give me Your Name...

"What an idiot!"
"You're such a doofus!"
"Did you see that jerk just cut me off?"
"Why are you being so stupid?"
"Ugh--he's so annoying!"
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The pastor of the church I visited this past Sunday spoke on the tripartite nature of man. In the course of his sermon, he reminded us that everything we learn in life about the world, we receive through our five senses; everything we learn about God, He communicates to us through our spirit.

In the middle of it all, our souls seek identity, trapping our spirits in the fabric of self-consciousness. No longer are we totally God conscious, centered on His will (as Adam was in the beginning); instead, we are a product of the "I-will" oriented nature of Lucifer in Isaiah 14, which he passed along to Adam and Eve at the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The sense of self that was absent in Genesis 2:25 suddenly surfaced in Genesis 3:7, and we have been running around seeking identity ever since.

There are two identities competing to imprint themselves on our souls. There is an identity we receive through our physical senses from the world (reading magazines, watching television, listening to people around us), and the identity that God tries to communicate to our spirits. Hebrews tells us that the Word of God is the only thing that can cut through the self-focused nature of the soul to the spirit of man so that God can communicate from Spirit to spirit. What we read in the Word is truth.

Pastor Sino's message deeply resonated with something the Lord has been working in my heart for several months regarding identity. Revelation 2:17 promises that the one who overcomes will receive a new name from Jesus; and Revelation 3:12 promises the same man or woman that Jesus will give to him/her His new name. We thus exchange our identity for the one He gives to us, just like a woman who marries accepts a new identity by adopting her husband's name. People view her through the lens of her husband's name, for better and for worse.

The law of patents makes it clear that only the originator has the right to name the creation. We see this at work in numerous ways throughout daily life, from building names to virus strains and vaccinations. The same principal holds true in a spiritual sense. Only one time in scripture do we see that God relinquished His right to name all things; He gave this right to a man who was completely God-centered and God-focused before sin entered the Garden of Eden.

Therefore, when we take it upon ourselves to tell someone who they are without hearing the Lord's thoughts about them, we are presumptuously setting ourselves up in the place of God in their lives. The Lord uses people to communicate His heart and thoughts to other people, but we must always speak in line with His thoughts and His words about them. Just as a bridegroom does not take kindly to anyone insulting his bride, so the Lord will rage against those who deal with His Bride in any manner that is not tenderly loving.

This is why our words should heal, not hurt--why gossip is so dangerous to those who abuse others in the church (even behind closed doors); they invite the judgment of God on their lives for maligning the Bride He passionately desires. This is doubly true of those who dare to speak against His Jewish people (and since Jewish blood runs through the veins of many without their awareness of that fact, it's best to keep that in mind when talking about anyone).

With that in mind, I've started compiling a (by no means exhaustive) list of what God calls us. I welcome and request your input! I'll be updating as I discover more names... =) Bless you all!
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Who does God say I am?

1. Daughter (Matthew 5:9: Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.)

2. Blessed (Matthew 5:3-10: the beatitudes)

3. Beloved (Deuteronomy 33:12: "Let the beloved of the LORD rest secure in him, for he shields him all day long, and the one the LORD loves rests between his shoulders.")

4. Accepted (Ephesians 1:5-6: having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved.)

5. Desired (Song of Songs 4:9: You have ravished my heart, My sister, my spouse; You have ravished my heart with one look of your eyes, with one link of your necklace.)

6. Precious (Psalm 72:14: He will redeem their life from oppression and violence; and precious shall be their blood in His sight.)

7. Beautiful (Song of Songs 4:1: How beautiful you are, my darling! Oh, how beautiful! Your eyes behind your veil are doves. Your hair is like a flock of goats descending from Mount Gilead.)

8. Lovely (Song of Songs 2:14: My dove in the clefts of the rock, in the hiding places on the mountainside, show me your face, let me hear your voice; for your voice is sweet, and your face is lovely.)

9. Unique and perfect (Song of Songs 6:9: but my dove, my perfect one, is unique, the only daughter of her mother, the favorite of the one who bore her. The maidens saw her and called her blessed; the queens and concubines praised her.)

10. Fearless (Psalm 91:5-6: You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday.)
11. Satisfied (Psalm 17:15: And I—in righteousness I will see your face; when I awake, I will be satisfied with seeing your likeness.)

12. Friend (John 15:15: I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.)

13. New creation (2 Corinthians 5:17: Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!)

14. Free (John 8:32: "Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.")

15. Loved by God (John 16:27: No, the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God.)

16. Spotless (2 Corinthians 5:21: God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.)

17. Chosen (1 Peter 2:9: But you are a chosen people...; Ephesians 1:4: just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love; John 15:19: If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.) -- [I may be blogging about being chosen here in the next few weeks...]

18. Royal (1 Peter 2:9: ...a royal priesthood...)

19. Holy (1 Peter 2:9: ...a holy nation...)

20. Called out of darkness (1 Peter 2:9: ...who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.)

21. King and priest (Revelation 5:10: "And have made us kings and priests to our God; and we shall reign on the earth.”)

22. Enlisted soldier (2 Timothy 2:4: No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier.)

23. Fruitful (John 15:16: You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you.).....and bearing the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.)

24. Dead to sin (Galatians 5:24: Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires.)

25. More than a conqueror (Romans 8:37: ...in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.)

26. In covenant and remembered (Genesis 9:15-16: I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.")

27. Blessed, especially when I bless Israel (Genesis 12:3: I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.")

more to come....