“The J-Name”

Scripture Lesson: John 1:1-5, 10-18

Sermon Transcript for January 4, 2009

Holy Communion Celebrated

By Pastor Andy Kinsey

“…to those who believed in his name, he gave the
right to become children of God.”

- John 1:12

Prayer of Preparation

O Lord, from the hour we first believed to the hour at hand may the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be acceptable unto you, our Savior, Redeemer, and Friend. Amen.

The Message

On this first Sunday of the New Year, I greet you in Christ’s name! Though we as Christians began our New Year five weeks ago on the First Sunday of Advent, I trust you have been able to mark this special time with a sense of joy and celebration. I didn’t know it, but New Year’s Day is the one holiday that is universal! It is the world’s most observed holiday. I didn’t know that, but it makes sense! Everyone recognizes it!

Therefore, with the New Year upon us, I trust you have made your New Year’s Resolutions! I trust you have resolved to lose the weight you have gained between Thanksgiving and Christmas! I trust you have made the appointment to exercise at the health club! Be it resolved that I will run three miles every day! Right?

The late Erma Bombeck made some memorable Resolutions over the years. She once wrote the following. She resolved at the beginning of the year…

1. To go to no doctor whose office plants have died!
2. To follow her husband’s advice to put a little excitement
in her life by living within the family budget!
3. To never loan her car to anyone she gave birth to!

Sound familiar?

Joke writer Ed McManus has some words of comfort for those of us who are making New Year’s Resolutions. He writes: “Don’t worry about keeping those 2009 Resolutions. You only have to deal with them until February and then you can give them up for Lent!”

I think someone has been spying on us!

Let’s see, if we were to make a resolution for the New Year, what would we say? What kind of resolution would we want to make? Be it resolved that… How would we complete the sentence? What kind of resolution would we make?

First of all, do we have any regrets for 2008? For most folks, we would rather forget 2008! It has been a difficult year! Positives are hard to come by. We would rather forget the past!

And yet, as a famous philosopher once remarked, we may live life forward, but we understand life by looking backwards (Soren Kierkegaard). To be sure, we cannot live in the past, but we cannot ignore the past either.

Secondly, if there are regrets, what needs to change? What needs to happen?

If we were to write out our regrets, what would we write? That’s one way to confront our problems, both personally and corporately. In fact, it might be therapeutic for some of us as we enter a New Year to write out our regrets and burn them on the altar! That’s one way to get at what needs to change!

But let me ask you: does that approach really address what needs to happen? What do you think? Are there other ways?

I ask those questions because, as we read in John’s Gospel this morning, there is another alternative; there is another Way: In John’s Gospel, we hear words that don’t emphasize the past as much as they point to the future, that don’t get bogged down with regrets as they point to possibilities!

In fact, if we listen carefully to this passage, we can hear that the point John wants to make is not on what we have been but on what we can become!

Listen again to what John writes in one of the most beautiful passages of Scripture: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. And through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made…he was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him” (John 1-3, 10).

“Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, born not of natural descent, nor of human decision, or of a husband’s will, but born of God” (John 1:12-13).

Again: the focus is not on what we have been, or even on what we are now, but rather on what we can yet become! “Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the power to become children of God.”

Did you catch that? To those who believed in his name, he gave the right, the power, to become children of God!

Point: The key to becoming who God created you to become is to believe in his name, to recognize him as your Savior, to receive him as your Lord! That’s the key! The key is not on the past, but on the future. And what helps us to become what God wants us to become is to believe – to be in his name! That’s the key – believing in his name! It’s the name that matters!

After all, what are the songs we sing?

“There is a name I love to hear, I love to sing its worth;
It sounds like music in my ear, the sweetest name on earth.

O how I love Jesus, O how I love Jesus,
O how I love Jesus, because he first loved me!

“Kings and kingdoms will all pass away, but there’s something about that name!”

Not any name, but THAT name!

“Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, sweetest name I know, Fills my every
longing, keeps me singing as I go.”

“Jesus, name above all names – beautiful Savior, living Word!”

“That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord” (Phil. 2:9-10).

No other name calls forth a response the way Jesus’ name does! No other name moves us from point A to point B the way Jesus’ name does.

Think about it! Jesus – Immanuel/God with us! Jesus – the Word made flesh. Jesus – Son of the Most High! Jesus – Son of God, Son of Man! Jesus – Wonderful Counselor/Mighty God! Jesus – the Anointed One of God! The list goes on!

No other name can bring about the change we need than Jesus’ name!

Even how we say the name makes an impact! For example, you can tell a great deal about a person by how they say Jesus’ name: I have heard people say Jesus, and I have heard people say Jeeesus, and then I have heard people say Jesuuus! Jesus’ name matters! Not so much how you say it, but that you say it!

We gather, we worship, we sing, we pray, we celebrate Holy Communion, we baptize – all in Jesus’ name!

As Christians, we really can’t do anything part from that name!

A couple months ago, we shared the importance of Jesus’ name: Jesus, or Joshua, or Yeshu’a means “God is salvation,” or the One who saves us from sin! That’s what Jesus’ name means. Jesus’ name is a life-changing name.

Of course, in the Bible we know that names carry great importance, and that, in some cases, set into motion a person’s destiny: e.g., Abraham means “father of many.” Daniel means “God is my judge.” Elijah means “My God is Yahweh.”

In other biblical cases, names hold significance because of character
or appearance, as Esau, for example, means “hairy,” or Korah means “bald.” Names matter. Names tell us who a person is, or what a person may do.

For example, I was reading the other day how new research has discovered that people are influenced enough by their names that they will subconsciously gravitate toward objects and actions that begin with their initials. Peter, for instance, might prefer Pepsi, while Caleb might prefer
Coke. Tim might prefer Toyotas and move to Toronto, while Fred might prefer Fords and move to Fort Wayne. Though this seems half-baked at best, let me also share that the research showed how baseball players in the Major Leagues whose first or last names began with the letter K were slightly more likely to strike out! I’m just reporting what I read! (Leif D. Nelson and Joseph P. Simmons, “Monika Maladies: When names sabotage
success. Paper is available upon request.)

I can already see how people are calculating their names! So John and Joyce prefer a Jacuzzi in January in Jamaica!

Names matter! There is no such thing as a name that doesn’t matter!

It reminds me of the cute story I heard the other day about the manager who called a new guy into his office at work. The manger asked him for his name.

“John,” he said. “My name is John.”

The manager scowled, “Look, I don’t know what kind of place you worked at before, but I don’t call anyone by their first name. It breeds familiarity, and that can lead to a breakdown in authority. I refer to my employees by their last name only – Smith, Baker, Jones, – that’s all. And I am to be referred to only as Mr. Robertson. Is that clear? And now that we have that straight, what is your last name?”

And the new guy sighed and said, “Darling. My name is John Darling.”

And the boss replied, “Okay, John, the next thing I wanted to tell you…”

Names matter! And what is important for us to understand is that when it comes to Jesus’ name, there is power. There is power given to us to access God’s own life, God’s own heart, God’s own grace. There is power to become God’s own children.

It’s what we celebrated on Christmas. The message of Christmas is that God became like us that we might become like him! God became a child that might become his children!

To fully and completely make God’s own heart known to the world (v. 18), God chose to take on human flesh in Jesus. God chose to lift up a name above all names to reveal the depths of God’s love and forgiveness, to reveal grace and truth, especially as that grace and truth die on a cross.

In Jesus’ name, there is power given not only to bring salvation but to make those of us who believe in him the persons he created us to be – that we not only profess his name but we bear his name in what we do! Not simply a name to profess but a name to bear in what we do.

As Christians, we have Christ’s name in our name, and because we bear his name in our name it’s a part of who we are, and because it is a part of who we are, it tells us something about what we are to do – that our mission is to do what Jesus did!

Jesus people! Christians! The name matters!

At the end of our passage, John writes that “No one has ever seen God,” That’s true! No one has seen God, but they have seen us! And they know our names!

Grace Church, let me ask you: what resolution shall we make in 2009? What shall we say? Let me provide a starting point: Be it resolved that in 2009 others will come know us by the name Christian and that, in doing so, they will come to know the Name above all names – the name of the One who invites us now to commit our lives to him and to live out his grace and truth… Be it resolved that we bear his name in all we say and do!

Amen.