Word on the Web

03 Apr 2008: Who they were

They were ‘saints’. The word ‘saints’ appears in six of the salutations of Paul’s epistles – obviously it’s very important. It means ‘set apart’ or ‘holy’. We belong to God. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 says ‘… do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own … you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.’ Saints are people who have been set apart for God.

This means that things that displease God can’t be in our life; that’s what Paul is saying in that passage from 1 Corinthians. He says, ‘You are not your own.’ The passage is talking specifically about sexual immorality, but anything that displeases God cannot be part of our lives.

A mother visited her son in the university and went to his room and found twelve rather suggestive pictures of women in various stages of undress. She got a shock but did not say anything. She went home and sent the son in the post a beautifully framed picture of the head of Christ. This boy was thrilled by the picture and put it just in front of his desk. That night, before he went to sleep, he felt a bit odd about the combination of pictures in his room. So he took the picture that was closest to the head of Christ down. Little by little, he took down all the pictures, because he knew that they couldn’t remain in the room along with the head of Christ.

Being a saint also means that we live only for God. Florence Nightingale, one of the great British women, only began her training as a nurse when she was thirty years old. She wrote this in her diary: ‘I am thirty years of age, the age when Christ began his mission. Now no more childish things. No more vain things. Now, Lord, let me think only of Thy will.’ A holy person lives for God only. When she was near the end of her career, someone asked her what her life’s secret was, and this is what she said: ‘I can give only one explanation … I have kept nothing back from God.’ She was totally devoted to Christ.

A saint is also one who glorifies God in their bodies, as 1 Corinthians 6:20 says. We reflect God’s nature because we are like God. A child was asked, ‘Who is a saint?’ He remembered all those stained glass windows with saints in his church and said, ‘A saint is one through whom light shines.’ The light would come into his church through the windows with the saints, and he had unknowingly given a beautiful definition of a saint.

• Saints are ‘set apart’ or ‘holy’ – but we live in the modern age. How can we live ‘set apart’ lives that honour God (a) at work (b) in our times of recreation (c) in the way we live our daily lives?

• What does it mean to ‘glorify God in our bodies’? Might it mean different things for different people?

This is an extract taken from one of the Keswick Ministries Study Guides; The Fullness of Christ (Ephesians) by Ajith Fernando.