Saint Patrick's Legacy

This time every year on March 17th Americans celebrate a holiday called Saint Patrick’s Day. I wonder how many people actually know who and what they are celebrating on this holiday. Who was Saint Patrick, and why do we memorialize his life? What legacy has he passed on, and does his life have significance for us today?

We can draw some important lessons from this incredible life. Here’s his story:

Circa 405 A.D., a band of Irish raiders laid siege to an English village. In the raid they overpowered and kidnapped a teenage boy, taking him captive to a land foreign to him – Ireland. It was there that this boy was now given an Irish name – Patrick – and put to work as a slave tending sheep.

Young Patrick proved himself a hard worker and a trustworthy servant to his master. And the hours in the field looking after sheep gave Patrick ample opportunity for prayer. It was in those seemingly endless and lonely hours that Patrick found the God of his parents. Patrick later recalled that in a day’s time out in the fields it was not uncommon for him to utter more than a hundred prayers. Like King David before him whom had also been a humble keeper of sheep, young Patrick got to know God very intimately during those lonely years of isolation.

One night Patrick had a dream about a ship that would take him back to his homeland. By this time Patrick’s master grew to trust him, and he profited well with faithful Patrick seeing after his herd of sheep. So after several years of service, Patrick approached his master and asked for his freedom as payment for his trustworthiness. But Patrick’s master was a businessman, and he knew he would have trouble replacing such a skilled and faithful worker. So Patrick’s request was denied.

Patrick, however, walked away from his master and back into the fields, and just kept on going…and going, and going. Patrick fled on foot for days and covered over 200 miles of terrain until he reached the coast where the ships docked. It was there on those docks where he knew he would find the ship he had seen in his dream.

Patrick did find passage on a ship as a servant looking after dogs, and after two more years of severe trials trying to get home, he finally reached his destination and was reunited with his family in England after being separated for eight years. But their reunion was not to be final.

After a time, Patrick had another dream that would change the course of his life. In his dream, he saw an Irishman beckoning him to come back to Ireland, and Patrick was filled with a desire to bring the hope of the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the very people who had kidnapped and enslaved him. For the next several years Patrick prepared for his mission by studying to join the Catholic priesthood, and was ordained in 417. He eventually returned to Ireland on a missionary journey that would essentially be his life’s work.

The work was not easy, however. Ireland was a pagan land where the Druids had great power and influence. The Druids were a group of religious pagans who practiced sorcery, worshipped nature, and whose religious practices involved human sacrifice. They were advisors to the king and queen, and the entire country was in the grip of their perverse religion. And they did not take kindly to Patrick attempting to teach a new and better way to their subjects. Patrick once wrote that he daily expected to be violently killed or enslaved again, yet he forged ahead. On numerous occasions the Druid priests conspired to murder Patrick, but through Divine intervention Patrick’s life was spared and his work continued.

A Druid Priest

One incident that particularly outraged the Druid priests as well as the king himself occurred on the night that the annual fire to honor the Druid gods was lit. On this particular night, which happened to be during the same time of year the Christians celebrate Jesus’ resurrection, a huge bonfire was built, and to give further honor to the occasion, it was forbidden that any other fire be lit. In direct defiance of this law, Patrick went to one of the highest hills in the area – the hill of Slane – and built a fire so massive that it could be seen by nearly everyone in the surrounding villages. The message to the Druids and the king was clear: Your gods are dead and false, but my God is alive and the Light of the world.

The governing powers were incensed. They called Patrick to appear before the king, and the Druid priests were demanding his immediate execution. However, it was there in the presence of the ones who had the power to take his life that he was given the opportunity to share the uncompromised message of Christ. And it was this very night that was instrumental in the king and queen eventually denouncing the Druid religion, banishing the Druid priests, and embracing Christianity. As a result of this pivotal night and Patrick’s continued work in building churches and preaching and teaching throughout the country, the entire country of Ireland was eventually converted to Christianity.

Patrick’s Lasting Legacy
So many lessons can be drawn from Patrick’s story that all of them cannot be expounded upon here. We could talk about his qualities of perseverance in difficult and lonely times; we could point out his compassion; volumes could be said about his willingness to forgive his tormentors. For our purposes here, however, let us consider his bravery to stand up for what he knew was right and challenge the status quo, though he knew it could mean his very life.

The fire he built on that hilltop that fateful night was not only a monument to God, but is serves today to memorialize a man who was not content to enjoy the comforts of “going with the flow.” For a cause higher than himself, Patrick laid down his ambitions and comforts in order to stand and face tremendous opposition in the hopes that his single act of defiance would be instrumental in bringing about change that would ring throughout all the ages. And indeed it has.

Where are the Saint Patricks of our time? Instead of taking a stand, we slink back into the shadows and try to blend in. We use the same worldly slang and even profanity; we adorn ourselves in the same worldly and seductive attire; we watch the same TV shows; listen to the same music; and are barely affected when someone on the movie or TV screen blasphemes the precious Name of our Lord. Our spirituality is poisoned, and we don’t recognize it. Our minds are perverted, and we know it not. We have eyes but we don’t see our wretched condition. We have ears but we don’t hear the cries of the prophetic voices of our time who call for repentance and purity. Alas, we don’t even seem to know what repentance is, and our concept of purity is at best a very twisted version of God’s. Like the church in Laodicea whom Jesus addressed in the book of Revelation, we have said to ourselves, I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing (Rev. 3:17). But I believe what Jesus said to the Laodicean church is what He might be saying to the American church today. "I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were one or the other! So because you are lukewarm – neither hot nor cold – I am about to spit you out of my mouth… You do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked" (Rev. 3:15-17).

It's time to get red hot for the Lord like Patrick was. It's time to take a stand against the moral decay of our culture by refusing to be particpants in it, and that means we will often have to make difficult choices. But it must be done. Every one of us has a mission from God we are here to accomplish; some small, and some great. And part of that mission will always involve the mandate of Ephesians 5:11 - "Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them."