I began wondering if I had been named something else like, Sunday perhaps, would I still be who I am today? By the way Sunday is not randomly chosen, my father apparently wanted that name, inspired by a song by the Monkeys or Connie Francis?
Names were very meaningful, important and representational in biblical times. Naomi said
📖“Don’t call me Naomi,” she told them. “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. I went away full, but the Lord has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? The Lord has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me.” Ruth 1:20-21
Jesus means; God saves The Lord is salvation
📖 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” Matthew 1:21
But God knew me in my mother's womb, He knit me together....before my parents named me.
📖For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. Psalm 139:13
We had different names chosen for our oldest and youngest up until right before they were born. Our middle ...we took a long time to come to her name.
Would they be different people if they were Carrisa Jean or Bartholemew John? (Someone might not like us very much!)
Our names are our identifiers as we go through life. but we sometimes get called by the wrong name, or a nickname.
There has been horrible times in history when humans have been reduced to just a number, their names stripped away, but God knew every single one of them.
I began thinking on Sunday, it doesn't really matter what my name is, or even what I am called. One of my favorites right now is GiGi!
The Bible does say names will be written in the Book of Life.....
📖 I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it. Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life. Revelation 21:22-27
📖 I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. Yes, and I ask you, my true companion, help these women since they have contended at my side in the cause of the gospel, along with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life. Philippians 4:2-3
And God said we are written in the palm of His hand
📖 and we are written in the palm of His hand.
See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands; your walls are ever before me. Isaiah 49:16
BUT what name? The name we were born with? The name we acquired when we married? The name we legally changed it to? The name our mother calls us when we are in trouble, or our siblings call us?
What does the Word say our name is???
Chosen
You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. John 15:16
Redeemed
📖 But now thus says the LORD, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel:
- Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine". Isaiah 43:1
- 📖 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace. Ephesians 1:7
Child of God
📖 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— John1:12
Heirs with Christ
📖 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory. Romans 8:17
Ambassador
📖 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. 2 Corinthians 5:20
Servant
📖 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness. Philippians 2:5-7
📖 You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. Galatians 5:13
Friend
📖 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. John 15:15
📖 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. John 15:13
I don't believe we can even comprehend the "name" etched on God's palm for us. It is a special, unique moniker that is known to Him. It encompasses all that we are to Him, and when we hear it will know our Shepherd's voice.
📖 My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. John 10:27-28
When He was hung on the cross for the sins of the world I believe that me, my sins, my individual person crossed His mind. After all He was/is God, so it IS possible, He knew all of us BEFORE we were formed....He knew us, knew our sins and chose to die for them.
📖But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5:8
The song Hello My Name Is by Matthew West got me thinking all this.
🙏🏼 Lord, I pray that I understand and believe that the most important name I am called is who YOU say I am.❤️
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