In the old Celtic calendar the last night of October was, Old Year’s Night or The Night of All Witches. Because this was being used as an excuse for degrading orgies, the church transformed it into All-Hallow-Even meaning The Eve of All Saints! The word hallow means to set apart so a saint is someone who is set apart to God. In the Lord’s prayer we pray “Hallowed be Thy name”. This reminds us that God’s name should be set apart above all names and always treated with the greatest respect.

After Halloween comes All Saints’ Day. One of the early saints was Saul of Tarsus who started off as the terrorist from Tarsus who thought he was pleasing God by persecuting Christians! Saul was a very religious but a very proud Pharisee who thought he was so perfect that he would certainly get to heaven! One day he was travelling to Damascus armed with letters from Jerusalem giving him authority to imprison Christians. Suddenly a light shone on him from heaven and a voice said, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? … I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.” [Read Acts chapter 9]. Saul was transformed! He changed his royal name Saul to the humble name Paul meaning little and called himself less than the least of all saints.

The Tarsus terrorist was now Paul the Apostle! Instead of delivering letters of hatred he wrote letters of love addressed, “To all the saints,” in Rome, Corinth, Ephesus and many other places. These saints were people from all walks of life who had turned from their sins to Christ and been adopted or set apart by God as members of His family. These saints were first called Christians, meaning Christ’s ones, at Antioch because people could see their Christ-like lifestyle. [ Acts 11:26 ] Are you a saint?

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