What is in a Name?

I love to hear what the new baby’s name will be. Sometimes new parents will name the baby as soon as they find out if it is a boy or a girl. This, now days, is long before the baby is actually born and we call it by name before the birth. And we monogram things with initials before the actual birth. The name is established at that point forever.

 

Your name is important and it’s how we know you. When someone says a name to me a picture of that person comes to my mind and all that I know about them if I've had any experience with them (I hope. As I get older it can be a little iffy.) If not, I ask questions about what they look like, who they are connected to in my realm, and other questions to place them in a category

For several weeks I've been thinking about all of the names of God too. So when I got to Philemon verse 3 I kind of camped out for a while.

Paul calls himself bound as a self-prisoner to God and uses theses names for Him to describe Him and all the experience he (Paul) has had with Him:

1.       God – the Creator and Owner of everything and everyone (He created me and therefore He has full rights to call the shots.)

2.       Father – the One who gave you life, the One from whom you are genetically descended (At the point of my salvation I was forever spiritually genetically connected to my God.)

3.       Lord – the One with absolute unquestionable authority over you, your protector, your Master who has license to expect your obedience (When I put myself under His authority and am obedient to Him I am protected and cared for by Him.)

4.       Jesus – The human name for God incarnate (His humanity assures me that He understands anything I may go through or get myself into.)

5.       The Christ – the anointed, appointed, foretold, and promised One from the Father, the Messiah, the King of all people (I am given confidence that this is exactly the One that humanity was waiting for to free them from the bondage of sin.)

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus the Christ . Philemon 3

When Paul used those 5 words to name the Savior he was calling the names given to God before the creation of the world. He was calling the names of God established forever. He was bringing to mind all of the things he knew about God and all of his experiences with God.

Creator

Owner

Life giver

Authority

Master

Savior

Promised One

Messiah

King

Wow, just think about it.  All that is in His name!