82 WHAT DOES YOUR NAME MEAN?
82 WHAT DOES YOUR NAME MEAN?
To my wife, I am Stephen; to my kids, I am Dad; to my grandkids, I am Grampy.
Different people know me by different names; some to my face and some behind my back. Each name has a meaning to that person and conveys a certain personality that I exhibited before that person on our first and consecutive meetings.
At work, I’m known as Steve to some, Bud to others and to some I’m nameless. All these names mean that I’m the guy that delivers product to them and they don’t have to know me personally; they only have to call me something for a few minutes in a day to communicate with me.
In between my close family and those, almost, strangers that I meet every day are a group of people that know me to some degree, depending on how important they want me to be in their lives; some want me to be their good friend and get to know me well. These generally call me Stephen or Steve; others, that only want to know me a little, call me Steve or whatever is comfortable for them to remember me by at that time.
There are those in my life that know me as Mr. Porter or Stephen Porter; these are generally business acquaintances or professional people that I meet. There are also those that know me because they knew my Father, Charlie Porter, and to them I am Charlie Porter’s boy.
There are those that call me ‘my friend’ or ‘my brother’; showing an intimacy that they want to have a close relationship with me or are trying to relax my guard into trusting them for one reason or another.
These are all the names that I am called to my face. Behind my back, I’m sure that I am known by a lot of names that I don’t hear like fool, idiot, that guy, our man, etc. and with entirely different meaning and emphasis connected to it.
Aside from what people call us is the personality that we project in connection to our names. Some people connect the word gentle with my name because of my actions towards them, others connect the word foolish with my name because of my actions towards them, and others may connect the word angry with my name because of my actions towards them and so on.
Our name means something to everyone that knows us; it gives them an expectation when we come into their presence again. Some are glad to see us again, while others just tolerate us until we leave.
How we treat God also builds an expectation in Him of how we will treat Him the next time we go to Him and our name, mentioned to Him, brings Him feelings of how we feel and act towards Him.
If we continually whine and complain in His presence, He will come to expect that of us every time we call on Him. Our name will become associated with whining and complaining to Him.
He has done all this so that our name can be called ‘His friend’ in the presence of His creation, the heavens and the heavenly beings. He will, one day, call our name either to wicked judgement or heavenly rewards. Everyone will hear what name He calls us and how He calls us on that day.
We are building that relationship with Him now. What does your name mean to Him?
