Revelation 21:1-4 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.  I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.  And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.  ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

What does a “saint” look like to you? What would be the words that you would use to describe one? When I ask that question to various classes, the responses I get back often include words like “holy,” “good,” “Christ like,” “God-fearing.” You get the idea. All good answers. The Greek word for saint, hagios, refers to “separate from common condition and use; pure; righteous.”

Those are helpful definitions, but I especially like the one that Frederick Buechner wrote: “In His holy flirtation with the world, God occasionally drops a handkerchief. These handkerchiefs are called Saints” (2004, p. 352). 

 What a marvelous picture of those saints God places in our lives. Add this thought to your pondering as well: 

 “God, the shy and proper lover whose heart has been stolen away by the world, drops a handkerchief in the pure, naïve hope that the world, that someone, will notice and pick it up and give it back and in so doing notice God and fall madly in love with God and talk with God, laugh with God, cry with God, even fight with God and fall asleep in His embrace” (Buechner, 1993.
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