The Saints: They Walked with God

I will walk among you and you shall be My people (Lev. 26:12).
What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God (Micah 6:8).
In the calendar of Saints of the Orthodox Catholic Church, are to be found names of men, women and children from every walk of life, the most humble, as well as the most exalted. Among them we find members of almost every nation, race or tribe, and of every profession and calling. However, there is one thing that they all share. Each saint in his own personal way walked with God. By reading these lives we are inspired and moved to do as they did. From them we too can learn how to walk humbly with God. Saint John the Divine reminds us: He who says he abides in Christ ought to walk in the same way in which He walked (1 John 2:6). Their example is a good example because, first of all and above all, they walked in the same way that Christ Jesus walked.
The Saints and their lives are important to us because in their lives they mirrored the life of Christ. Each Saint received the Light of Christ and reflected it into the world. We know that if a mirror is to reflect an accurate and undistorted image, it must be itself as perfect, clear and pure as possible. The importance of the example of the life of a Saint is directly related to his life as a follower of Christ. No mirror can reflect light unless it is facing the light, so all true Saints lived out their lives in the full Light of Christ. Above all a Saint is and remains an individual. In following Christ he does not lose his own unique personality; rather, in Christ, in the sacrament of Chrismation, he is given the possibility of fulfilling that personality more perfectly, more completely.
As we study the lives of Saints we see how they followed Christ, and we learn how to follow Him in order that we too might grow unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ (Eph. 4:13). The life of a Saint is his personal experience in the Church of Christ, which we are privileged to share with him. From the Saint's life we can gain a new insight into our own Christian life. The Saints reveal to us how the Grace of God and the power of His love work in the lives of men. God transforms by His Grace and man's cooperation the most ordinary life into that of a real and great Christian Hero, or Saint. A worthless and wasted life, like that of Mary of Egypt, is changed into a glorious, a wonderous and luminous personality. These luminous and glorious lives become like the stars that shine in the heavens. They become fixed guiding stars for those who travel on land and or sea or in the air in God's world.
In the early Church, when the memory of the Apostles, and even of Christ, was still very much alive, all members of the Church were called Saints. The faithful Christian is a saint not because his life is perfect or without sin, but because he has entered into and has become a participant in the perfect and good life of the Church which is the Body of Christ. It is this life which is redeemed by Christ, and sanctified (made holy) by the Holy Spirit. However, today we usually reserve the name Saint for those who are not only faithful Christians because they are members of the Body of Christ, but those who having entered into this life have made creative and abundant use of the Grace that God had given them in His Life. For this reason they have been glorified by the Church, and are set aside to be followed and to be called Saints.
There are as many kinds of Saints as there are ways of following in the Way of Christ. There are hermit saints, who left the world and lived in isolated areas where they meditated and prayed and fought the temptations and passions of the evil spirits. There are Priest saints - bishops, priests and deacons. They administered the Mysteries of the Church. They preached the Gospel. They taught others the Way of Christ by word and example. They lived in the world, but they never allowed themselves to become tied down to the world. There were saints from the ordinary walk of life who lived simple but holy lives. Finally, there were martyrs and sufferers, who made the supreme sacrifice for the Truth that is Christ. They all tried to walk humbly with God in the paths of Truth. They received the Crowns in Heaven that were promised by God: Be faithful unto death, and l will give thee a crown of life (Rev. 2:10). As we sing during the Holy Sacrament of Matrimony and of Ordination: "O Holy Martyrs, who fought the good fight and have received your crowns . . ."
The Church reminds us in many other ways that we are all members of the family or Community of Saints. Our churches are always decorated with ikons of Christ and the Saints, as well as events from the life of Christ and the Saints. These ikons have sometimes been called "windows into Heaven," because they help us to gain a vision of the glory and beauty of God's Kingdom. The walls of our churches reflect the glory of God in color, like the Saints in heaven reflect His Glory by their lives.
The Bishop, or Priest, or Deacon censes the church, the ikons and the faithful during the services. In this ritual action we are reminded that we have been called to the saintly life, a life of purity and holiness, that we might worthily worship God. The Church also calls us to unite with the Saints in love and faith to worship God in the Holy Trinity. We who live in the world, comprising the Church Militant, unite with the Saints in heaven, the Church Triumphant, to offer our common prayers of glory, praise and thanskgiving to God the Father, through Jesus Christ our Lord, and by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. In the prayers of the Church we are reminded many times of the intimate fellowship which we have with the Saints; for example, the commemoration which ends many litanies: "Calling to remembrance our most holy, all pure, most blessed and glorious Lady, the Birthgiver of God and Ever-Virgin Mary, with all the Saints, let us commend ourselves and each other and all our life unto Christ our God."
Our unity and oneness in Christ Jesus which is so vividly expressed in the prayers and ritual of the Church, and so beautifully portrayed in the ikons, is also graphically pictured (imaged) in the mystical offering of the Divine Liturgy where prayer, ritual, ikons, man and angels unite in a harmonious symphony of worship of God. In the Liturgy of Oblation, during which the offering of bread, wine and water is prepared for the Holy Communion, the Priest cuts from the first offering bread (prosfora) a large cube, called the LAMB of God (Agnetz), which is placed on the Paten. From the second offering bread the Priest cuts a pyramid of bread in memory of the Theotokos (Mother of God), and this is placed on the right of the Lamb of God. From the third offering bread the Priest cuts nine smaller pyramids of bread in memory of the nine ranks of Saints: first John the Baptist, then the Prophets, the Apostles, the Martyrs, the Teachers, the Healers and all the Saints, known and unknown. From the fourth offering bread small particles are taken in memory of the Living, and from the fifth in memory of the Dead. These are placed at the foot of the Lamb of God. In this graphic image of bread on the Paten the Church portrays the Offering of the Eucharist as an offering of the Church, the One Holy Body of Christ, which is offered up to God with these words: "Thine own, of Thine own, we offer untoThee in behalf of all and for all." As we worship, so we offer ourselves up to God, with love and unity and oneness.
In the Mystery (Sacrament) of Holy Matrimony the Christian couple receive from the Church crowns in anticipation of heavenly crowns which will be given to all who have faithfully "walked in God's commandments with a pure heart." While wearing these crowns the husband and wife with their hands joined are led by the Priest around the table on which are the Gospel and the Cross. In this ritual action the Church shows the couple how they must walk with God in the way of Truth and with a pure heart if they are to be worthy of their high calling, for Blessed is the man who endures trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life which God has promised to those who love Him (James 1:12).
At the burial of a faithful Orthodox Catholic the Church places on his forehead a symbolic crown. The faithful Christian, having completed the course of this life, is now ready to stand before the dread judgment seat of Christ, and the Church prays that hewill indeed be able to give a good answer, and be found worthy to receive the unfading crown of glory (1 Peter 5:4).
When we study the lives of Saints we learn that no matter how great was the gift of God's power and grace given, each individual Saint had to apply the gift in his life. He had to make use of the gift, and this was never easy. He was beset by many temptations. The greatest of these was to follow the example of the wicked servant in the parable- to bury the talent; or that of the Prodigal Son - to waste it in riotous living. However, the true Saint was able to overcome temptations, and to win the battle against evil. It took all the great qualities and virtues of Christian living to win the battle: humility, patience, meekness, hunger and thirst for spiritual truth, mercifulness, purity of heart, peace of soul, courage, and patient perserverance. Each saint's life illustrates one or more of these virtues as they are revealed to us in the Beatitudes from the Sermon on the Mount of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The Saints accepted God's Gift. They put it to test in their own lives. They passed the test, and received the promised reward: Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven (Matt. 5:12). Whatever their task, they had labored well in the knowledge that they served the Lord and not men, knowing that from the Lord they would receive the reward of the inheritance (Col. 3:23-24).
As we read the lives of the saints, let us learn from them how to live the Christian life as it must be lived to be worthy of the Life-giver, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Who purchased by His suffering and death our inheritance, eternal life. Christ our Lord prayed thus for those who believe in Him:
Father, I desire that theyalso, whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am; that they may behold My glory, which Thou hast given Me: for Thou lovedst Me before the foundation of the world. O righteous Father, the world hath not known Thee: but I have known Thee, and those have known that Thou hast sent Me. And I have declared unto them My name, and will declare it; that the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them (John 17:24-26).
Let us also, the faithful in the Church Militant, offer our prayers to God and call at the same time the Saints to come to our help, that they who stand near to God, by their prayers and intercessions, may purify, strengthen and offer before God our faithful prayers that we too may receive Eternal Life.