Luke 6:20-31
Then Jesus looked up at his disciples and said:
“Blessed are you who are poor,
for yours is the kingdom of God.
“Blessed are you who are hungry now,
for you will be filled.
“Blessed are you who weep now,
for you will laugh.
“Blessed are you when people hate you and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice on that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven, for that is how their ancestors treated the prophets.
“But woe to you who are rich,
for you have received your consolation.
“Woe to you who are full now,
for you will be hungry.
“Woe to you who are laughing now,
for you will mourn and weep.
“Woe to you when all speak well of you, for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets.
“But I say to you who are listening: Love your enemies; do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you; pray for those who mistreat you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also, and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who asks of you, and if anyone takes away what is yours, do not ask for it back again. Do to others as you would have them do to you.
There is a patron saint for almost anything. If you have a fear of caterpillars, meet St. Magnus - the Patron Saint for Protection against those creepy crawlers. Work at a gas station? St. Eligius is your saint. He was the patron saint of horses and blacksmiths, until cars came along and someone decided he should cover gas stations too.
If you are a beer lover, Arnold is your saint. The tradition goes, some thirsty people prayed to him to give them what they lacked and a pot of beer appeared. And if the morning after gets rough, there’s even St. Bibiana, the patron saint of hangovers. I’m not making that up.
Then, there’s Drogo, patron saint of unattractive people, not that any of you need to pray to him. I think you get the point. There is a saint for nearly every situation.
One of my favorite saints, and the one I think we need inspiration from today, is Saint Aelred of Rievaulx, the patron saint of friendships. You’ve probably never heard of him, which is part of why I love him. Aelred wasn’t known for miracles or dramatic conversions, but for the way he understood and practiced friendship as a path to God.
He was born in northern England, the son of a married priest before that became outlawed, and he was well-educated and well-liked from an early age.In his twenties, he served in the Scottish court under King David I: respected for his intelligence, diplomacy, and trustworthiness.
But at age twenty-four, he walked away from what was surely a promising career and entered the monastery at Rievaulx in Yorkshire. I’m sure his parents were thrilled since monking makes such good money.
He quickly became known for his warmth and wisdom. He eventually rose through the ranks and became the abbot of the whole monastery, overseeing more than 600 monks. But he didn’t lead the way we usually imagine leaders do—commanding, strict, or heavy-handed.Aelred was gentle and empathetic, rarely a harsh disciplinarian, and always attentive to the spiritual and emotional needs of the people entrusted to him.
He’s best known for his writing and preaching on friendship. Aelred had a gift for befriending the people others overlooked, those who were weak, temperamental, or thought to be less than holy. In his most famous work, Spiritual Friendship, he describes a true friend as:
“the guardian of my very soul” the one who protects all the secrets of my spirit in loyal silence, the one who bears and endures anything wicked they see in my soul. For a friend will rejoice with my soul rejoicing, grieve with its grieving, and feel that everything that belongs to a friend belongs to themself”.
That kind of definition might make us rethink who we call a friend. Aelred’s idea of friendship isn’t casual or convenient; it sounds more like the love of a spouse, a parent, a sibling, or that one person who walked with us through the best and the worst. And for many of us, that’s the person we remember today on All Saints Sunday.
Today is unusual in the church year. Instead of primarily giving thanks to the God we know in Jesus Christ, this Sunday is set apart to remember the people we have known and loved in Christ, the ones who have gone before us and now rest in him.
And whether we realize it or not, we’re also honoring the love shared between us: the risk of loving and being loved, or as Aelred might say, the holy work of friendship.
On All Saints Sunday, we remember not just the people we loved, but the risk it took to love them and the risk they took in loving us. Every real relationship carries the possibility, maybe even the certainty, of hurting and being hurt.
And that’s true of the saints we remember today. Some of them were anything but saintly. Some were difficult. Some were wounded, and some were wounding. Even the best of them didn’t consistently love their enemies, pray for those who hurt them, or give generously all the time.
But in the Lutheran tradition, that’s not what makes a saint. A saint isn’t someone who got it right. A saint is someone who tried, failed, and is forgiven by God. That is what makes a saint: a forgiven sinner.
Which means this loving and being loved is risky business, no matter who it is. C.S. Lewis puts it this way:
“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe and dark, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.
To love is to be vulnerable.”
Is there anyone who knows this risk — this vulnerability — more than the God we know in Jesus Christ? He left heaven, only to be betrayed by his own people, abandoned by his friends, and to have his heart beaten and broken until it stopped on the cross. And he did it so that we might be made into saints — forgiven sinners. Truly, there is no greater love than that.
This morning we don’t just remember the saints in our lives, we remember the love it took to be in relationship with them, and the risk that love always requires. Saint Aelred reminds us that to love is to risk. And to follow Jesus is simply to keep risking love again and again. Which means this life of faith is never without risk.
Today is not only All Saints Sunday; it’s also the launch of our capital campaign. You’ve seen the plans, the pictures, and you’ve given feedback along the way. And today we want to show you where all of that has led us.Because at the heart of this campaign is not just more seats in a sanctuary, or a bigger building. At the heart of it is more relationships. Buildings don’t make a church. Relationships do.
But buildings can give us the space where those vulnerable, holy friendships can take root. That’s what we’re after: a sanctuary that makes room for more people to experience the grace of Jesus Christ, and one that finally allows everyone to enter, serve, and participate fully in worship. And a Community Hub: a space where neighbors can connect, where learning and conversation can happen, where kids can play and grow, where anyone can meet, make, or find a friend.
Does this involve risk? Absolutely. Not just financial risk, though that’s part of it. The deeper risk is opening ourselves to the people around us.
We risk people coming into our space simply to use it — and nothing more. We risk people learning what we believe about God’s grace and deciding they want nothing to do with it.
And we risk forming new friendships that will stretch our hearts and our community to make room for the people God sends our way. We could get really attached to these people. We could give our hearts to them. And that requires vulnerability.
But that’s the life Jesus calls us to — a life of risk, of friendship, of love.
And if that is not at the heart of why we’re doing this — if all we want is a bigger building with more empty chairs and tables — then this campaign can be damned. But if we are willing to take the risk — to open ourselves, to make the kind of friends Aelred made, the ones others overlook and dismissed, and to share the love of Jesus with a community who needs to see it, hear it, and feel it — then we are truly rooted in grace and growing in mission.
Since there’s a saint for nearly every situation, let Aelred be our saint for this moment.
Not because he built anything, but because he loved people others ignored. Because he believed friendship was holy work. Because he knew the work of grace was making room for the overlooked and the imperfect.
This campaign is not about numbers or square footage. It is about making more room for that kind of love: the kind that turns strangers into friends, and friends into saints.
Because as Aelred wrote, “True friendship draws us right up to the edge of what it means to know God and experience God.”
Amen
