Genesis 17: 1-7, 15-16 Psalm 22: 23-31
Romans 4: 13-25 Mark 8: 31-38
Speak, Lord, for your servants are listening.
Do you know what your name means? Anyone? Just shout it out…(this is the assembly participation portion of the sermon.) I took the liberty of looking up the meaning of a few names of folks I knew would be here this morning. Here are a few that I found: Vicki means Victorious. In English, Jackson means “Son of Jack”, but in Scotland it means “God has been gracious.” Gordon means “round hill”. In German, Lorraine means “Made famous in battle”. Knowing a few of our Scouts, I checked out the meaning of their names. Peter, as we also know from Scripture, means “rock.” Grant means “great”. And not surprisingly, Scott means “Of Scottish origin”.
Not everyone likes their given name, especially if that name is cause for teasing or doesn’t fit well with their last names. Rob Morrow and his wife named their daughter Tu, so her full name is Tu Morrow. And then there are nicknames. When my younger brother was a toddler he could not pronounce the letter L, so he could not say Julie. Instead he chose a nickname for me…DoDo. Awesome.
Way back in 1922, a book was published, called “How to Name Your Baby Without Handicapping It for Life” by Alexander McQueen. In it, McQueen admonished, “Give your children names indicative of what you would have them be–in this world and in the world to come–.”
In our reading from Genesis today, Abram and Sarai have enjoyed their names for the length of two very long lives. Although their lives have been long, and although they have been full lives, lived closely to their God, Abram and Sarai do not have the desire of their hearts and what they believe to be the only way that they will fulfill their purpose for their people….there is no male heir. There is one illegitimate son of note, Ishmael, who was conceived by Sarai’s servant Hagar, with Sarai’s full cooperation. But for Abram and Sarai, there has been no heir.
And in today’s reading God comes to Abram and tells him that this is Yahweh’s covenant, God’s promise, to both Abram and Sarai, that they will be the father and mother of a multitude of nations. These elderly two, who are unable to bear a child.
To prepare for this life in the new covenant, God changes their names. Abram becomes Abraham. Abram meant “high father” and Abraham means “father of multitudes.” Sarai meant either “barren mountain” or possibly “contentious”, but Sarah means “Princess” or “lady”.
This passage from Genesis is also the first time that God is named “El-Shaddai” or as it is translated in our reading, God Almighty.
What can it mean that El-Shaddai, God Almighty, comes to Abram and Sarai, and does something so remarkable at such a late time in their lives, that it means that their their very identities, are changed?
This week we, again, have watched as disasters, both natural and otherwise, have played out in the news. Some are global concerns…as we watch oppression continue to reach out its tentacles of fear and hate; or as we hold our collective breath as we wait to see what happens in Israel and Iran. Still other stories come from familiar places on our own soil, familiar stories of nature’s fury unleashed on those who have been so besieged by these familiar tornadoes that one wonders how they find the strength to rebuild yet again. And there are the tragedies that are startling no matter how many times we re-live them; of young people, the same age as many of us gathered here today, who are so confused and oppressed and hopeless that they resort to unimaginable violence. And three teenage classmates die and countless lives are forever changed.
At this point, I want to pause, and say to all of the youth gathered here today, that if you are, at any time, dealing with something that seems much bigger than you, that seems too hard to bear or too heavy to carry or that you imagine to be too shameful to share….there is help and there are people who will help you. Teachers, counselors, your parents, your friend’s parents, your scout leaders, your pastors, this pastor…there is someone there who can help you. Growing up is hard. It is. But there is help. And if, God forbid, the adults have betrayed or abused or turned away from you, keep looking until you find a safe space.
So often, too often, it is easy to become defined in life by our circumstances. Tell me, do any of us remember the name of the boy who fired those shots in Chardon Ohio last Monday? Even his first name? It was T.J. T.J. Lane, who is now being named as ,disturbed, sick, mentally unstable.
Or the young Georgetown University Law student called horrible names by an extremist right wing talk show host. What is her name? Anyone? Her name is Sandra. It is not the terrible things she was called on the airwaves. It is Sandra.
All thirty eight victims of this week’s tornadoes had names, too. I couldn’t find them, though. And all of the victims of all disasters, both natural and made by human hands and hearts, have had names. First names, that meant something about who they were. First names, spoken by their mothers and fathers at their birth. Names called in roll call in grade school.
Names are powerful. Ask any person who stands at the Vietnam Memorial in Washington D.C. and touches the name of their soldier. Ask any person who stands in New York City or Oklahoma City or in the field in Shanksfield, Pennsylvania and lifts a hand to a name of a person they have lost.
What is your name? What kind of power and promise and possibility is present in your name? I don’t want to know what your name means in its literal sense. I want you to think about what your name means to you. The way it sounds when it is spoken or called out by someone you love. Or the way it sounds when you hear it in exasperation or disappointment. What does your name mean to you?
How else are you known? By what other definition? Are you Boy Scout or Girl Scout? Beloved daughter or son? Sister or brother? Friend or enemy? Are you a bully or a peace maker or an agitator? Are you a victim or a perpetrator? Are you known as wise or foolish, calm or agitated, brave or fearful, rich or poor, good or bad…what are those other names, those other ways you are known?
Some of the ways we are known are due to choices we make and some aren’t. But here is the good news, the Gospel news, that is true for every one of us. God has another name for us. For every single one. It is Beloved Child of God. No matter the name we were given at birth, no matter then name that has become attached to us because of what has happened to us or because of a choice we have made…we are known as Beloved Child of God.
It is our truest name. It is true enough that we can write it on that name tag if we so chose and let it be the name by which we are known. Of course that means we have a roomful, no a city full, no….a world full of God’s beloved children. And how we respond to that is our choice, every day. How we respond to our own name as God’s beloved child and how we respond to every other person as beloved child of God could change the way we see ourselves and others. And that, I think, is exactly what God has in mind.
Amen.
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