When parents are expecting a child, one of the tasks, indeed, privileges, is to choose a name for the boy or girl to be born. Sometimes they choose a name because of its sound. Sometimes they want to honor someone, a relative or famous historical figure. Despite such intentionality, it is not always the case that a name is chosen for what it means. And I doubt if it is ever chosen with an understanding that this is who this child is. In this regard, names in the Bible are of a different ilk. They very often signify something about the person: Abraham, the father of many nations; Jacob, supplanter; Nabal, fool; Moses, drawn out, which refers to his having been drawn out of the water by Pharaoh’s daughter, but also that he would draw out God’s people from Egypt.
This association of name and person takes on eternal weight when we consider the name of God. Though there are several names by which the one true God is known, in an exchange with Moses we learn of the name that is unique to him: “God said to Moses, ‘I AM WHO I AM.’’ And he said, ‘Say this to the people of Israel, “I AM has sent me to you.”’ God also said to Moses, ‘Say this to the people of Israel, “YAHWEH, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you”’ (Exodus 3:14-15). From this name we learn of God’s transcendence and his imminence, his aseity and his covenant faithfulness. He exists, dependent upon nothing. But he is also near, carrying out his promise to Israel’s forefathers.
We can then understand why God places such a premium on his name, why it is that his people are not to “take the name of YAHWEH your God in vain.” His name is his, it is holy, it is revelatory. If we use his name as a cloak for evil, such as to validate an oath we have no intention of fulfilling, or if it is woven into colloquialisms that express our surprise or frustration, or defame it by making it interchangeable with some “four letter word,” we have gravely diminished the glory attached to the only true God for we have treated his name as though it were worthless, signifying nothing.
God’s name is to be reverenced by all, but this is a particular obligation for his people. As he places his name on them, calling them his own, it is to be borne well by them as they live their lives. And because it is name of the God of salvation, revealed to us in Jesus Christ, we are to confess it before all for “there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).
