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 many of us wear invisible name tags stuck to our souls, imprinted with names that have been assigned to us by someone else. Some of these names may be flattering, some may be disparaging. Some may invoke pride and joy, others shame and regret.

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 process 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, king 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 in someone else's eyes? 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 who I am is more than what I do.

The real question is one of identity. What matters most is what name God, the Father, has assigned to you.

I think we can learn a lot, maybe even be inspired, if we consider the names of four of Nebuchadnezzar's captives, a group of young Israelites who are well known to anyone who has read the book of Daniel. Let's look, and compare the meanings of their God-assigned and King Nebuchadnezzar-assigned names - 

God assigned name	God assigned meaning	King assigned meaning	King assigned name
Daniel	God is judge	Bel will protect	Belteshazzar
Hananiah	God is gracious	Inspired of Aku	Shadrach
Mishael	Who is like God	Belonging to Aku	Meshach
Azariah	God is my help	Servant of Nego	Abednego

A name is much more than a string of characters; a name has meaning. A name is given to identify the character and the state of 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 as believers. These names speak to the state, the position, the who-we-are, in Christ. In the book of Ephesians, chapters one and two, we are told that as his child we are, 

LOVED

CHOSEN

HOLY

WITHOUT FAULT

A 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, those repetitions weren't a typo)

A CITIZEN

A MEMBER OF GOD'S FAMILY

Wow. What a name. What names! These have been given to those of us who believe in the gospel. And our new names are one of the many reasons we call the gospel, "Good News". We are no longer who we were or what we've been called or identified as. We are now new in him.