I can’t think of anyone who has ever told me they wanted to be a saint when they grew up. I’ve heard a lot of things, but never a saint.
We all know why no one wants to be a saint when the grow up but the reason is unutterable, like Voldemort’s name. Deep down we all know what produces saints, it’s suffering.
People will take on a lot of suffering for other life ambitions. They will abandon family, friends, recreation, morality and integrity all to gain riches. They will put their bodies through trial, deprivation, illegal drugs and a shortened lifespan just to compete at the top levels of their chosen sport. They will undergo shame, humiliation and relational disaster at the shot of fame through some reality TV show. They will go deep into debt to gain an education for a lucrative career. Even the religious will pursue study or hazardous missionary or humanitarian assignments to win or free a certain people, but that isn’t the same.
The kind of suffering that produces saints is not heroic, it’s ordinary. It’s the kind of suffering that you can find in nearly every family, every marriage, every aging body, every impoverished country or community. It is the kind of suffering that is so absolutely common that no one pays much attention to it besides some weak promise of intercessory prayer and a more deeply felt sigh of relief that the other’s burden is not theirs.
Many of these sufferings are escapable, and therein lies the trick. The accepted and common path is one of assignment of blame, a reasonable degree of bitterness, community acceptance of the choice of escape, and a successful exit to a preferred future. Relief is more desirable than sainthood.
For some there is no physical or relational escape, just subtler means, and sainthood escapes again.
The conditions for the growth and quiet revelation of a saint seem to combine a voluntary choice to that common bondage with a decision to love. Eugene Peterson in his book Under the Unpredictable Plant notes that the Benedictines added to the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience a vow of stability. They somehow learned that sainthood most often requires that roots be seldom moved. Saints grow in ordinary places, in ordinary sufferings, in ordinary cells.
I think we know this too because we often find great saints residing quietly in ordinary places. They are known to be saints by those around, but there is a quietness about the exceptionality.
It would be tempting to say that saints are getting rarer, but I don’t know that. One of the deep religions of our western culture is one of choice. As a culture we don’t celebrate the building of pyramids or obelisks so much as we celebrate the introduction of choice to people and groups who have been denied choice. That’s not always a bad thing, Jesus’ manifesto in Luke 4 was all about setting captives free. The irony of course would be that towards the end of the story while he was nailed to a cross he would be taunted that he saved others but he COULD not free/save himself. They of course had that wrong, and there again is the key to sainthood. He COULD free himself, he CHOOSE not to. A song in Philippians 2 has something important to say about that. Maybe in a strange way our culture of choice will enable as much saint making as it is offsetting through easy escapism. I don’t know.
I do know that escapism is the easiest and most common antidote to sainthood. It doesn’t require public sanction or celebration. It doesn’t even require any physical or relational release. It can be found simply by wishing it and using one’s noodle.
In a blog post by Daniel Kirk one little story stuck out at me and I’ve recalled it a number of times. Here it is.
Story time: almost two weeks ago I taught a class that ran through the Catholic Epistles in one day. After getting through Hebrews, James, and 1 Peter one of my students raised his hand to speak. I typically allow this in my classes, so I called on him. His observation was this: “It seems that all of these letters are telling Christians that our calling is to pray for faithfulness and perseverance in suffering, whereas we always pray for God to change our situation.”
It seems the writers of the Bible both wanted to be saints, knew the path, and weren’t afraid to travel it. They also understood that it can only be traveled by, with and through prayer.
I don’t know to what to attribute our lack of desire to be great saints. Is it cowardice? Is it because we are still more enamoured by what we’re offered by our world of choice, affluence and pleasure? Is it cost or might it be humility? I don’t know.
Sunday I get to teach on the seventh trumpet in Revelation 11:15-19. I did all that work on wrath this week and what I discovered is that in the third woe, the seventh trumpet, the main thing is simply that God shows up, full force, full face, in all his glory and awesome power. This causes all in rebellion and the fruit of all rebellion to cry in protest and agony, but it gives all good pleasure to the saints who have been suffering and who cried out in chapter 6 “how long?!” Rebellion gets what they want, which is nothing of God, which is called hell, and those who want God get him fully.
Saints seem to want God more than anything else and the promise of the Bible is that they will be satisfied. That desire for God is a desire for love, even love for the ungrateful and the undeserving (Luke 6:27-36).
The lines to be wealthy, beautiful, famous, popular, major sports stars, reality TV stars, fodder for the tabloids, noteworthy political heros, persons of accomplishment and memory are long. There is never a line for sainthood. There are infinite opportunities to love the hard to love. Nursing homes are filled with lonely people who are no joy to visit. Your neighborhood is filled with dull, bitter, selfish, petty people. Availability for sainthood creation abounds. In most cases we don’t even need to go looking, they are already in our lives.
Leadingchurch.com 
Why no one wants to be a great saint when they grow up
I can’t think of anyone who has ever told me they wanted to be a saint when they grew up. I’ve heard a lot of things, but never a saint.
We all know why no one wants to be a saint when the grow up but the reason is unutterable, like Voldemort’s name. Deep down we all know what produces saints, it’s suffering.
People will take on a lot of suffering for other life ambitions. They will abandon family, friends, recreation, morality and integrity all to gain riches. They will put their bodies through trial, deprivation, illegal drugs and a shortened lifespan just to compete at the top levels of their chosen sport. They will undergo shame, humiliation and relational disaster at the shot of fame through some reality TV show. They will go deep into debt to gain an education for a lucrative career. Even the religious will pursue study or hazardous missionary or humanitarian assignments to win or free a certain people, but that isn’t the same.
The kind of suffering that produces saints is not heroic, it’s ordinary. It’s the kind of suffering that you can find in nearly every family, every marriage, every aging body, every impoverished country or community. It is the kind of suffering that is so absolutely common that no one pays much attention to it besides some weak promise of intercessory prayer and a more deeply felt sigh of relief that the other’s burden is not theirs.
Many of these sufferings are escapable, and therein lies the trick. The accepted and common path is one of assignment of blame, a reasonable degree of bitterness, community acceptance of the choice of escape, and a successful exit to a preferred future. Relief is more desirable than sainthood.
For some there is no physical or relational escape, just subtler means, and sainthood escapes again.
The conditions for the growth and quiet revelation of a saint seem to combine a voluntary choice to that common bondage with a decision to love. Eugene Peterson in his book Under the Unpredictable Plant notes that the Benedictines added to the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience a vow of stability. They somehow learned that sainthood most often requires that roots be seldom moved. Saints grow in ordinary places, in ordinary sufferings, in ordinary cells.
I think we know this too because we often find great saints residing quietly in ordinary places. They are known to be saints by those around, but there is a quietness about the exceptionality.
It would be tempting to say that saints are getting rarer, but I don’t know that. One of the deep religions of our western culture is one of choice. As a culture we don’t celebrate the building of pyramids or obelisks so much as we celebrate the introduction of choice to people and groups who have been denied choice. That’s not always a bad thing, Jesus’ manifesto in Luke 4 was all about setting captives free. The irony of course would be that towards the end of the story while he was nailed to a cross he would be taunted that he saved others but he COULD not free/save himself. They of course had that wrong, and there again is the key to sainthood. He COULD free himself, he CHOOSE not to. A song in Philippians 2 has something important to say about that. Maybe in a strange way our culture of choice will enable as much saint making as it is offsetting through easy escapism. I don’t know.
I do know that escapism is the easiest and most common antidote to sainthood. It doesn’t require public sanction or celebration. It doesn’t even require any physical or relational release. It can be found simply by wishing it and using one’s noodle.
In a blog post by Daniel Kirk one little story stuck out at me and I’ve recalled it a number of times. Here it is.
Story time: almost two weeks ago I taught a class that ran through the Catholic Epistles in one day. After getting through Hebrews, James, and 1 Peter one of my students raised his hand to speak. I typically allow this in my classes, so I called on him. His observation was this: “It seems that all of these letters are telling Christians that our calling is to pray for faithfulness and perseverance in suffering, whereas we always pray for God to change our situation.”
It seems the writers of the Bible both wanted to be saints, knew the path, and weren’t afraid to travel it. They also understood that it can only be traveled by, with and through prayer.
I don’t know to what to attribute our lack of desire to be great saints. Is it cowardice? Is it because we are still more enamoured by what we’re offered by our world of choice, affluence and pleasure? Is it cost or might it be humility? I don’t know.
Sunday I get to teach on the seventh trumpet in Revelation 11:15-19. I did all that work on wrath this week and what I discovered is that in the third woe, the seventh trumpet, the main thing is simply that God shows up, full force, full face, in all his glory and awesome power. This causes all in rebellion and the fruit of all rebellion to cry in protest and agony, but it gives all good pleasure to the saints who have been suffering and who cried out in chapter 6 “how long?!” Rebellion gets what they want, which is nothing of God, which is called hell, and those who want God get him fully.
Saints seem to want God more than anything else and the promise of the Bible is that they will be satisfied. That desire for God is a desire for love, even love for the ungrateful and the undeserving (Luke 6:27-36).
The lines to be wealthy, beautiful, famous, popular, major sports stars, reality TV stars, fodder for the tabloids, noteworthy political heros, persons of accomplishment and memory are long. There is never a line for sainthood. There are infinite opportunities to love the hard to love. Nursing homes are filled with lonely people who are no joy to visit. Your neighborhood is filled with dull, bitter, selfish, petty people. Availability for sainthood creation abounds. In most cases we don’t even need to go looking, they are already in our lives.
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About PaulVK
Husband, Father of 5, Pastor