JOY!

Behold, the virgin shall be with child, 

and bear a Son, 

and they shall call His name Immanuel, 

which is translated, "God with us."

--Matthew 1:23, NKJV

Wonderful Names

“If I’d known what my children would be like once they were grown, I could’ve chosen more appropriate names for them,” she said.

Although that’s true, none of us have that kind of foreknowledge, do we? Thus, we simply choose a name we like or one that’s been in the family for generations or one that’s the same as someone we admire. Sometimes we create a new one.

However, some parents mentioned in the Bible were told. For example, an angel appeared to aged Zacharias to tell him he and his wife Elizabeth would have a baby and that they were to name him John. (That name means “Jehovah [God] has been gracious, has shown favor.”)

An angel also appeared to Mary, a young virgin, and said to her, “…you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name JESUS.” (A name derived from the Hebrew name Yeshua, which means “to deliver, to rescue.”)

Jesus’ life matched the meaning of His name. He did deliver us from our sins and rescue us from being cast into Hell, forever separated from the One who loves us more than we can conceive.

He also lived up to another name given to Him centuries before His birth: Immanuel. That name, which means “God with us,” refers to not only His deity (God) but also His identification with and His nearness to mankind.

As Henry Barraclough’s beautiful hymn (1915) says:

Out of the ivory palaces

Into a world of woe

Only His great eternal love

Made my Savior go.

He came down to us in order to provide the way for us to go up to live with Him throughout all eternity. In the meantime, we who know Him can come to Him with our praises, with our gratitude, with our confessions of sins, with our pleas for help, with our brokenness, with our….

Because God the Father knew exactly what His Son would be and do, every name He chose for Him is appropriate, each one describing who He was and is and forever will be. 

Oh, blessed be every name given to our wonderful Savior and Lord!  

Note: A longer version of this was published in the Chapel Hill News and Views magazine in December 2019. 

Line Leader

When I taught third grade students many years ago, the students yearned to be the “Line Leader” for the day. I thought about that just recently when I read an article by Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer in the April 2015 issue of *BBN Monthly Newsletter. In the article, Dr. Lutzer says, "Christ was resurrected with a new, indestructible body, a prototype of the body we shall receive,” as Philippians 3:20b-21 affirms.

Dr. Lutzer then says, “Our Lord goes ahead of us, first through the gates of death and then beyond to His resurrection and ascension to glory.” Thus, we are promised safe passage on the path He followed.

He mentions that W. Frank Harrington uses the title a “Go-ahead God,” based on Bible accounts such as when God, in the form of a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night, led His people through the wilderness. Centuries later, Jesus, when speaking to His disciples mere hours before His arrest and crucifixion, said, “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also” (John 14: 1-3, ESV).

Thus, Jesus is not only the “Line Leader” (based on what the Apostle Paul said in Romans 8:29, “the first-born of many brethren”) and the “Go-ahead God,” He is also “the Ever-present God” (to whom David is speaking in Psalm 139) and “Immanuel” (God is with us, Isaiah 7:14).

Oh, how blessed we are, Dear Reader, to have an awesome God who loves us and leads us and LIVES IN us in this life and in the life beyond.

Note: *BBN=Bible Broadcasting Network is my favorite radio station. And, much to my delight, I recently downloaded an app for it on my cell phone, which means I can listen in anytime, anywhere! To listen on your computer, visit www.bbnradio.org.