For All the Saints
For all the saints who from their labors rest,
Who Thee by faith before the world confessed,
Thy name, O Jesus, be forever blest.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
All Saints’ Day is one of those special days of the church year that we celebrate every year on November 1. It is a feast day, when we change the paraments to white from the green that we have seen for so many weeks during the long season after Pentecost. It is a day that we celebrate the glorious mystery of the church that is Christ’s body. White represents the righteousness of Christ that each of us has been clothed with in our baptism through faith.
“And behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes. These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” Revelation 7:9, 14
Maybe you don’t think of yourself as being in the great tribulation. After all, you haven’t been asked to give your life for the sake of faith in Christ. Or have you. Aren’t you the one that gives freely of your time and your money and your talent all that Christ may be glorified? Sure you do it so that the church may continue here; so that all the things that this congregation does may continue to flourish and prosper. Maybe that doesn’t make you a martyr in the strictest sense, but it does mean that you are sacrificing yourself in one way or another for the sake Christ and the spread of the Gospel.
The tribulation involves temptation by the devil, persecution by individuals and governments, but it also includes the turmoil you suffer within as your own sinful nature tries to steal your joy in giving and caring and sacrificing what you want so that others may have the chance to know that Jesus died so that they may live. That is what a saint is; one who dies so that others may live. You have died to self so that Christ may live in you.
The church is truly found in that place where God’s Word is preached and the sacraments are administered. It is also where the saints and martyrs gather to receive blessing and give praise and honor to God and the Lamb. It is where all the saints, you, me and all those that have gone before us, gather around the throne. You are a saint and I give thanks to God for you who bear that title, for as such, you also strive to live a sacrificial life that gives testimony to your faith in Christ as the only way to salvation.
God continue to strengthen and bless you in your support of the church and the spread of the Gospel, for it is in this communion of the saints that we will be able to persevere through this time of tribulation.
Oh, blest communion, fellowship divine!
We feebly struggle, they in glory shine;
Yet all are one in Thee, for all are Thine.
Alleluia! Alleluia!
From earth’s wide bounds, from ocean’s farthest coast,
Through gates of pearl streams in the countless host,
Singing to Father, Son, and Holy Ghost:
Alleluia! Alleluia! (LSB 677)
In Christ, Pastor