A Wonderful Name

Names matter. Names are important. Do you know the meaning or the significance behind your name, and why your parents picked that name for you? Or what about picking the names of your children; what was that experience like? Hopefully, it was one that was positive and exciting. For us a lot of care went into the selection of the names we chose for our kids. David was named for our Pastor and for my Papa. Emily was so named out of our admiration for David and for Mindy’s sister. Isaac was named…well, that’s an interesting kid of story.

We were done having kids after Emily. In fact, in November of 2007 we traded in our Mini-van for a much smaller vehicle. In January of 2008 we learned that we were expecting again. Isaac is a very biblical name. Do you know where it comes from? Abraham and Sarah named their child Isaac, because when Sarah heard that she was going to have a baby she laughed. Isaac means to laugh. And even though we were young enough to still be able to have children, Mindy and I figured that we were beyond our child bearing years, like Abraham and Sarah, and yet when we found out that Isaac was coming, our reaction was laughter and joy. And as it turns out, if you have ever heard this kid laugh, you know he is very well named.

Well in the church calendar today is kind of a special day. It’s not that it’s new year’s day, although I wish you a very happy new year. Remember that for the church new year’s day was back in November when we celebrated the first Sunday in Advent. But do you know what today is on the calendar in the church year? It is the name and circumcision of Jesus. It’s a day that we don’t often hear about all that much, but that is because it doesn’t usually fall on a Sunday.

So we begin this New Year, not with a bang, but with a name. You probably recall how Jesus got his name. When Joseph found out that Mary was pregnant he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and told him that the child in her is from the Holy Spirit. Don’t be afraid to marry Mary. She will bear a son and you will give him the name Jesus.

The name Jesus was not selected because it was a popular name, although it was a popular name. It was not selected because it was a strong family name, although it certainly could have been. It was not selected because it was cute. But the name that was selected describes who this child is and what he does. He is the one, who saves people from their sins.

The name Jesus means “Yahweh [the Lord] is salvation.” Another way you could translate it would be to say “Yahweh saves.” And this is exactly who Jesus is, and what he does. He is none other than Yahweh himself. He is God in the flesh. He is God incarnate. He is our Immanuel, God with us. Out of his great love for you, for me, for all the people of the world he became one of us and came into our world in order to do for us what we are unable to do for ourselves.

He meets all the requirements of God’s law and fulfills it. He willingly lays down his life on the cross in order to pay the price for our sins. He deals a death blow to death and defeats the powers of sin and devil with his resurrection three days later. Therefore, because of Jesus and for his sake we are able to, and indeed we do, enjoy a relationship with our God. And not just any relationship, but the kind of relationship where he is our dearly loved father, and we are his dearly loved daughters and sons.

So Jesus does for us and is for us exactly what his name says. He is God in the flesh, who for us and for our salvation came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit. Sound familiar? What is awesome about this God in the flesh, this incarnation is that God did not just look like a human being. He did not just take on the form of a human being. But he was in fact a human being. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary. He was born. And in this one verse Gospel lesson for today, we see that he was eight days old. And that he was circumcised.

This baby whose birth cause us to marvel, and celebrate, and give gifts, and sing songs; this baby, who is only eight days old, is God himself. He was named Jesus and he was circumcised at eight days old. But why even make mention of this? And why give it its own day of commemoration in the church calendar?

Well, because there is an important theological point being made here. At issue is not a cultural practice or a medical procedure, but it has to do with God’s promise. It goes all the way back to Abraham. If you go to the seventeenth chapter of Genesis you will see how God’s covenant, God’s promise, is made with Abraham. It is at this point that his name is changed from Abram to Abraham. And God promises to be his God and the God of all of Abraham’s children, which is pretty amazing because at this point Abraham does not have any children with Sarah. And the sign of this promise? Well, that’s where the circumcision comes in.

It is a physical reminder of the covenant that God made with Abraham and with his offspring. I will be your God. I will bless you and you will be a blessing. Through you all the nations of the earth will be blessed. Abraham’s offspring were chosen for a special purpose. They were chosen to share, and make know God’s love in the world. They were chosen to bear witness to who God is. And they were to live their lives in such a way as to show this.

Through Abraham’s descendents and the way they lived their lives, the people of the world would know who God is, they would know the life and salvation that come from him, and they would know his love and what it is to live in relationship with him.

But, as you know, that didn’t work out so well. And while they may have carried the sign of the covenant physically, their hearts were uncircumcised. That is they were not living in accordance with the covenant. But God’s love for his people, and the people of the world was so great that he became a human being so that he could fulfill that covenant on our behalf. And live the perfect life that God requires that we cannot do on our own. That is why he is being circumcised here. It is part of him living the life that God requires.

He did for us, what we are unable to do for ourselves, and we see this in the very way that he lived his life, for he lived his life in accordance with the covenant and all of its requirements. He did this, so that we could be people of God and live life in relationship with him. He did this for you and for me.

We do not have access to God based on how good we are. We do not have a relationship to God in accordance with how well we keep the laws of the covenant. I am a pretty good person, so I have a pretty good relationship with God. He would love me more if I behaved better. That is not the case at all. Nothing could be further from the truth. Although I think we can act that way sometimes.

We have access to God because of and for the sake of Jesus. We have access to God through Jesus, who lived the perfect life we are unable to live. Therefore, as we heard in our epistle lesson for today, we have received adoption from our God. We get to live life with him, not as the worshipers of a deity, but as God’s own dearly loved sons and daughters.

And while people like to make distinctions among ourselves and compare ourselves to one another and create in groups and out groups and all that kind of stuff. In Jesus those things are removed. We are all loved and valued the same. This doesn’t mean that we don’t have different gifts, roles and abilities. Because we obviously do. But what it means is that those different gifts, roles and abilities do not separate us from one another. For we are all loved greatly by our God. We are all made righteous not by our own works, but because of and for the sake of Jesus.

He keeps the covenant for us. We have forgiveness, salvation and life in him. We are made offspring of Abraham, adopted children of God because of him and his great love for us. Such an important and special thing should not be ignored. And so the church sets aside this day to remind us of these wonderful things.

As we begin another year, may you know the joy of living life as God’s own dearly loved daughters and sons, and making that love of God known in the world around you. Now and always. Amen.