Saints: Life & Times

Lesson 1: Holiness

All Things in Due Season

Let’s look at our ancestors in faith: the patriarchs and prophets in the Old Testament. Why did God choose them? Some seemed to have characters ill-suited for the job they were to perform or the role they were to fulfill in God’s plans. How could Moses change from a fearful, stuttering murderer(Ex. 2:11-`14, 4:10) to the law-giving leader of a nation? How could Jacob, the trickster who stole his brother’s patrimony and outwitted his father-in-law (Gen. 25:27-34, 27:1-40, 31:19-20) become Israel, the patriarch who fathered 12 tribes and handed on to them the faith and the covenant made with Abraham? What is it that changes a man so profoundly that the unjust become just and the powerless powerful? What is it that makes a saint? Scripture gives no clues as to why some were chosen for special roles in salvation history and others were passed over. The reason for divine election remains a mystery. Those who were chosen did themselves choose to cooperate with grace and were willing to be transformed into men of God. Perhaps it is this willingness to believe and this struggle to obey which lies at the heart of sanctity. “For the just man falls seven times and rises again, but the wicked stumble to ruin.” (Prov. 24:16)

The tradition of sanctity continued, sometimes almost reluctantly, from Old Testament into New Testament times, when the river of faith slammed into a Rock and man came face to face with God. At this collision, cultural suppositions were tossed aside, political hopes demolished and re-formed, and the world turned upside down. Those who accepted Him had to go on faith alone. Prophecies were being fulfilled, but they didn’t know that until much later, when their minds were opened by another encounter. Like the man born blind, they recognized the sanctity of one who could work miracles to support his teachings, and, like blind men themselves, they were willing to be led. There was something strangely compelling about this man that awoke and nourished a great hunger in his audience. They were like sheep without a shepherd; he spoke with authority. They longed for the deliverance of Jerusalem; he spoke of another Jerusalem that was their true home. They begged for healing; he forgave their sins, the source of all sickness, and raised the dead. They chaffed under the tyrant’s yoke; he shouldered it with them and pulled them free of another, more ancient enemy. He knew their thoughts and read their hearts; all they knew was Jesus.

The world was ready. It was at peace, the Pax Romana, enforced by a conquering army. The Romans connected the far-flung regions of their empire with excellent roads. Geographically, the Chosen Land was at the center of the known world, at the intersection of important trade routes both by land and by sea. Peaceful conditions and the Roman form of religious tolerance allowed Christianity to develop and spread throughout the Empire and beyond. Even Roman law worked in its favor, protecting the apostles from the vagaries of local rulers. Conditions would sometimes change and tolerance be replaced by cruelty, but not before the grace of God had moved many hearts, and the Church founded on Peter had become the breeding ground for saints.

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