We all wear name tags.
You may not be wearing one of those sticky paper, red bordered, name tags on the top left corner your shirt right now, but I know there are names that have been assigned to you. Good or bad. Maybe both.
Before I was born, while my mother was pregnant, she was told, "Don't tell anyone you're pregnant, you haven't been married long enough and people might get ideas." Shame was the name assigned to me before I was even born. What was supposed to be an occasion for joy, was covered in shame and fear. What names have you been tagged with?
In Babylon (modern day Iraq), thousands of years ago, a group of young Israelite captives were undergoing cultural indoctrination, and as part of that inclusion into Babylonian society and service, they were assigned alternate names. They already had names given to them by their Hebrew parents; names that reflected who they were and who the God they trusted in was. But that didn't stop the king of Babylon (Nebuchadnezzar) from tagging them with more culturally "appropriate" names.
Have you ever experienced that? I mean the assignment of a label to identify who you are to someone? When I attend conferences, I'm given a lanyard with my birth name and job title - Joseph Furcinitti, SharePoint Systems Designer. I could take pride in that title; it sounds almost impressive. But that is not who I am. I do that, but I am not that.
The real question is, what name has God, the Father, assigned to you?
I think we can learn a lot, maybe even be inspired, if we see the names of those four captives, the young Israelites who are well know to anyone who has read the book of Daniel. Let's look, and compare the meanings of their names (God-assigned and King Nebuchadnezzar-assigned) -
A name is much more than a string of characters with meaning. A name is given to identify the character, the state, the person that the name has been given to. Many years later Paul, apostle and author of much of the New Testament, penned some of our God-assigned names; the state, the position, the "who we are", that God has assigned to those who belong to Him in Christ (Ephesians 1,2). As His child you are,
LOVED, CHOSEN, HOLY, WITHOUT FAULT, FOLLOWER, BLESSED, NEAR TO GOD, FAITHFUL, UNITED WITH CHRIST, ADOPTED, BELONGING TO HIM, FORGIVEN, SAVED, HIS, PURCHASED, ALIVE, SEATED WITH JESUS, UNITED WITH CHRIST, UNITED WITH CHRIST, UNITED WITH CHRIST (no, that repetition wasn't a mistake), A CITIZEN, A MEMBER OF GOD's FAMILY.
Wow. What a name (what names!) He has given to us who believe in the gospel. That's one of the many reasons it's called "Good News".
You may not be wearing one of those sticky paper, red bordered, name tags on the top left corner your shirt right now, but I know there are names that have been assigned to you. Good or bad. Maybe both.
Before I was born, while my mother was pregnant, she was told, "Don't tell anyone you're pregnant, you haven't been married long enough and people might get ideas." Shame was the name assigned to me before I was even born. What was supposed to be an occasion for joy, was covered in shame and fear. What names have you been tagged with?
In Babylon (modern day Iraq), thousands of years ago, a group of young Israelite captives were undergoing cultural indoctrination, and as part of that inclusion into Babylonian society and service, they were assigned alternate names. They already had names given to them by their Hebrew parents; names that reflected who they were and who the God they trusted in was. But that didn't stop the king of Babylon (Nebuchadnezzar) from tagging them with more culturally "appropriate" names.
Have you ever experienced that? I mean the assignment of a label to identify who you are to someone? When I attend conferences, I'm given a lanyard with my birth name and job title - Joseph Furcinitti, SharePoint Systems Designer. I could take pride in that title; it sounds almost impressive. But that is not who I am. I do that, but I am not that.
The real question is, what name has God, the Father, assigned to you?
I think we can learn a lot, maybe even be inspired, if we see the names of those four captives, the young Israelites who are well know to anyone who has read the book of Daniel. Let's look, and compare the meanings of their names (God-assigned and King Nebuchadnezzar-assigned) -
A name is much more than a string of characters with meaning. A name is given to identify the character, the state, the person that the name has been given to. Many years later Paul, apostle and author of much of the New Testament, penned some of our God-assigned names; the state, the position, the "who we are", that God has assigned to those who belong to Him in Christ (Ephesians 1,2). As His child you are,
LOVED, CHOSEN, HOLY, WITHOUT FAULT, FOLLOWER, BLESSED, NEAR TO GOD, FAITHFUL, UNITED WITH CHRIST, ADOPTED, BELONGING TO HIM, FORGIVEN, SAVED, HIS, PURCHASED, ALIVE, SEATED WITH JESUS, UNITED WITH CHRIST, UNITED WITH CHRIST, UNITED WITH CHRIST (no, that repetition wasn't a mistake), A CITIZEN, A MEMBER OF GOD's FAMILY.
Wow. What a name (what names!) He has given to us who believe in the gospel. That's one of the many reasons it's called "Good News".
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