Suffering Unto Sainthood
Sermon preached by Dn. James Wilcox on Sunday, June 7, 2026
Readings from Heb. 11:33-40: 12:1-2, Matt. 10:32-33; 37-38; 19:27-30
In today's Epistle reading, we are introduced to a number of the Saints in the Church who are depicted as stalwart heroes of the Christian faith. And no doubt, there are many such Orthodox Saints from which we can choose when it comes to the spiritually heroic. And they are right to be venerated for their great and many acts of self-offering! As the Epistle informs us, some were tortured, some were sawn in two, and there were others even who were capable of resurrecting dead! But because our Saints are so often depicted in this manner, I imagine we've grown to think of Sainthood as something belonging to an upper echelon of Christians, per se, who resemble spiritual giants, or those who can perform the miraculous. And to this I would direct our attention to the LAST verse in today's Epistle reading where the writer of Hebrews states "… let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith." [1] This i would argue is a very basic definition of what it is to be a Saint. One who holds fast, perseveres, and endures life's most difficult moments while keeping our hearts, eyes and mind firmly fixed on Jesus Christ.
And if we are truly looking to Christ as the "pioneer" of our faith, as the text states, we must understand that Christ has pioneered this faith through His own suffering on the cross. He didn't simply will the Christian faith into being through some mighty act of magic, or call down the Kingdom from heaven and establish it here on earth, but Christ pioneered and perfected our faith through his own unjust suffering on the cross. And more importantly… it was His own unjust suffering the He accepted voluntarily! And this He did, in order to perfect the Christian faith on our behalf.
This concept may be a little difficult to comprehend, but truly there is something quite simple behind it. And that is the acceptance of what simply IS. Life's most difficult moments will come to each of us. There is not a single person in this room who can avoid the experience of suffering. We can question it, we can try to deny it, we can do our best to avoid it, but suffering, nevertheless, will come to us. It is something from which we cannot escape. It is simply part of the human experience. The hard part is learning to voluntarily accept it.
A few years after Brooke and I were chrismated into the Orthodox faith, I learned that an old college roommate of mine was very close to death. Brooke and I were living in New York City at the time, so I booked a bus to Boston and made every effort to get to the hospital where he was being treated in order to see my friend Sam one last time. I said numerous prayers as the bus motored along, asking for the intervention of the Saints, and praying to God for a miracle. Sadly, when I arrived, I was only permitted into the waiting area. As it turns out Sam was nearing the end, and only the family was allowed to be with him in his final moments.
I awoke the next morning and decided to make my way to St Mary's. After hearing the official news that Sam had died shortly after I left the hospital, I decided it would be good to talk with Father Antony. I arrived just as Orthros was getting underway and Father stepped out to meet me in the front pew, where I emptied my heart for a good ten minutes or so. It was very much like being in confession, except that instead of confessing my sins I was confessing my doubts. "Why did this happen?" I asked. "We can't know," Father responded. "This isn't fair!" "I know it isn't." Father responded "Sam was a man who loved God, loved his wife and and now his kids have no father! This feels like such waste!" Father continued listening compassionately. What about these miraculous healings I hear about coming from Mt Athos or from any of the Saints in our Church?" Father Antony — as the wisened spiritual counselor he is — turned said, "Those healings are more rare than a rosebud in a Russian winter." My heart sank a little. I had to sit with that for a moment or two. After some time had passed, Father turned to me and said something that has stayed with me to this day. "James," he said "These are fair questions with no easy answers. Do take as much time as you need to mourn over your friend Sam. But know that the longer you dwell upon these questions the longer you will continue to suffer."
I had to sit long and hard on that one. But in the end, I got there, even if it wasn't an answer I was content with at the time. The longer I avoid accepting that Sam is gone, the longer I allow myself to suffer over it. Healing begins when we accept what simply IS. After all, what could I really do? Sam wasn't coming back. And so it was in that moment that I was introduced to what it means to willingly accept suffering.
Now this was a lesson I learned when I was young in my Orthodox faith. Today on this Sunday of All Saints I'm further along, of course but I'm no Saint. And i'm often left to wonder … what does the acceptance of suffering look like from a Saintly perspective?
The life of St Olga of Alaska, one of the Church's newest saints, I believe has something to offer us on this point. Olga was an ordinary woman who endured great hardship and suffering in her own life. When suffering came to her, she turned it into a means of helping others to heal from their own brokenness. A news article on her recent glorification, puts it this way:
"As the wife of an Orthodox Christian priest, [Olga] was a "matushka," … She became known in church communities across Alaska for quiet generosity, piety and compassion — particularly as a consoler of women who had suffered from abuse, from miscarriage, from the most intimate of traumas. She could share from her own grief, having lost five children who didn't live to adulthood." [2]
Now here is a woman who knew the pain of losing not one child, but five! Some to miscarriage. And if we're being honest, the modern Orthodox Church doesn't have an abundance of resources for women who've undergone this form of trauma. Matushka Olga refused to remain indifferent about this. She identified with her own suffering, accepted it, and turned it into a very saintly means of helping other women who've gone through similar unspeakable abuses, many of which the Church hasn't learned to talk about. Where the Church was unable to minister, Matushka Olga was the Church. Her life wasn't one of wonder-working miracles or theological heroics, but she she remains exemplary in the example of learning to suffer with those who are suffering, to help bring healing and to remind them they are still human beings created in God's image.
Friends, we should think of ourselves as sinners striving to become Saints. Each of you is beautifully made in God's image. No matter what form of suffering has already visited you, no matter what form has yet to meet you, nothing can strip you of your beauty as a child of God. May each of us persevere in the race is set before us always looking to Christ who Himself suffered unjustly, long before we came into being. And may we allow our own sufferings to transform us into more saintly, and Christ-like people, who seek the well-being of all who are in need of Christ's unconditional love.
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[1] Hebrews 12:1-2.
[2] "Alaska Native woman, 'everybody's helper,' is Orthodox church's first female North American saint," accessed June 7, 2026, https://www.ncronline.org/news/alaska-native-woman-everybodys-helper-orthodox-churchs-first-female-north-american-saint