{"id":1848,"date":"2022-08-02T09:46:14","date_gmt":"2022-08-02T13:46:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=1848"},"modified":"2022-08-02T09:46:14","modified_gmt":"2022-08-02T13:46:14","slug":"in-the-company-of-saints","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2022\/08\/02\/in-the-company-of-saints\/","title":{"rendered":"In the Company of Saints"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Throughout the month of August,\u00a0we\u2019re taking a close look at 23 verses of the New Testament.\u00a0 They comprise Ephesians chapter one, which paints one of the Bible\u2019s most comprehensive pictures of what it means for ordinary people to be \u201cin Christ.\u201d \u00a0<\/em>
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The irreverent British comedians known as Monty Python became famous, in part, because they never hesitated to take on sacred subjects.\u00a0
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That included the life of Jesus.
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The result was their controversial 1979 film The Life of Brian.\u00a0 <\/em>Do you remember when Jesus presents the Beatitudes as part of his Sermon on the Mount?\u00a0 Here\u2019s the Pythons\u2019 take on that signature moment in spiritual history:
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An old woman looks toward the top of the hill and shouts, \u201cSpeak up!\u00a0 I can\u2019t hear you.\u00a0 What\u2019s he saying?\u201d\u00a0 A raggedy old man turns to her and says, \u201cI think he said, \u2018Blessed are the cheesemakers.\u2019\u201d Another woman seems confused.\u00a0 \u201cBlessed are the cheesemakers?\u00a0 Whatever does that mean?\u201d\u00a0 Her husband answers confidently, \u201cHe doesn\u2019t literally mean cheesemakers.\u00a0 He\u2019s referring to makers of any dairy products.\u201d
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The goat farmer standing next to him then says, \u201cHey Big Nose, keep it down.\u00a0 I can\u2019t hear what he\u2019s saying!\u201d\u00a0 \u201cDon\u2019t call my husband Big Nose,\u201d the wife snaps back. \u201cYou shut up, too,\u201d retorts the goat farmer.\u00a0 \u201cDon\u2019t tell my wife to shut up or I\u2019ll shut you up.” The raggedy man glares at all of them and says, \u201cShhhh!\u201d\u00a0 <\/em>The goat farmer then nods, \u201cAll right, let\u2019s listen up; there might be a part about blessed are the big noses.\u201d\u00a0
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The old woman who initiated this whole ruckus finally sighs and gives up.\u00a0 \u201cLet\u2019s go to the stoning,\u201d she says.
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Since this isn\u2019t exactly the way the Bible reads, The Life of Brian <\/em>took a beating from Christians around the world.\u00a0
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It\u2019s no surprise that numerous church leaders condemned it as blasphemous.\u00a0 But since most of them never actually went to see the movie, they overlooked something significant:\u00a0The Life of Brian <\/em>has nothing bad to say about Jesus.\u00a0 In fact, in the group\u2019s authorized biography \u2013 The Pythons on Python<\/em> \u2013 Eric Idle points out that the comedians took the time to read the gospel accounts before making their movie.\u00a0 They were deeply impressed with Jesus.\u00a0 How could you possibly make a funny movie about him?
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Director Terry Jones said, \u201cThe humor lay in somebody preaching and talking about peace and love, and then in people who spend the next 2,000 years killing and torturing each other because they can\u2019t quite decide how he said it.\u201d\u00a0 John Cleese adds, \u201cWhat is absurd is not the teachings of the founders of religion; it\u2019s what the followers subsequently make of it.\u00a0 And I was always astonished that people didn\u2019t get that.\u201d
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In other words, The Life of Brian <\/em>isn\u2019t a put-down of Jesus.\u00a0 It\u2019s a movie that exuberantly makes fun of the people who follow him.\u00a0
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Over the centuries, people have been unfailingly impressed with Jesus.\u00a0 They just aren\u2019t very impressed with us<\/em>.\u00a0
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The book of Ephesians opens with these words:\u00a0 “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God<\/strong><\/em>; to the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus”\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>(1:1).
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The most jarring of those words is \u201csaints.\u201d\u00a0 To whom exactly is Paul addressing this letter?\u00a0
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The word \u201csaint\u201d has had an interesting history.\u00a0 During Christianity’s early centuries it came to represent a woman or a man of exceptional spiritual maturity.\u00a0 Well into the Middle Ages, in the Roman Catholic tradition, the word \u201csaint\u201d designated a deceased Christian of such purity and virtue that he or she could actually intercede for struggling Christians here on earth.\u00a0
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It seems clear that the apostle Paul has something different in mind.\u00a0 The saints in Ephesus were ordinary followers of Jesus.\u00a0 They were rank and file disciples, including beginners, stragglers, and strugglers.
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It\u2019s worth noting that the word \u201csaint\u201d in the New Testament never applies to someone who is dead, but always to those who are living \u2013 and always to a group<\/em> of living persons at that.\u00a0 The literal translation of the Greek word is \u201choly one.\u201d\u00a0 On the pages of the Bible, holiness is closely connected with the idea of separation.\u00a0 Someone who follows Jesus is therefore one who is separate, or set apart, from the world with regard to priorities, thinking, and behavior.\u00a0
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So look around the next time you\u2019re at a gathering of people who have enrolled as lifelong learners of Jesus.\u00a0 You are in the company of saints \u2013 God\u2019s set-apart ones.
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The concern, of course, is that the people whom the Bible calls \u201csaints\u201d do not seem to be particularly saintly.\u00a0 It\u2019s ironic that Paul himself goes out of his way in several of his letters to admit that he had previously tracked down and presumably murdered some of Jesus\u2019 earliest followers.\u00a0 He labels himself \u201cthe chief of sinners.\u201d\u00a0
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God tells us, and he tells the world, that we are his holy ones.\u00a0 Yet stunningly often our behavior is unholy.\u00a0 Take a deep breath.\u00a0 This is it.\u00a0 We are God\u2019s Plan A to fulfill his mission on earth.\u00a0 We are the saints entrusted with getting it done.
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Seriously?\u00a0<\/em>
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An increasing number of American saints appear to have concluded that it\u2019s not all that crucial to hang around with other saints.\u00a0 More than 40% of self-described Christians report that they seldom, rarely, or never attend church \u2013 a trend that was in play even before the pandemic.\u00a0
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So why can\u2019t I simply walk away from the messed-up people and hypocrites who inevitably surround me wherever I go to church?\u00a0
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The simple answer is that the Bible tells me that I am not myself by myself<\/em>.\u00a0 It pleases God to accomplish my spiritual transformation by means of other broken people \u2013 through their partnerships, their prayers, and even (in ways we often cannot foresee) their most grievous failures.\u00a0 The book of Ephesians goes on to tell us how that can happen.
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In the movie Gladiator<\/em>, the central character Maximus stands in the Colosseum arena surrounded by a small group of frightened men with drawn swords.\u00a0 He says to them, \u201cWhatever comes through those gates, if we stay together, we can survive.\u201d\u00a0
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That is God\u2019s word to all of his set-apart ones.\u00a0 We cannot stand by ourselves.\u00a0 \u00a0
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But by the power and grace of the God who unites us, we can increasingly become the saints he has called us to be.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Throughout the month of August,\u00a0we\u2019re taking a close look at 23 verses of the New Testament.\u00a0 They comprise Ephesians chapter one, which paints one of the Bible\u2019s most comprehensive pictures of what it means for ordinary people to be \u201cin Christ.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The irreverent British comedians known as Monty Python became famous, in part, because they never hesitated to take on… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1848"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1848\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1850,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1848\/revisions\/1850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}