The word “saint” is commonly misapplied by people in the world. Our neighbors might use the word to denigrate those they believe to be a “holier than thou” kind of person, who walks around with nose in air, acting better than everyone else. Certainly God’s people should not act that way, but what’s frustrating is how attitudes like that are often summarized as “he thinks he’s a saint” or “she thinks she’s a saint.”
A saint does not refer to someone who thinks he is better off than the rest of the world.
A saint is someone who has been saved by God, “set apart” (that’s the meaning of the word) by Jesus Christ, and made distinct from the world. That doesn’t mean saints are better than the world. In the words of my mentor Bob Turner, “Christians aren’t better than the lost; we’re better off.” I’ve been blessed with great riches for which I did nothing to deserve. That makes God the one who is better, not me.
Unfortunately, because the world doesn’t understand that about the saints of Christ, they misuse the word. And, unfortunately, too many of my brethren are eager to let that misunderstanding take root when they say to people “oh I’m just a sinner like everyone else.”
NO YOU ARE NOT!
I wish I could convince all my brethren to stop calling themselves sinners. You are not a sinner. You are a saint. You might sometimes sin, but the difference between you and a sinner is the fact that you are saved FROM your sins, as opposed to a lost person/non-saint, who is lost IN his sins.
Stop calling yourself a sinner. Call yourself a saint because that word best-describes what God has done for you: You have been “set apart” from the rest. When we ignore that we undermine the work Christ did for us on the cross and the blessing He gave us through His death and resurrection.
Call yourself a saint. It will raise eyebrows, it will make people challenge you, it will force you to explain what you are and how you came to be that way, and it will allow the true meaning of the word to be known by the lost in the world. If you want to “set yourself apart” from the way everyone else talks about themselves, then start by describing yourself as someone who has been “set apart.”
Call yourself a saint.
~ Matthew