Christians are ... Saints

Text: 1 Corinthians 1:2-3

Theme: What are Christians? According to the Bible we are, Saints, Sons, Sheep, Servants, and Sufferers.

What are Christians? The simplest definition is that we are Christ-followers. The first time anyone was called a Christian is recorded in the Bible, “It was at Antioch that the believers were first called Christians” (Acts 11:26). The word “Christian” is less important than the spiritual reality it illustrates.

Christians know God loves them.

They recognize their rebellion separates them from God. This is what the Bible calls sin.

They know Jesus came to earth, died and came to life again to offer forgiveness.

Christians have responded to God's offer of forgiveness by making a choice to stop living for themselves and allow God to make them who He wants them to be.

These are things we know and believe about our faith. But when it comes to fleshing out what it means to be a Christian, how do we understand who we are. According to the Bible we are, Saints, Sons, Sheep, Servants, and Sufferers. Over the next five week, I want to look at each of these words to help us discover what we are.

I. CALLED TO BE SAINTS

1. the English word saint is the translation of the Greek word hagioi

a. it’s a form of the Greek word for holy and is closely related to the word sanctified

ILLUS. If you ever read a book on the life of a famous Christian your reading a Hagiography. I encourage you to read such stories. The stores of Christians like St. Patrick, St. Francis of Assissi, St. Nicholas (yes, Virginia, there really is a Santa Clause), Martin Luther, Lottie Moon, even Billy Graham are Christians whose lives are worth reading about. Almost every month, our church newsletter includes a very brief biography of Christians you Ought to Know. They are meant to “wet your appetite” to read in more detail about their lives.

2. it’s a word used frequently throughout the New Testament ... 61 times

a. and every time it’s used, it refers to all who name the name of Christ, not a select group of men or women who have been singled out by the Church for special recognition

1) this is one of the principle differences between Evangelicals and denominations like Catholicism, all the Orthodox groups, and Anglicans

3. most Christians, I think, would naturally recoil at the thought that someone might refer to us as a saint or as saintly

a. we shouldn’t be

A. SAINTS ARE HUMAN

1. who among us would be presumptuous enough to put ourselves in the league of some of the people I just mentioned?

a. any yet, when you read about the lives of these people, you see that they had “feet of clay” just like you and me

ILLUS. Martin Luther is certainly one of my heroes of the faith. (I’m sure the Catholic Church has no plans to canonize him any time soon). Luther was a great Christian, mightily used of God. Yet, he could be absolutely profane and obscene, using language that I would never dare repeat. He was especially adept at using scatological references to insult his opponents. And, most unfortunately, late in life he became horribly anti-Semitic.

2. consider, if you would, who the Apostle Paul is writing to in our text

a. this is a congregation plagues by disunity, appalling sin within the church, issues over worship, the use of gifts, and the Lord’s Supper

1) the Church at Corinth is a model church of dysfunctionality

b. yet, the Apostle writes, “To the Church of God that is in Corinth ... called to be saints ... “

c. referring to the Body of Christ as saints should be one of the primary ways we address the Church

B. SAINTS ARE CHOSEN BY GOD

1. I don’t have any real issue with singling out significant Christian throughout the centuries as examples of the faithful

a. but it’s not the Church who makes saints ... it’s God who makes saints

2. that is clear from the use of the word called in vs. 2

a. it’s God, through His Holy Spirit, who does the calling of men and women into a relationship with Him

1) left to our own, we would never come to God, never seek Him out

b. every sinner who is saved by God’s grace is a saint

1) we are in the process of being transformed by the Holy Spirit of God

2) we call that sanctification

3. the one criteria necessary for sainthood if faith in Christ

a. biblically, there is no other requirement

b. our Roman Catholic neighbors know it as Canonization—the declaration of a deceased person as an officially recognized saint

c. it can be a lengthy process because it demands verifiable miracles wrought when a living Christian prayed to a dead Christian asking them to intercede with Christ for them

1) the candidate goes from "Servant of God" to “Venerable” to “Blessed” and finally to “Saint”

2) the Saint is assigned a feast day and parish churches may be erected or named in the saint’s honor

3) there are approximately 1,000 canonized Catholic Saints

d. all of this of course has no Scriptural basis

C. SAINTS ARE IN FELLOWSHIP WITH OTHER SAINTS

1. from a human viewpoint, the church is a local body of people spiritually united in fellowship by the common experience of faith in Jesus Christ

ILLUS. The British author, C.S. Lewis once wrote: “The New Testament does not envisage solitary religion. Some kind of regular assembly for worship and instruction is everywhere taken for granted in the Epistles. So we must be regular practicing members of the church. Of course we differ in temperament. Some (like you-and me) find it more natural to approach God in solitude; but we must go to church as well. For the church is not a human society of people united by their natural affinities, but the Body of Christ, in which all members, however different (and he rejoices in their differences and by no means wishes to iron them out) must share the common life, complementing and helping one another precisely by their differences.

2. fellowship is the lifeblood of the church

“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. 2 The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. 3 We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We write this to make our joy complete.” 1 John 1:1-4 NIV

a. for the early Christians, koinonia was not the frilly "fellowship" of church-sponsored, biweekly bowling parties

b. it was not tea, cookies, and sophisticated small talk in Fellowship Hall after the sermon

c. it was an almost unconditional sharing of their lives with the other members of Christ's body

3. that’s what the fellowship of the saints is all about

a. the church is a human institution

1) that means that we are called out of the world and into faith, and that faith makes us a kingdom of priests to God, and puts us into fellowship with other believers

D. SAINTS ARE ONE WITH ALL THE OTHER SAINTS

1. Paul ends vs. 2 saying “with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,”

ILLUS. Ukraine experience.