurrection, Easter, and Pentecost always fall on a Sunday, so there’s no adjustment to the calendar there. The Feast of the Nativity and Epiphany are celebrated regardless of the day of the week on which they fall. Other lesser feasts we observe only in the years in which they fall immediately on a Sunday. However, the Feast of the Reformation and the Feast of All Saints are important enough. All Saints is celebrated on the Sunday closest to November 1st; obviously today is November 1st. Reformation is observed the week before All Saints, so in this case, although Reformation was yesterday, that’s what you celebrated yesterday. You dressed up as Martin Luther, right? But we observed that the previous week, because they’re important. Reformation and All Saints go hand in hand. Reformation tells you how you become a saint, and so they naturally fit and are important enough that we observe them every year, regardless of the date when they actually occur.
These saints that we celebrate and remember today include both the saints on earth and those who have reached eternal glory before the throne of God. On the Feast of All Saints we give attention particularly to those who are at rest before heaven’s throne. The saints in heaven include not only the ones of biblical renown, people such as the blessed Virgin Mary, Paul, Peter, the rest of the apostles, John the Baptist, the patriarchs, even going as far back as Adam and Eve. All of these saints we give thanks for. Yet no less important are those saints we’ve known in our own lives, perhaps a faithful mother, a father, a saint, a grandfather, or an aunt, someone whose life and faith inspired you in the devotion that you now possess, someone who set a great Christian example in what they did and what they believed. They are those who join us at the Lord’s table here every time we celebrate the sacrament. They fill in the other half of our circle around the altar.
Our communion rail is intentionally designed as a half circle with space for 12 people to kneel on the cushions. This is meant to depict the reality of the heavenly throne room described in Revelation chapter 4. “Whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who sits on the throne, who lives forever and ever, the 24 elders fall down before him who sits on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying: You are worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they exist and were created.”
In our first reading from St. John’s Revelation, chapter 7, the 12 tribes were listed. You may wonder why we read this laundry list of tribes, why that’s so important. But those 12 tribes represent the church of the Old Testament. Those 12 tribes are found in the heavenly throne room as 12 of the elders gathered around the throne of God. In this continuous circle around the heavenly throne, 12 of those elders are those 12 tribes, the church of the Old Testament. The other 12 elders around the throne are symbolized by the 12 apostles, who represent the church of the New Testament. They represent you and I. So we have this picture in the heavenly throne room of this circle surrounding the throne of God, of the 12 tribes of the Old Testament and the 12 apostles of the New Testament. This is the church of God, both the church in grace here on earth and the church in glory found in heaven.
And notice how this illustrious company worships before the throne of God. These men and women fall down before him, casting their crowns before the throne, ascribing to him all glory and honor and power. In other words, they humble themselves. They throw down those crowns, those symbols of any earthly glory they may possess, and they confess that they were poor in spirit. They were unable to save themselves, and any blessing that they now possess, every joy they have, every peace, the fact that they suffer no more tears or heat or hunger, all of this they have received from the Lamb of God, slain from the foundation of the world. All of these are gifts of his grace alone.
In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus repeats this word “blessed” nine times. Nine. Every word Jesus states is important, and we should pay attention to it. But as I always say, if Jesus repeats something, you especially need to pay attention to what he’s repeating. And if he repeats it nine times, guess what? It’s important. Blessed: to be blessed is to be saved and redeemed. To be blessed is to have your sins paid for by Christ’s death on the cross. To be blessed is to have those crimson stains washed white as a lamb’s wool, to be adorned as Christ’s bride in the garments of your salvation. It is to be a saint.
Who are the blessed of the Lord? Well, now we get another series of adjectives. To be blessed of the Lord is to be poor in spirit. Christ came to preach the good news to the poor, to seek and to save the lost. Christ came for sinners, the spiritually poor. Such men and women confess that they are dead in their sins, that they are unable to raise themselves to life again, that they need a Savior. And this confession, this poverty of spiritual wealth, drives them to mourn for those sins, which is the third descriptor that Jesus uses. All throughout the Beatitudes, Jesus is building this image of the believer. And he continues to build on this by saying that the believer is meek, or humble, as we might say today.
The Lord in Scripture described Moses, this mighty man who led the children of Israel through the Red Sea with the staff raised up, this mighty man who led the children 40 years in the wilderness. The Lord describes him as the meekest, the most humble man that ever lived. This is because Moses had learned that he was strong not by his own physical strength, not by his own intellectual ability, but because he rested in the Lord for his salvation. He rested in the power of his God. He was not a weak man, but he had learned to temper his physical strength, his mental abilities. He learned to temper them and restrain them and humble them to the will of God.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, more precisely for the righteousness of God. They will be filled. In fact, they are filled. They are filled because they are blessed. The kingdom of heaven is already their possession. They are already heirs to all that Christ possesses. They have already inherited the earth. They are already comforted in the forgiveness of their sins. All of these things are theirs. And by extension, all of these things are yours. They are yours because you possess the forgiveness of sins. They are yours because you have been baptized into Christ. They are yours because he has put his name upon you in those blessed waters. They are yours because you are anointed with his Spirit, which empowers you to do every one of the acts and deeds of faith and obedience that the Lord has appointed for you, and he nourishes you with his body and blood in the Eucharist. The blessings of heaven are yours today, right this very moment. The description of the blessed of the Lord, the description of the saints, is meant to describe not only those who have gone before us in faith, but to describe each of you here today.
We celebrate those who have gone before us because of the great example they’ve set, this great cloud of witnesses that we have, who we can look to, and we can behold and see these imperfect men and women. And yet by faith they’ve been blessed by the Lord. They set an example that runs counter to the narrative of our age that celebrates self-esteem, pride, and celebrity. One of the greatest examples is known as the Theotokos, the mother of God, St. Mary. In the words of her Magnificat, she confessed that the Lord looked upon the lowly estate of his handmaiden, the lowly estate of his handmaiden. In other words, she’s a servant, a slave of the Lord. She was a young woman of no distinction. She was a young woman who, like every single man or woman born of the flesh, bore the weight of original sin. Yet now all generations call her blessed. Why is that? We call Mary the blessed Virgin Mary not because of any innate or intrinsic aspect of who she was, but because of her faith. Because, as she confessed, “He who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name.” She is blessed just like you and I are, because God filled her with his Holy Spirit. She bore the Christ child in her body for nine months, the Christ from whom everything he touches becomes holy, and he made Mary holy. She is uniquely called in that vocation. However, you and I today are made holy every time we come to his altar. We take his body and blood into ourselves. Everything the Lord touches with his body and blood is made holy, and you are made holy every time you come to his table.
Mary was blessed to be able to go to her son with her petitions, as she did at the wedding at Cana. However, you and I have even greater access to her son with our petitions than she ever did prior to the Ascension. Every single time we pray, our Lord has promised to hear. You and I never need experience the fear or anxiety that Mary and Joseph did when our Lord was a 12-year-old boy and they lost him for three days. For three days they didn’t know where he was. For three days they were anxiously searching for him. You and I, we know exactly where Jesus has promised to be found. He’s promised to be where two or three are gathered in his name. He’s promised to be in his word. He’s promised to be in his sacraments. We know exactly where to come to find the Lord. He’s not lost. He doesn’t hide. We could get lost at times, but the Lord is not lost, and he’s promised to hear us, and we can pray to him any time, day or night. We can pray to him as often as our heart desires, and he promises to hear and to answer those prayers every single time. What a tremendous privilege this is.
We give thanks for Mary because she modeled the Christian life. When the angel Gabriel appeared, she did not question God’s will, but she humbly declared, “Behold the maidservant of the Lord. Let it be to me according to your word.” Amen, thy will be done. What a tremendous thing for this young girl to do, to humble herself to the word of the Lord, no matter what it would mean for her life.
The blessed of the Lord look always and only unto Christ for their salvation. Every time you examine a saint in Scripture, whether it be Moses or Abraham or David or any of the apostles, you see that they look to Christ for their salvation. They point others to Christ for their salvation. Mary, at the wedding at Cana, pointed the servants to Christ: “Do what he tells you to do.” The saints worship Christ alone. The saints call on God alone. They find peace in Christ alone. As Peter declared before the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem, “Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”
These words bring us full circle back to the Beatitudes. “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets before you.” So they persecuted the apostles before you. So, too, they persecuted many of the saints before you. Ad leones: they sent them to the lions. The Sanhedrin had commanded the apostles not to preach in the name of Jesus. They had the apostles beaten, and then they threatened them with death. How did the men respond? Well, they reacted as each of us should when we’ve been in similar circumstances. They departed from the presence of the council rejoicing, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name. And then every day after that, they went to the temple, and they went to every house of every believer, and they did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ. They were not afraid.
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Indeed, these humble men, through their preaching and teaching of the Lord’s word, inherited the earth and all that dwells therein, in their humility, placing their faith firmly in the Christ and keeping their eyes firmly fixed on him, the crucified one. They were filled with his Spirit. They were filled with strength and power, and they turned the entire world upside down by the preaching of the gospel, the word of God.
Now the mantle of such saints, men like Peter, James, and John, women like Anna, Mary, and Dorcas, that mantle now rests on each of us, the blessed of the Lord. Old or young, rich or poor, whether you be in good health or feeble, it does not matter. It makes no difference. You are the blessed. You are blessed. You have been given strength. You have been given the Spirit of the Almighty God. You are called by his name, fed with his body, washed by his blood. There is nothing on this earth that should scare you, not one single thing. Yeah, but the demons, they had their little festival last night. But no, without a doubt, they tremble at the very name of Jesus. They tremble in his presence. They cower, for their time is short. Your time, your time is eternal. Drive any such terror from your heart, your heart, and your nation. For you are the blessed of the Lord. Let us rejoice on his account. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Now may the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.