All Saints Sunday
Texts: John 11:32-44;
Isa 25:6-9; Rev 21:1-6a
See also the accompanying Sermon Notes
ALL SAINTS AND LIVING INTO THE PROMISE OF NEW CREATION
There is a common theme in our readings this morning. Did you happen to notice? The prophet Isaiah, speaking to his people, who are becoming the indigenous people in other peoples’ empires, portrays God as throwing a banquet for all people. A feast where God himself will wipe away everyone’s tears. John the Visionary, who wrote the Book of Revelation, also sees God wiping away the tears. And Jesus, the one we call God’s Son, is there with his friends Mary and Martha, shedding tears with them at the death of their brother Lazarus. These three readings together, from three quite different places in the Bible, give us this remarkable picture that God is with us at our times of grief and loss. We have all known that God through our times of loss — especially when we the saints comfort one another and help to wipe away one another’s tears.
But here’s another thought: compare this view of a loving God with that of a God who punishes some for an eternity in hell. Are these two pictures of God compatible? Do these two gods square with the Gospel-writer John, who summarizes the Christian message: “that God is light and in God there is no darkness at all” (1 John 1:5)? Later on, he will simply say that “God is love” (1 John 4:8, 16). Full stop. Hold these questions in mind as we notice another common thread in today’s readings — namely, that God is also with us to seemingly to try to lead us into a new reality.
First, we have the new reality posed by someone returning from the dead. Jesus shows us the loving God’s power of life in the face of death. He has them unbind Lazarus, unbinding not only him, but I think all of us, in general, from the fear of death. Jesus weeps, but I think he is also concerned that Mary, Martha, and their friends are perhaps too captive by the power of death. He is “greatly disturbed” by the way they are weeping, seemingly without hope in God’s power of life. So he reminds them of that power. A power he himself will trust in going to the cross.
Second, God through Isaiah prophesies of a time when God’s people will no longer bear the shame of being oppressed people in other people’s empires. By the end of the Book of the prophet Isaiah, in the last two chapters, the overall theme will be characterized by, “For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth; the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind” (Isa 65:17).
Third: It’s the same new creation as portrayed by John in the last two chapters of the Bible. John portrays the grandest vision of all, of the new Jerusalem, a new Holy City, descending to earth and open to everyone, where the Tree of Life gives healing to the broken nations. The question for us, as people of faith, is always whether we can see this prophesied new reality, this new way forward. What does it mean to leave the old ways behind and move decisively forward into God’s new creation?
That’s why I’ve come to characterize our focus on going to heaven when you die — even though that remains so important — as a small picture of the Gospel, especially when compared to this expansive vision of new creation. To revitalize the Gospel is to preach this larger message of the new creation, this new reality, which God is offering us.
Let’s ask that question of ourselves. What does it mean for us to begin to see this reality? First, do we understand that the New Creation means, in essence, a new God? Or seeing the true God for the first time. In other words, do we come to see the vital relationship between the two commonalities in today’s three readings. That the way forward into a new reality is being offered by the God characterized by wiping away our tears, not by a god who punishes people for an eternity. Can we come to see that we human beings have created false gods in our own image to justify our ways of ruling over one another and constantly warring with one another? And so the Bible is the story of the true God leading us away from those false gods into fully understanding that the power of creation is the power of love. That’s what we come to see in Jesus. That the Bible tells of the long, long journey of human beings stuck in the old way, stuck with the old gods who do things like punishing enemies for an eternity; and at the same time, it’s the story of the true God promising to journey with us — this thing we call covenant — to ever invite us into the new reality. New Creation means meeting God anew. It’s not the same old gods who simply rubber stamp our status quo.
Second, do we understand that accepting God’s invitation into the New Creation, also means embracing a new way of being human. Of course, new things can be scary, so it can be easy to make us afraid to take steps forward, finding ourselves relying instead on the ‘same ‘ol, same ‘ol.’ But God in this message of New Creation — which we see popping up more and more throughout scripture, and finally pounding that message home in the New Testament in what Christ came to do for us — that it’s all about the Way to be human. In fact, in the book of Acts you will see the Jesus movement simply named as “the Way,” with a capital W. The Way of caring for each other and the creation. Do we understand that meeting God anew in Jesus the Messiah means a new way to live? The Way of mutual service. Today, we might meaningfully name it as the Way of being “All Saints.”
What does it mean to say that we are all saints? Proposition: that we all are created as having equal value to God our creator. God did not create people with unequal value. God did not create some with more power and wealth in order to rule over those of lesser means. God did not create a good, favored people to eradicate other peoples who are God’s enemies. That’s the false god of our own making. We meet the true God in Jesus the Messiah, who came as a lord and master who serves — like we read two weeks ago, when Jesus tells his disciples straight-out, “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:42-45).
And last week we proposed that the heart of St. Paul’s Gospel is God creating one new humanity in the face of all our divisiveness — all the ways in which we try to punish one another. Jesus came as a Messiah who endures our typical kind of punishment on the cross, rather than coming as one who’s all about dishing it out. ‘I am your retribution.’ A Messiah whom God raised from the dead in order that we might see anew the new Way to live as human beings. In short, it is an invitation to the way of forgiveness and mutual service among equals, in place of the old way based on retribution and on servitude between unequals. That’s what I think proclaiming and celebrating “All Saints” means. It means choosing God’s new way of being human over the old way.
What are examples of living into the new reality of “All Saints”? This year in particular I’ve come to love our county, to love this experiment in democracy, more and more deeply. This amazing founding Principle, that “All people are created equal,” is in many ways what “All Saints” is about. We all have equal value in a self-governance of equal citizens. No one is born to rule over others. We elect one another to lead for prescribed segments of time. Everyone is equal under the law. We’ve never quite lived up to ideal of the Principle, but we’ve continued to inch closer, taking steps backward at times, but then also lurching forward, slowly but surely forward all told over the nearly 250 years of our experiment.
That’s why I think the election on Tuesday is so important. Can we frame the decision before us in terms of the old way of being human vs the new way? Might we take big steps backwards into the old of ways of some ruling over others? Or might we continue to take small steps forward toward the reality of “All Citizens”? Where we guard each other’s rights and opportunities to help each other flourish? This is why I’ve felt it important to read our scripture readings this year in light of so-called Christian Nationalism on the agenda of some of our fellow citizens. This Tuesday, I believe, we begin to find out what the difference might mean between an age-old way of being human and a Way from our Scriptures that talks about a new heaven and earth, a new way of being human in which we are All Saints equally. All citizens equally.
I’d like to end this morning talking about how what we celebrate on All Saints is our acceptance of God’s new way to live in church communities, where we live into the way of mutually serving one another, truly regarding everyone as created of equal value to God. We already do this in so many ways! In a few minutes, we light candles in memory of loved ones, griefs that we share along the way. We remember the saints who have gone before us, modeling for us lives lived into the New Creation, the new life that God has for us.
The All Saints experience also came to mind in talking to Anita yesterday. She has been cheered up the past several weeks by the prayers, people calling with well-wishes. People coming by with soups and some of her favorite Danish dishes so that instead of dwelling in tears with the back pain and arduous recovery from surgery, when she spoke yesterday it reminded me of the feast in our First Reading today. That we in times of need help one another and care for one another.
Finally, the All Saints experience of living in our church communities is truly experienced by continually welcoming new people to join us. This is the point of going through the process of Reconciling in Christ. Our relationship with LGBTQ people has, for me, been an ugly part of this election season — all the campaign adds implying resentment and fear of LGBTQ people. We as saints together in this place are being challenged to some new ways of welcome and acceptance of LGBTQ people, and so inviting them to join us. This Saturday, we’re going to learn more about that process, at a synod event titled “We Love All 2024.” That’s “All Saints!” That all of us here this morning, and all of the saints who have gone before us, and all of the new saints that we’d like to invite to join us in this venture — that we love all and live into that love for all. Amen
Paul J. Nuechterlein
Bethania Lutheran Church,
Racine, WI, November 3, 2024
