All Saints 2007

Daniel 7:1-3,15-18

Psalm 149

Ephesians 1:11-23

Luke 6:20-31

This past year a book was published about the private writing of Mother Teresa. This book received a great deal of press at a time when some people were pushing to have Mother Teresa on the fast track to official sainthood.

What created such a stir was the honesty of Mother Teresa’s struggles and personal doubts. Apparently some folks have been assuming that people like Mother Theresa, Ghandi, and Martin Luther King Jr have no doubts. These modern saints, and the ancient ones for that matter, are fully convinced of their faith and the presence of God.

But in reality, doubts assail even the most spiritual of people. It is part of life, even the life of faith. Anne Lammot writes: “The opposite of faith is not doubt: It is certainty. It is madness. You can tell you have created God in your own image when it turns out that he or she hates all the same people you do. The first holy truth in God 101 is that men and women of true faith have always had to accept the mystery of God’s identity and love and ways.”

Sometimes that mystery of God’s identity means we can’t always see God at work in our lives, in our midst.

Mother Theresa doubted God’s presence in her life. Now, some folks are disturbed by that. If she didn’t always believe, how can I?

I find it hopeful. For if she can have doubts, if the great saints have doubts, then my own doubts are okay.

If I don’t always see God at work in my life it doesn’t mean God isn’t there. Again, it isn’t up to me, is it? God’s presence isn’t a matter of emotions or rational thinking.

God’s presence simply is.

Sometimes we block it. We surround ourselves with money and food…wine women and song…

We rely on our own resources, our own intelligence, our own vision.

Jesus knows this. The beatitudes call us on this.

Woe to the rich, the full, the laughing, the popular. For that is so much smoke and mirrors.

Blessed are the poor, the hungry, the weeping, the hated…for in our vulnerability we are most aware of God’s presence, we are most dependent on God’s providence.

When all supports are stripped away you, O Lord, are still my guide and stay.

In my own life, it is when I have hit bottom I most feel the presence of God in my life. In the silence I am most aware of God’s presence. In the pain God’s healing begins.

Of course I sometimes have doubts, don’t you? Doubts that God is really changing things, doubts that God really hears my prayers, doubts about this whole concept….

So perhaps Saints are really those people who are brave enough and honest enough to acknowledge the doubt, to struggle with it, to admit it and then to trust that God remains with them. Even in the midst of doubts.

For if our certainty is stripped away, if the gods we make in our image fall short, if we are challenged in our faith…what is left? Only to throw ourselves into the arms of a compassionate God.

Trusting that God remains faithful to us.

In the meantime, in these days in which we live, is it such a bad thing to live into our faith? To act as God would have us act even when our hearts are weak? To do the work that lies ahead of us even when we go home filled with doubt?

We are called, commissioned, sealed for service in our baptisms. We are to love our enemies, do good to those who hate us, bless the ones who curse us, pray for those who abuse us. Give to everyone who begs… do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

We have tasks ahead of us…jobs to do. We can follow the example of folks like Mother Teresa who even when assailed by doubts kept doing the work of Christ in a hurting world. Her personal struggles, her dark nights of the soul did not stop her from caring for the most vulnerable of people.

God continued to use her for good: a good that continues even after her death.

On this All Saints Sunday I remember the people I love who have died over the past few years: a mixed lot, all of them.

People who died in the faith, but none of them were perfect. None of them were so certain of their faith that they walked a narrow, straight line into heaven.

All of them were good and bad mixed up together, sinner and saint at the same time. But nevertheless, God was always with them, present even when the warm fuzzy feeling wasn’t. God was with them in the dark days, the struggles, the doubts. God came to them where they were and carried them home at the end.

We have been created to be human beings; we are sometimes strong, sometimes weak, sometimes broken, always being healed.

Sometimes blessed, sometimes woe is what we hear.

Through it all, weaving life together is God: under the doubts, in the darkness, in the daylight. God is present. Not dependent on our moods or emotions, our good deeds or bad…

That’s a relief. After all, it is God who makes us saints, all saints. So we don’t need to stress out about that. Instead, we can use that time to do good, love, pray, give generously…

Care for the other saints around us.

Doubts come with the territory…a part of faith, which keeps us engaged and curious and alive.

For all the saints, for one another, we give you thanks, O God. Amen.