The Church of Rome now has 4,399 "saints" in its calendar. Pope Pius X (1903-14) was recently canonized at a colorful ceremony in Rome before an estimated crowd of 500,000 persons, while millions more viewed the proceedings on television. A few days later five more "saints" were created by papal pronouncement. All this suggests the question, What is a saint according to the Word of God? and how does he become one?
First, let us go back from 1954 to the year 60 A.D. We find that there were saints in the city of Rome then-actually living there. The Apostle Paul at that time wrote an inspired epistle to them. He said: "To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ." Rom. 1:77To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. (Romans 1:7). Notice that the words "to be" are in italics in the text which indicates that they were not in the original Greek. They were not called to be saints at some future time, but were saints then by calling; that is, by God's call. They were not saints by birth, nor by some human attainment in life, nor by canonization after death; they became saints by divine call through the operation of the Spirit of God, by the Word of God.
They became saints in the same manner in which the Apostle Paul became an apostle. The first verse of the chapter has the same construction: "Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God." He was an apostle "not of men, neither by man," but by God's sovereign call. He was not called to be an apostle after his death, but was one at the same time that they were saints.
This place of special favor was not confined to the Christians at Rome, for the Apostle likewise addresses the Christians at Corinth as "called saints" (1 Cor. 1:22Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours: (1 Corinthians 1:2)). In Acts 9:1313Then Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to thy saints at Jerusalem: (Acts 9:13) they are referred to as a class belonging to God: "Then Ananias answered, Lord, I have heard by many of this man, how much evil he hath done to Thy saints at Jerusalem." The same thought is found in Col. 1:2626Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints: (Colossians 1:26): "Even the mystery which bath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to His saints." The wonderful fact that the Christians on earth were united to Christ the Head in heaven was revealed to those living on earth, called "His saints." 1 Thess. 3:1313To the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints. (1 Thessalonians 3:13) and Jude 1414And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, (Jude 14) speak of the Lord's coming back to the earth with His saints, after He first comes to receive them to Himself (John 14:33And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. (John 14:3)).
All Christians are embraced in this class: "Wherefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus, and love unto all the saints." "That ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints." Eph. 1:15; 3:17, 1815Wherefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus, and love unto all the saints, (Ephesians 1:15)
17That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, 18May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; (Ephesians 3:17‑18). "Since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love which ye have to all the saints." Col. 1:44Since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love which ye have to all the saints, (Colossians 1:4). "Hearing of thy love and faith, which thou hast toward the Lord Jesus, and toward all saints." Philem. 1:55Hearing of thy love and faith, which thou hast toward the Lord Jesus, and toward all saints; (Philemon 5) Clearly, then, the Word of God speaks of all Christians living on earth as saints-His saints.
In the New Testament the word hagios, which is translated "saints," is also translated "holy"; as, "Holy Ghost," "holy angels," "Holy Father," "holy priesthood," etc. When Christians are called "saints," they are thereby designated as "holy ones." This is the expression of their relationship with God which is founded on the fact that Christ has purchased them by His death- "purchased to God by Thy blood" (as Rev. 5:99And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; (Revelation 5:9) should read). They belong to Him, and have been set apart from the world for Him. "Saints" is a class designation and includes every true believer on earth. To say that I am a Christian is to profess that I am one of God's holy ones who has been consecrated to Him down here. It is not something achieved after death, but is the present portion of every true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.
There are those who profess to be Christians but who are not real; they never had to do with God about their sins, nor had they accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior. All such deceive themselves, and increase their responsibility by reason of their profession. This blessed relationship with God is formed in the individual by the gift of life. Christ is the life of all such, and their standing before God could not be improved, nor could it ever be lowered. It is as fixed as the throne of God. Inasmuch as the saint possesses Christ as his life, he possesses unchangeable holiness before God. The contemplation of the excellency of our position before God should fill our hearts with wonder and praise.
Now this life which the saint possesses is a perfectly holy life, but Christ Himself was the only perfect expression of it. His absolute perfection shone out at every step of His earthly pathway. Every true child of God will admit that his own life does not come up to that standard, but yet the new man desires that it should do so. The saint has no other pattern or model than Christ. The true heart desires that in everything—in thought, and word, and deed -he may be more like Christ. To use the words of another: "Christ is for him [the saint], from God, the substance of that which he longs for; because Christ, who is his model, is his life already." This is developed by daily communion with Christ. It is by the contemplation of Christ in glory that we are changed into the same image (2 Cor. 3:1818But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. (2 Corinthians 3:18)). Occupation with Him will produce a change into more conformity to Himself. Such progress in practical holiness will be made without effort to be holy. The saint desires to be more like Christ and, instead of seeking it by legal means, he fixes his gaze upon the loveliness of Christ, and the transformation is the result. The full end of being like Christ will never be attained down here, but when we shall see Him, "we shall be like Him" (1 John 3:22Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. (1 John 3:2)). At that blessed moment when we rise to meet Him in the air, and see Him face to face, the change will be complete.
"No more deferred our hope shall be,
No longer through a glass we'll see,
But see Him face to face."
The chastening which God gives to all of His children has for one of its ends, "that we might be partakers of His holiness." Heb. 12:1010For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness. (Hebrews 12:10). He is not satisfied merely to save us from the judgment to come, but would have His children more like Himself down here; to this end He works with us in discipline.
The canonization of more "saints" also suggests the question, 'What about Christians praying to "saints"? It should suffice to say that there is no warrant for such a thought in all Scripture. That one saint may pray for another saint while both are on earth is plainly taught. In fact the Apostle Paul prayed for the saints, and desired that they might pray for him, but nowhere is there the slightest suggestion that prayers should ever be addressed to departed saints or to angels.
It was not until the third century of this era that departed saints were mentioned in prayers, and then it was to pray for them that they might speedily see the face of God. Historians tell us that the virgin Mary and all other departed saints were prayed for, not to. Christ was the only one that was not prayed for. The writer, Hincmar of the ninth century, gives a prayer that was said for Leo (Saint Leo), but by the thirteenth century, as given by Pope Innocent, it was turned into a prayer that "by the intercession of the blessed Leo, this offering may profit us." This briefly gives the progress of this superstition.
And why should any Christian pray to any departed saint? We have access to God Himself, with the assurance that "the Father Himself loveth you." To seek to go to God through any saint is a denial that we have "boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus." The veil was rent when Christ died, and the way into the holiest is open to every saint on earth. He is not at a distance, and does not need any intermediary; to affect to have one is to deny the truth.
Furthermore, the Lord Jesus came down into this world and tasted all its bitterness and woe; He entered into the trials and difficulties His saints would encounter so that He might be a "merciful and faithful high priest." He is touched with the feeling of the infirmities of His people and so can succor us in trial, and give timely help.
"With joy we meditate the grace
Of God's High Priest above;
His heart is filled with tenderness,
His very name is Love.
"Touched with a sympathy within,
He knows our feeble frame:
He knows what sorest trials mean
For He has felt the same.
"But spotless, undefiled, and pure,
The great Redeemer stood,
While Satan's fiery darts He bore,
And did resist to blood.
"He, in the days of feeble flesh,
Poured out His cries and tears,
And, though ascended, feels afresh
What every member bears.
"Then boldly let our faith address
The throne of grace and power;
We shall obtain delivering grace
In every needed hour."
To quote the words of another: "He has shrunk from no suffering, no humiliation, that I may have confidence in His love and readiness to help. The invocation of saints and angels comes to deny all this." Then in answer to the suggestion that the Lord Jesus is too high and exalted, and His heart not sufficiently tender, so that the help of some departed saints should be sought, this same writer says, "It is all shameful dishonor put upon Christ's grace and tenderness. I know no one so kind, so condescending, who is come down to the poor sinner, as He. I trust His love more than I do Mary's, or any saint's; not merely His power as God, but the tenderness of His heart as man-none ever showed such, or had such, or proved it so well. None entered into my sorrows, none took a part in them, as He; none understands my heart so well; none has inspired me with such confidence in His. Let others go to saints and angels; I trust Jesus' kindness more. If it be said, He is too high, I answer, He became a man that we might know His tenderness; and He is not changed. And why go to them? Why, in Jesus' name, not go straight to the Father? The need of all this troop of mediators only shows that men do not believe the gospel. They cannot go to God Himself. Now Christ has brought us to God. Suffering, the just for the unjust, He brought us to a God of love, our Father, having put away our sins. Rome would turn us out again, to leave us trembling at the doors of saints. I would rather go to God Himself. He, I know, loves me; He has given His Son for me. Which of the saints has done that? As to angels, they are ministering spirits sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation. Looking to them is treated as apostasy in Scripture."
In Colossians 2 The Apostle Paul denounced the worshiping of angels as leaving Christ the Head, voluntary humility, and as being vainly puffed up by a fleshly mind. And lest some contend that praying to angels and saints is not worship of them, let it be noted that the word Paul used in the Greek is not the word for worship, but threskia which includes any and all religious service or deference whatever. But man has ever been prone to render homage to the creature. Cornelius fell down before Peter, but Peter said, "Stand up; I myself also am a man." He would have none of it in his lifetime, nor is it proper to pay homage to him now. (Acts 10.) The Apostle John fell down before the angel in Revelation, but was rebuked with the words, "Worship God."
A church council held in Laodicea forbade the invocation of angels, and called it secret idolatry, and many of the early church fathers condemned it. Scripture, however, should be sufficient answer to the human tendency to place angels between God and His saints, and between the Redeemer and His redeemed. An gels are but the spectators of God's wisdom and ways of grace in bringing fallen human beings into His presence in all the loveliness of Christ. They cannot break forth into singing for they have not been the objects of redeeming grace. We have been brought into an infinitely better place in Christ.
"Though angels praise the heavenly King,
And Him their Lord adoring own,
We can with exultation sing, `He wears our nature on the throne.' "
May the contemplation of the wondrous place into which we have been brought cause us to exclaim, "What bath God wrought!"
In this column of the September, 1952 issue, we reported that a mock crucifixion had taken placer on the campus of Oberlin College. We are now in receipt of a letter from the Director of Public Relations for the college which states that the officials of Oberlin made an exhaustive investigation of the alleged event and could find no evidence to substantiate the story. We would much prefer to believe that this did not take place, and so herewith acknowledge their denial of the account.
We might add, however, that the periodical which first carried the story is considered thoroughly reliable and trustworthy, and to this date it has not retracted it, but we have no desire to be a judge in this matter, and so accept the statement of the Oberlin College official.
Our withdrawal of the account of the mock crucifixion should not be considered an endorsement of the Oberlin College as an orthodox Christian school. Enclosed with the recent communication from the Oberlin College were several mimeographed chapel talks by various members of the faculty. We read these carefully in hope that we might find evidence of sound Christian doctrine, but alas, it was otherwise. While we realize that the spiritual standard of a school cannot be ascertained fully by six chapel talks, nevertheless, we did not discover one single instance of the mention of repentance toward God, faith in the finished work of Christ, the blood of the atonement, judgment to come, or of the absolute inspiration of the Holy Scriptures. Instead, we found written: "In any event, the Bible is very complex, and it is my feeling that one can accept it as a record of the progressive revelation of God in human life without being committed to the theory of divine inspiration of every word and every sentence." Is divine revelation only a theory? And if some of it cannot be trusted, then we have no anchor for our souls.
In these talks, references were made to fellowship with God, seeking Him over and over again, practicing His precepts, cooperating with a just and merciful Providence, and "following the footsteps of our greatest teacher, Jesus Christ." Nicodemus called the Lord Jesus a teacher come from God, and that great Jewish leader was willing to be taught, but he had to learn that he "must be born again." Whatever is born of flesh is flesh, and if you teach flesh "Judaeo-Christian religion and ethics," it is still only flesh and must needs be born again. In not one of these "talks" was there a word about how a poor, fallen, lost sinner could have his sins forgiven, have peace with God, and receive eternal life. Scripture shows that apart from these fundamental facts, it is utter folly to talk of following His footsteps. We must know Him as the One who suffered for us on Calvary's cross before we can attempt to follow Him. Otherwise, we have just so much religious and moral ethics, and not the Christianity of the Bible.
We are not singling out Oberlin College for this criticism, for this neo-orthodoxy is quite prevalent, and we see in it that condition which was foretold long ago in the Holy Scriptures: "Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof." 2 Tim. 3:55Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away. (2 Timothy 3:5). It is the old story of the "way of Cain" who approached God on the ground of his own works, and was rejected. The Epistle of Jude, which describes the last days, says, "Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain."
May God in His grace lead many in this country who are ensnared by the religion of Cain to justify God and not themselves, and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ to the saving of the soul.