Which Saint Are You?

The other day I read two very funny stories or memes about two saints we would recognize by name. The first is Saint Anthony.

“Saint Anthony asks God what He did to deserve an eternity of looking for Everyone’s Car keys.”

When I read this, I chuckled. Why the Saint for Lost things? It made me wonder. Supposedly it all goes back to a story from his life. A novice stole a book of Psalms that belonged to him. St Anthony prayed to God for it to be recovered, the novice returned the book.  So, in our prayers to him (to any saint) we are invoking the aid of the Saint to help us in……. because they too had struggled in that area. They understood or they had a gift from God in that area so that they may help us by still using that gift from heaven.

The other saint is St Jude. His name was really Judas, alas sharing a name with the traitor of Jesus, and so the shortening of his name to Jude. In the early church Judas Iscariot was despised and ignored, a tradition gathered over the centuries of petitioning to St Jude only when all the other saints had failed to answer one’s prayers. The faithful were reluctant to seek intercession of one whose misfortune was to share a name with Christ’s betrayer. Out of confusion or an abundance of caution Saint Jude became the Patron Saint of Hopeless Causes, the last resort. When the dam was barely holding, a pulse was growing faint, the rain would not come or come too much, a candle was lit, a prayer spoken to Saint Jude, hoping against hope, that he would respond.

So why acknowledge Saints, or even pray to them? We celebrate them, especially on All Saints Day, for the great things God has done for us through them giving their lives to God. They are good role models. They were like us. Human. Frail. Full of faults and failings. But with God in their lives, they did miraculous things. Lived heroic lives. These men and women show us how God in our lives changes us for the better. How we all can attain sainthood, for that is the will of God for each of us.

Paul tell us that we are called to be saints …

To all God’s beloved in Rome, who are called to be saints:

Romans 1:7 NRSV

To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ…

1 Corinthians 1:2 NRSV

God sanctifies people from their sins and sets them apart from the world to serve Him alone. It is God’s grace within us, His gift and working, transforming us that make us holy, make us saints.

So one day there will be a Saint ……….. (put your name here) and maybe some human being who can relate to you, your personality, your gifts, your workings and doing upon the earth, may one day pray to you for aid and help in petitioning to Our Loving God.

(My family call me “the bag lady” because I tend to carry a lot of bags of stuff around with me – things I need. Maybe I will be the Patron Saint of Carrying a Lot!)

May these jottings from my journal inspire you to believe in and fall in love with Christ- the hope of the world, as stated in Jeremiah 17:7, ‘Blessed is the man who believes and trusts in and relies on the Lord and whose hope and confident expectation is the Lord!’

Love

Rosemary

Every week groups of ladies meet together to chat about the things I raise in my weekly blog post and to chat about life in general. We call these ‘Heart Connect’ groups. If you would like more information please click HERE.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

Is there a Saint that you admire and relate to?

Can you see yourself as a Saint?

How do Saints encourage you to be more with God?