What do we need from God? Housing? Food? Employment?
How about a good name?
If someone steals our good name, they have robbed us of something that can devastate us. How far will God go to return our good name?
Proverbs 22:1 tells us that a good name is better than riches, and a kind heart better than silver and gold.
A mother who had always lived a defeated life gave her son the name Mister. Why? She wanted her son to have the respect that went with that word.
Yet, as he grew up, upon meeting new people, he would give his name, often getting negative reactions. He endured many a beating, because people thought he was being arrogant.
Years later Mister changed his name. He had learned an important lesson that impacted his life. Mister had figured out early on that respect is earned, not given in a name.
In biblical times, a name described who a person was. A name might even be changed to represent a family connection, an occupation, or even a prophetic connection. Think of Abram whose name was changed to Abraham. Saul’s name was changed to Paul. These name changes were extremely important, because they were a reflection of who these men became.
Today, names are seen very differently. They can be feminine or masculine. Sometimes they roll off our tongues or recall people we’ve known years before.
Yet, our names are still as important to us as in biblical times.
Take social networking. The concept is that we invite people, many of whom we don’t know, to be our friends. If the posts and tweets we put out there are “liked,” then we get lots of “friends.” We get a good name.
If we read others’ posts and tweets, we can tell much about them. We sometimes forget that it goes two ways. They can also tell much about us.
Even if we don’t want to think about it, there are people checking us out. We can Google people, finding all kinds of information about them. People are also checking us out all the time. No, not romantically. They are checking out our name. Companies are looking at us financially, finding patterns in what we do, how we shop, and marketing to us. They are looking for our good name.
Even our finances can be affected by how good our name is. Landlords; employers; credit bureaus; utility companies; insurance companies. Our good name affects how much they will charge us.
In Part 2, we’ll find out how God wants to restore our good name.
Names may be used very differently today than they were in biblical times, but they still tell the world who we are.
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