The Lord God Almighty, the Lord is his name! – Hosea 12:5
INTRODUCTION
How do you feel if someone calls you by name? Well, your attention goes to where the sound came from isn’t it? Salt and Light Ministries will take you to an intriguing voyage to explore the various names of God and its usefulness in our Christian journey. Your name is the main thing people ask for when they meet you. It is the most important means by which someone can identify and refer to you.
Names have great symbolic import in Scripture. a person’s name connects to their identity and individuality It’s important that we know the names of God because it reveals His character as Father, Creator, Merciful, Avenger just to mention but a few.
WHY CHRISTIANS MUST KNOW THE NAMES OF GOD
It is important to use a person’s name when interacting with them. It is, after all, their most significant connection to their identity. When you address someone using their name, you acknowledge their importance, which is the easiest way to get their attention. Hosea 12:5 helps us to acknowledge specifically the name of the LORD as His memorial name.
Thetext illustrates that the name of the LORD is more than simply the means by which you remember Him. His name carries His renown, His reputation. It also bears His very being.
You cannot separate the LORD from His name. And in His name, you are taught His character, what makes the LORD to be the LORD, what sets Him apart from everyone else, what makes Him to be God unlike any gods, what makes Him holy—distinct, different, unique, separate from all others. His name and character are intrinsically bind together and that is why Hosea says He has to be worshipped.
GOD’S NAME AS A MEMORIAL
God also tells Moses that His name, Yahweh, is His memorial. Specifically, God says, “This is My name forever and this is My memorial from generation to generation” (Exodus 3:15, author’s translation). What does it mean for God’s name, Yahweh, to be His memorial? Many translations render this verse so that His name is how He is to be remembered.
That is certainly part of what it means for “Yahweh” to be His memorial. A few other texts help reveal more. Isaiah 26:8 ties God’s name and His memorial together as the desire of His people. Psalm 135:13 poetically places the name of the LORD and His memorial together even for generations to come.
GOD REVEALS HIS PERSONAL NAME
God reveals His personal name. His name is Yahweh. You will find variant spellings of that name as it is brought from Hebrew into English. Since biblical Hebrew was written without vowels, some choose to bring God’s personal name from Hebrew into English by transliterating the four consonants of His name as YHWH.
Moses knew the fear of God. In Exodus 3, God appears to Moses, speaking to him from the burning bush. Moses rightly hides his face out of fear (Exodus 3:6). God then tells Moses why He is appearing to him: He has heard His people’s cry and He will deliver them from slavery in Egypt. Moses will be His chosen instrument to accomplish their deliverance. This is no light task. Egypt was then a political and military powerhouse.
Moses objects, first asking, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” (Exodus 3:11). God’s response is simple: “I will be with you” (Exodus 3:12).
Moses further objects that when he tells the people of Israel that the God of their fathers has sent him, they will ask, “What is His name?” So, God reveals His name to Moses.
God responds, “I AM WHO I AM. . . . Thus, you will say to the sons of Israel, ‘I AM’ has sent me to you” (Exodus 3:14, author’s translation). In the very next verse, God further instructs Moses, saying, “Yahweh, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you” (Exodus 3:15, author’s translation).
Yahweh Is the Self-Existent, Eternal God. God has no need of us.Thatsimple fact can be a little offensive to our human nature: that part of us that wants to be significant; to be needed.
But it’s true God does not need us. He doesn’t need anyone. He is completely whole within himself, and he is eternal, he has always existed, and he always will. He is the beginning and the end, the Alpha and the Omega.He is the only one in existence who can be described this way.
The rest of us need quite a lot of medicine to keep existing to a point before succumbing to death! The most powerful human on earth is still at the mercy of His health and fortune.God stands alone in needing nothing, in being wholly self-sufficient.
YAHWEH IS A RELATIONAL GOD
Yahweh is only used in the Bible when the author is talking about God’s personal relationship with his people.
A great example of this is Psalm 19. The author talks in the first 6 verses about Elohim (another name for God) and his relationship with the material world. Then, in verse 7, he shifts and starts to write about Yahweh and his relationship with those who know him and who are in covenant with him.
The fact that God introduces himself to us as “Yahweh” tells us that his first priority in relating to us is making sure we know that He is the intensely personal God, seeking to have a relationship with His people.
This is a God who is so love-motivated to know us and to be in relationship with us that He came to earth as a human and took the punishment we deserved.This is indeeda relational God.
PRAYER POINT
Yahweh is the name that is most closely linked to God’s redeeming acts in the history of His chosen people. We know God because of what He has done. When you pray to Yahweh, remember that He is the same God who draws near to save you from the tyranny of sin just as He saved His people from tyrannical slavery in Egypt.
Remain Blessed!
Please continue to join us on Asempa 94.7 FM – Sundays 5.30 am., Sunny 88.7 FM – Tuesdays 5:30 am; and YFM 107.9 – Sundays 6.30am; for our Radio Bible Study as well as Sunny FM 88.7 FM every Sunday at 3:30 pm. for Hymn and their Stories
