What's in a name? It's a good question. Most of us would probably say “not much.” After all, it's what's inside that counts. And yet names do have meaning. I did a bit of research on my own name for example. I discovered something I never knew. I've never actually looked up the meaning of my last name. “Davis” can mean many things, apparently. It means “son of Davie.” It's serves as a pet form of the more formal first name “David.” It can also mean either “commander,” “beloved,” or “friend.” That was all very interesting to me. I never realized that the name “Davis” could have so many different and very diverse meanings, because I've always just taken my last name for granted. My first name I was more familiar with. “Steven” (with a “v” because my momma knew how to spell it properly!) is derived from the Greek and it means “crowned one.” Do some research sometime on your own name – first and last. You find out some very interesting things that can sometimes give you hints about your ancestors and who they were because last names especially often referred to a person's identity or livelihood, so that if your last name is “Carpenter” you can be pretty sure that you had distant ancestors  who worked with wood. Other things that I discovered were that “Lynn” is an English name meaning “waterfall” and, of course, “Hannah” is a well known biblical name that means “grace of God.” I didn't, of course, have time to investigate the names of everyone in our church family, but I did look into what our names might tell you about the staff here at Central – and I discovered that “Robert” means “bright fame,” “Darlene” means “little darling,” “Douglas” means “dark water,” and “Heather” means “flowering plant.” As for our Chair of Council – Jim, your name means “supplant” or “replace.” It's all very interesting, and although we tend to downplay the meaning of our names with phrases such as “what's in a name” in the Bible at least names were considered very important, so that children were often given a name that reflected on what was in the thoughts of their parents at the time of their birth.

 

     In today's Gospel passage, Jesus suggested that indeed names are important – or at least one name in particular is important. Jesus prayed this for His disciples: “protect them by the power of Your name – the name You gave Me – so that they may be one as We are one.” The name of God not surprisingly has always been seen as an important name. “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God,” says the fourth commandment. God's people are to treat the name of God with the respect that it deserves. Psalm 9 says “those who know Your name will trust in You.” Knowing someone's name is a sign that you're in some sort of relationship with that person. To truly know and revere the name of God is to truly trust God. Jesus' words tell us that there's a power to the name of God that goes beyond the power of a mere word and that must mean that it does more than identify Who God is. The Bible uses a lot of names for God. To be honest, given the problems involved with translation I'm not even sure that it's possible to come up with an exact number of how many names are used for God, but I do have on a my bookshelf a series of five books – five! - that discuss just the biblical names for Jesus! That's a lot of names, but there is one name for God that stands over and above all others, and that the name I think Jesus was meaning in today's passage.

 

     Moses stood before the burning bush on the heights of Mount Sinai and received his instructions to go to Pharaoh and to demand the release of the people of Israel from their bondage. Exodus tells us that  “Moses said to God, 'Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is His name?' Then what shall I tell them?' God said to Moses, 'I am who I am.'” God wasn't being deliberately obtuse with Moses. That name actually tells us something very important. God's people need to know nothing more than that God is; that God exists; and that God can be whatever God chooses to be. Basically the name means the self existence of God. God is He Who was, Who is and Who will be always. God is the origin and the essential quality of life, the only true life. God is existence and the One without Whom there would be no existence at all. I find it fascinating that Ramana Maharshi – who was a Hindu scholar and sage – actually said that of all the names and definitions that one could attribute to God, “none is indeed so well put as the biblical statement 'I am that I am.'” From our perspective, understanding this as the name God claimed for Himself is a call to humility. The prophet Micah calls us to “walk humbly with our God.” Here is the reason. God identifies Himself as “I am who I am,” not as “I am whoever you think I am.” We don't get to define God for ourselves. God is Who God is. None of our doctrines or dogmas can completely explain God, none of our denominations or religions can fully define God and none of our rituals or sacraments can fully reveal God. God is Who God is, not who we want God to be. This comes back to the Latin phrase I shared with you last week: “Deus cognitus, deus nulles” - a God comprehended is no God. Our calling as people of faith isn't to understand or define God; it's to enter a relationship with God through which God will reveal Himself as God chooses to do so. 

 

     Jesus tells us that God's name was given to Him, and as Christians, our claim is that God is fully and perfectly revealed through the life of Jesus Christ: that Jesus' life was the life God lived as a human being.  You will come across many people who will try to get you to believe that nowhere in the New Testament does Jesus ever claim to be God. Well, even if you set aside the last few words of today's reading - “that they may be one as We are one” - there is another even more dramatic passage in John's Gospel. Called before the Jewish religious leaders in John 8, Jesus said, “'Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing My day; he saw it and was glad.' 'Your are not yet fifty years old,'” was the reply, “'and you have seen Abraham!' 'I tell you the truth' Jesus answered, 'before Abraham was born, I am!' At this, they picked up stones to stone Him.” Jesus claimed God's name for Himself with the words “I am.” That's why those to whom He was speaking were going to stone Him – that was the punishment for blasphemy; for claiming equality with God. They understood what Jesus was saying. They had no doubts. Surprisingly enough, most of the doubts seem to come from within the Christian community itself, in spite of the fact that Jesus' desire was that this name of God would become the source of unity for God's people in the world.

 

     “... protect them by the power of Your name – the name You gave Me – so that they may be one as We are one.” Again, we find our unity, our calling, our destiny and our salvation not through the external and outward things we do – although make no mistake that it's important to live in a manner consistent with how Jesus lived – but rather through claiming the name of God which calls us to humility and by claiming the name of Jesus – which means “the Lord saves!” That's the power of God's name. It takes a disparate group of people from all ages and genders and races and all with our own unique gifts and talents and weaknesses and makes us one. It takes us rich or poor, young or old, male or female, black or white or anything else you can think of and and it tells us that none of those things matter – because by the power of the name of God we are one people in spite of our differences.

 

     We live in a world today that often refers to itself as “post-Christian.” Even Christians themselves don't seem to know quite what to make of this Jesus Whom we claim to follow. It's really quite simple. In the words of Paul:

 

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the church; He is the beginning and firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything He might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through His blood, shed on the cross.

 

     To those words I can add nothing. I simply stand in awe of the power of God's name and claim the unity God's name grants me with all who claim His name.