Joseph, the carpenter-father of Jesus, is celebrated as the saint of workers around the world
We had such an amazing time with so many wonderful volunteers and families as we served together on Be A Saint Saturday. Here’s a brief devotion we shared as we began our day of service:
Good morning everyone. Welcome to ‘Be a Saint Saturday’! For our devotion this morning, I wanted to talk briefly about what it means to be holy. What is holiness?
Now, does anyone know why we named this day of service ‘Be A Saint Saturday’? Exactly, because today is “All Saints Day.” There’s actually another older name for this day. Does anyone know what it is? It’s “All Hallows Day”, which, of course, is where we get “All Hallows Eve” aka Halloween. What does this have to do with being holy?
A “hallow” – used as a noun – is a holy person, also known as a saint. You probably don’t hear the word “hallow” being used very much, but we actually find it in a very well-known and often recited prayer. How does the Lord’s prayer begin? “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.” You see, to hallow something means to give it honor because it is holy. We pray for God’s name to be hallowed because God is holy.
So, what does it mean to be a saint, a hallow, on this All Hallows Day? When we think of holiness, I think two broad characteristics usually come to mind: (1) something that is utterly pure and unstained by sin or evil; (2) since nothing in our lives or our world seems to be utterly pure or unstained by sin and evil, this something must be “not of this world”, something heavenly, or spiritual. So holiness is something pure and therefore something that can’t really exist in our everyday lives.
If that’s the case, how are supposed to “Be A Saint”, a holy person? In 1 Peter 1:16, Peter quotes the book of Leviticus and tells his listeners: “Be holy because [God is] holy.” This would be completely impossible if holiness is something so pure that it can’t exist in our everyday lives.
I think our usual definition of holiness needs to be tweaked. Being holy and being human are not opposites. Being pure does not mean avoiding contact with the dirtiness of the world around us. You see, all of life is holy. Why? Because all of life is a gift of God, created through Jesus Christ, and sustained by the life-giving breath of the Holy Spirit. A teacher once told me that if God were to hold God’s breath we would all be gone. That’s in Psalm 104. Life is holy because life comes from and is sustained by a holy God.
This holy God was not one who was afraid of being “stained” by an evil world. This holy God was born as a human and walked this earth – fully divine, fully human. One of Jesus’ many titles is “Holy One of Israel.” He was holy his entire life. For the majority of the time, Jesus wasn’t doing things we normally associated with “being holy.” He was a simple carpenter, a construction foreman even.
This is important for us today and not just because we’ll be doing carpentry! It tells us that being a saint is a lot more ordinary than we think. It means that worldly things, like houses, matter to a holy God. We can be saints today because being holy ultimately means being like God – the God who became flesh and blood and moved into our neighborhood. You’ll get a chance to talk about this more in your lunch devotion. For now, I want to leave you with this thought: being human and being holy are not opposites. In fact, being fully human is the minimum requirement for being holy.
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