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Somebody's
Calling my Name --
My Lord,
What Shall I Do?
by the Rev. Rich Smith
January 13, 2008
Isaiah 42:1-9, Matthew 3:13-17
Somewhere in my collection I have an old bluegrass song
called "The Baptism of Jesse Taylor". It tells the story of how a
little Tennessee town's most notorious sinners finally took the
plunge. "They baptized Jesse Taylor in Tinker Creek last Sunday,"
it begins, and it goes on to describe how the town is gonna be a whole
lot quieter now that the devil's right hand man is changing his
ways. In fact, they won't be able to call him that anymore.
Jesse is getting a new identity. Having made a certain name for
himself, a reputation, he's now going to make another one, and become a
whole new man.
I suppose that when you get right down to it, that
is what the sacrament of baptism is really all about: making a name for
one's self, taking on an identity, being recognized as somebody.
When Jesus went down to the Jordan and was baptized
by John, it wasn't to repent of sins, as was the case for most who went
there, it was to reveal his identity. Each of the Gospels has an
account of this event -- this morning we read Matthew's -- and while
they differ in the details, they all agree on one thing: that at his
baptism, Jesus was revealed as the chosen one of God. There are
differing reports of the Spirit alighting on him, various descriptions
of mysterious voices, but the bottom line is, here Jesus' identity is
proclaimed: This man is God's own son!
So when we baptize someone in our church, though it
may seem a far cry from a repentant sinner being immersed in a river,
it still has to do with the matter of identity -- Who you are, and more
importantly, WHOSE! To be baptized is to receive a name and to be
accepted into the family of God's people, into the body of
Christ. This is more important than the method used, or the age
of the person, or the words employed. It’s about identity in
terms of belonging, belonging to God and to one another. And if you
listen real hard during a baptism, you can almost hear a voice from
heaven: "This, too is my child!"
That could be said about each one of us! We
have all been given names and included in the family of God---even if
we have not been formally baptized, by the way; after all, our ritual
is simply a recognition of what God has already done, in calling our
names and in making us God's own.
Each of us has a name! Without a name, we are
nobody. That's one of the problems of modern life -- that so much
of technology, in the name of efficiency, reduces us to cyphers and
bytes in a computer, a universal product code: a drivers license
number, a social security number, even an offering envelope
number. We choose screen names and get assigned PIN’s.
There’s major debate about Homeland Security’s proposals to mandate
secure ID cards, with encoded information. But in the end, we've
all got names! We're not nobodies! And our names are very
special, very sacred things, and like God's, should not be taken in
vain!
Having a name makes you a real person, not just a
lost soul. Even when we give animals names, we treat them
differently than we might otherwise. For example, Robert Fulghum,
in his book, it Was on Fire When I Lay down on It, tells of the
primitive Akah villagers in the mountains of northern Thailand, where
their dogs are kept in pens like pigs, but their cows are treated like
companions, whom they work along side. They give their cattle
names, and would never, never think of eating one. Their dogs,
however, have no identities, and frequently turn up ON the dinner
table, not under it! (As some of my Midwestern friends tell me,
when you grow up on a farm you may love fried chicken, but it always
makes you uneasy eating one whom you knew personally!)
When you know a person's name, they have an
identity, they are real, they are part of the family, and you have to
treat them differently. One day some years ago while driving I
found myself a bit impatient with the car ahead of me, and actually
blasted it with my horn. Road rage! On passing, I discovered it
was driven by someone I knew, one of the more mature members of my
church, to be exact. I was so embarrassed. Kind of slunk
down in the seat so they wouldn't know it was me, and wished I'd been
driving my wife's car. If I'd known that I knew them, I certainly
would have been a lot more patient. (I later confessed this
misdeed in a sermon, and though it only happened once, six different
people came up later and said, So it was YOU!)
Now besides identifying someone as a part of a
family, names have often said something important about a person.
In early Biblical times, a name often described a quality (Isaac:
laughter; Haggai: born on a festival day; Esau: hairy; Hashum: flat
nose), or offered a sign (Emmanuel: God is with us;
Maher-shalal-hashbaz: The spoil speeds, the prey hastens).
By about the 3rd or 4th century B.C., however,
children were named mostly for others, for some great person of the
past (perhaps a way to bring back the good old days?); and the practice
of Papponymy began to take hold, which isn't as sinister as it sounds:
it's simply naming someone for his grandfather.
The poet Sandra McPherson wrote a poem entitled,
“Helen Todd, My Birth Name.” It’s about being adopted. Seems her
biological mother wrote the name “Helen Todd” on her birth certificate;
but then two days later her adoptive parents renamed her “Sandra
McPherson.”
And she wonders how life might have been different
if she’d lived it as Helen Todd. Having a different name might have
completely changed who she was. Instead of being the poet Sandra
McPherson, perhaps she might have turned out to be the math teacher
Helen Todd.
Names are powerful in shaping who we understand
ourselves to be. They tell us something about who we are and where we
come from. They tell us who claims us.
One of the more unique girl’s names I have
encountered is Nevaeh. That’s a name that wasn’t even in
circulation until about ten years ago. But in 1999, there were eight
baby Nevaehs born in the United States. The next year, there were 86
Nevaehs. Today the name is in the top 100 most popular baby girl names,
even beating out Sara, Vanessa and Amanda!
Where did Nevaeh’s popularity come from?
MTV. Seems that a Christian rock star by the name of Sonny
Sandoval appeared on MTV with his baby daughter. He announced that her
name was Nevaeh: “Heaven spelled backward,” he explained. And
there you have it.
Recently a Chinese couple attempted to name their
child “@.” “At.” As they “The whole world uses it to write
e-mails and, translated into Chinese, it means ‘love him.’” If “@” had
been a twin, maybe the other one would have been named “&”!
We worked very hard at naming our children. We
needed something unique, which you have to have when your name is
Smith! For our son, Aaron, we also wanted something that couldn't
be shortened to a nick name. Some of our relatives had trouble
with that. One thought that Aaron was a bit unusual, and so we ought to
call him Chris, a shortening of his middle name, Christopher. No,
we said, it's Aaron. Well, he said, his initials are A.C., a
brand of spark plugs, maybe I'll call him "Sparky". We were
forced to remind this relative of his own initials, C.C., Canadian
Club, and that we might have to call him Whisky Face. Being a
tee-totaler by conviction, he dropped the subject! Then, there
was a dear lady who was simply aghast at our choice, and was sure
we wouldn't actually call him Aaron, since she was from South Carolina,
and never forgave Aaron Burr for shooting Alexander Hamilton, a
Southerner, in a duel!
Aaron, of course is a Biblical name: he was Moses'
brother, the mouthpiece. Aaron does like to talk, in the right
setting, if you ask him about his music. Christopher, his middle name,
simply means, "Christbearer" and he is that, though as with all
children, you have moments of doubt!
As for our daughter, Alison is a German name meaning
"of sacred memory". We picked it because we liked it, it went
well with Smith, and the only trouble we’ve had is getting people to
spell it with only one "l"; Her middle name, Rose, was my
great-grandmother's name, as well as the name of a dear now departed
lady from our Tombstone church, and our favorite flower. Her
Irish red hair-temperament confirms that roses don't come without
thorns -- but they're worth it!
My own family name, Smith, comes from the time when
Blacksmith shops were as prevalent as gas stations are today, and as
necessary. It came from my German grandparents who came here
before the Civil War, and was actually Schmidt until the Great War of
1914-18 made it advantageous to Americanize it. But that's part
of my identity/understanding as well!
Now names are often thought to contain a certain
power. If you know the name of someone else, and especially if
you have given them their name, you have a kind of power over them,
which you can use responsibly, or not. Why do we pray in the name
of Jesus? In Genesis, Adam names all the living things and has
dominion over them. And novelist and theologian Frederick
Buechner writes, "When I tell somebody my name, I have given them a
hold over me that they didn't have before. If they call out, I
stop, look, and listen whether I want to or not." This is
even true for God, he notes, for "In the book of Exodus," he points
out, "God tells Moses that his name is Yahweh, and God hasn't had a
peaceful moment since."
There is a great paradoxical truth at work here --
to reveal your name is to relinquish power (e.g., with door-to-door
salespeople); but it also saves you from the void of
dehumanization. Our greatest fear is not dying, but dying alone,
uncared for, unknown. But to be known carries its own risks as
well. You reveal your name and you let someone into your life,
you take on a certain vulnerability. Your name will be called,
and you will have no choice to but to turn and listen.
Thus it is both a comfort and a source of no small
anxiety to discover that God knows your name. We all want to be
somebody, and in God's eyes we are; Our names are written in the book
of life, and the very hairs on our heads are numbered (for some
that's saying more than for others!); but, sometimes we would like to
be a little more anonymous! That's probably why the back rows of
the church always fill up first! We want to be known, and then
again, maybe not! If this being a Christian means we're gonna get
called on, then I'm not so sure....Remember the Old Testament prophets,
called by name by the Lord God, called out of obscurity and given a
task! Our Old Testament lesson offers a classic example of the
prophetic call. "Here is my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in
whom my soul delights; I have put my spirit upon him..." What
always happens is that God singles someone out for an important but
risky mission. They protest (Jeremiah: I am too young!
Isaiah: Woe is me for I am unclean! Amos: I'm just a country
bumpkin!) but God assures them that they will be given the strength,
the where-with-all, the smarts, the abilities and the courage they need
for the task. It's like being in school -- who's going to be the
first to recite the Gettysburg Address? Let me see some
hands! And you slink back in your seat and wish you weren't so
tall. And then the teacher points and calls you by name: Richard,
let's hear from you! And how can you refuse?
My call to the ministry was something like
that. It wasn't an announcement from the pulpit, "Anyone who is
interested, please see me..." No, it was more specific, a direct
word from my pastor: "Richard, I want you....and I believe God
wants you...for this work!"
So to make a long story short, here I
am. But, more importantly, here you are! And I presume you
are here in part because God knows your name too, that God has called
you into the fellowship of the church, or is calling you, and God has
chosen you for some important task and is even now equipping you to
perform it. And sitting in the back row will not keep you from being so
noticed and so chosen! For you too may be one whom God
would call "my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul
delights; I have put my spirit upon you."
There is the story told of the Sunday School child
who was heard to pray: "Our Father who art in heaven, how did you
know my name?"
God knows your name, because ultimately, it is God
who named you, and to whom you belong! And God continues to name
you and claim you, and call you out to be a bearer of light and love
and life,... in your family, on your job, in all your relationships....
even unto the ends of the earth!
.
Last updated Wednesday, Februrary 29, 2008
1
Westmoreland Circle
Bethesda, MD 20816
301-229-7766
Email the church office: churchinfo@westmorelanducc.org
www.westmorelanducc.org
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