LOOK AT HIS NAME!

 

The naming of a child is important. Sometimes, a young couple will decide on the name of a child months before the birth. They think deeply about that name and its significance.

But there are other times when the name doesn’t come to our minds until the child is born. My wife and I once waited two days before naming one of our eight children. You may think we had just run out of names, but we wanted to get it right, for names are important. They define you and may describe you.

In Jesus’ day, the father had the final say on the naming of a newborn. Joseph did not name his son, however, for that blessed child’s heavenly Father had already named him. God knew Him from eternity. Joseph just cooperated with God, and an angel delivered the message from heaven to instruct this new father.

Joseph, son of David, don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife, because what has been conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” (Mt 1:20–21)

JESUS

The name “Jesus” or “Joshua” in the Hebrew language means “Salvation from God” or “Savior.” The angel explained to Joseph why this was to be His name for this newborn had come to live and die and rise again to do exactly that.

The title is given to our Lord above all others because He is a Savior in a sense in which no one else is or can be. He saves His people from their sins. The first link between my soul and Christ is not my goodness but my badness, not my merit but my misery, not my standing but my falling, not my riches but my need. He comes to visit His people—not to admire their beauties but to remove their deformities, not to reward their virtues but to forgive their sins. (Spurgeon, Spurgeon Study Bible, pg. 1281)

Just think of all the ways Christ saves us …

·      From the stain of our original sin,

·      from the power of our daily sins,

·      from the ruin of our calloused, deliberate sins, and our unthinking sins,

·      from the condemnation of our lifelong sin, and

·      from the presence of our sin eternally.

If you are not a follower of Christ, you may wonder why Christians talk about being “saved.” “What an odd thing,” you might say. “I don’t need to be saved from anything,” you might boast in your pride. But such a statement indicates you have not yet realized your desperate need and what your sin has done and is doing to you, marring the image God has created, and causing a separation between you and God.

You may not understand that you were a sinner by birth and by choice and that sin, left undealt with, brings eternal death. You might vainly believe that some of the more humane things you have done have tilted the scales in your favor and erased the stain of the hundreds of thousands of sins you have committed, but you have failed to see that the greatest sin is that God has sent His only begotten Son to save you, and you have rejected Him. You have ignored Him, believing that you can save yourself.

OUR SAVIOR

But those of us who have been graciously called to Christ; who have come to Him in brokenness and humility and cried out for Him to do His saving work in us; and who now have the Holy Spirit in us, constantly testifying to our human spirits that we are now adopted into His family and heirs and joint-heirs of Christ … we gladly sing of that name. For we have experienced and know something true and life-changing and glorious, which is this:

“And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.”  (Acts 4:12)

Oh, what a Savior. Jesus, my Lord!