Those Who Came Before Us - All Saints, 2023

“Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses …” (Hebrews 12:1).

The writer of Hebrews recounts a long list of those who came before—those who walked by faith (Hebrews 11). He described them as individuals “of whom the world was not worthy” (Hebrews 11:38). They were not the so-called great men of history— kings, emperors, generals. (Sorry, ladies—it was a patriarchal world.) Rather, they were the great men and women of faith. (Women were included in his list because patriarchy does not overpower faith.) His list reflects the stories found in the Hebrew Scriptures—Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, the parents of Moses, Moses himself, Rahab (a Gentile), Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, the prophets. These were not deemed great by worldly standards yet great in the eyes of God because of faith.

These were the ancestors of faith who came before us. Although we did not know them—other than their stories as told in scripture—they guided us, contributing to the formation of our lives. They helped to shape our faith. They helped to shape who we are today. They touched us without knowing us. They shaped us without knowing they were doing so.

Thanks to the work of kinfolk I do not know, I can trace my family on my father’s side back to England and the 1600’s. His mother’s maiden name indicates Irish heritage although we have not traced the ties back to those who immigrated from that country. The links to my mother’s side of the family go back to the Civil War. To me, most of these ancestors are only names on a page. I do not know who they were beyond their names. I do not know their stories. (What stories they must have been—immigrating to a strange country, pressing west in search of land, fighting in the American Revolution and the Civil War, etc.) Yet, I would not be here today if they had not lived. I am the product of their lives, their adventures, their efforts, their love. I doubt that any of them looked forward in time to imagine my birth much less who I am today. Yet who I am today is because of them.

All Saints Day is about recognizing those who came before us. It is a reminder that who we are is not the product of our own efforts alone. Others contributed. We know and can name some of those who helped us on our journeys. We readily give thanks for them as we speak their names in our own list of our cloud of witnesses. Others, however, lie outside our awareness. They shaped us in ways we do not recognize. All Saints is acknowledging these touches on our lives—both known and unknown. It is giving thanks for those who shaped who we are today.

All Saints is also a reminder that we are shaping those who come after us. It calls us to be aware of—dare I say intentional about—how we shape them. All Saints calls us to be intentional in sharing who we are and in telling our stories. It calls us to be intentional in nurturing those who come after us that they may live out of who God created them to be more than who the world has shaped them to be. It calls us to share our faith stories that they too may know the God of grace revealed in scripture and supremely in Jesus of Nazareth.

All Saints reminds us that one day we, too, will be among those who have gone before. We, too, will be a part of the cloud of witnesses for those who come after us—those we know and those in the distant generations whom we cannot even imagine. It calls us to live as the followers of Jesus in such a way as our lives today will shape their lives and their faith in the future.

And so we pray: for those who came before us, shaping us in ways we do not see, we give thanks, Abba Father. We recognize their touch on our lives as your touch, shaping us into who we are today. We pray for those who come after us. Use us in shaping their lives as your Spirit works to conform them to the likeness of Jesus your Son. Continue to shape us in the likeness of Christ Jesus our Lord that your kingdom may come on earth as it is in heaven.