Names matter. We choose them with care. If we are parents we
know that we take risks when we name our children – we might get it right or
wrong. They may hate what we call them. We just can’t be sure what they will
grow up to be and do, and what name will suit them in the end – a serious,
plain name, or something exotic or frivolous.
For God, says Isaiah, it is different. “While I was in my
mother’s womb [God] named me” he says. Like a lot of Isaiah’s prophecy, there
are all sorts of ways of interpreting this passage. Isaiah might be speaking
about himself, or it might be the unnamed figure of the Servant, who might even
be the people of Israel themselves, that this refers to. In a way, it doesn’t
matter, though. The point is the same. Each of us comes into the world as
unique, with gifts and a calling which only we can fulfil. We don’t know what
it is. No one knows what it is, except the God who made us. Whatever our
parents call us, it is that name that really matters, the name that expresses
our truest and deepest selves.
In today’s Gospel reading, names are also significant. It’s
a wonderfully told story, not just because of what is in it, but also because
of what is left out. Two as yet unnamed disciples of John the Baptist are
pointed towards Jesus – “follow him”,
says John, “not me”. So they do,
quite literally, tagging along behind him through the streets, until Jesus,
knowing they are there, turns to speak to them. “What are you looking for?” he asks, and perhaps caught off guard by his question, they seem to say
the first thing that comes into their heads, which isn’t really at all
relevant. “Where are you staying?”
What difference does it make? “Come and
see”, says Jesus. And they do, going to Jesus’ home, and then…then what? We
aren’t told where the house is, what happens, what they talk about, what they
do at all – that’s what This morning I asked people to imagine that house where Jesus took them, and
what happened in it, and we came up with a very wide variety of stories of how
and where the day unfolded. Whatever happened though, the end result was that those
disciples were convinced that this man, this Jesus, was the Messiah.
It’s one of a number of names and titles he is given in this
passage – we counted either 7 or 9, this morning, depending whether you count
the translations. He is the “Lamb of
God”, “the one who ranks ahead of me,” “the one who was before me”. He is “the one who baptises with the Holy Spirit”.
He is the “Son of God”. He is called “Rabbi “ translated as Teacher. He is the “Messiah”, translated as Anointed.
And of course, he is also Jesus, a
name with its own significance, because it means “God Saves”. In Hebrew it’s
the same name as the Old Testament leader Joshua, who led Israel into the
Promised Land.
We thought a bit about what name, what description we would
use for Jesus – friend, confidante,
leader, guide, saviour, mighty counsellor, healer, welcomer… For those two
disciples it was the name “Messiah”
which was the most significant, the anointed one, the chosen one, the one they
had been waiting for. But the fact is that, just like those disciples it’s only
when we spend time with Jesus, living as he told us to, meeting him in bread
and wine, in the words of the Gospels, in one another, that we really start to
discover who he is to us, that he becomes not some figure from a distant,
shadowy past, but someone who has the power to change our lives.
That’s the effect he had on those two disciples. Jesus
stepped out of the crowd, and into their lives, to transform them forever. And
now we discover, after all that has happened, that one of those who went to
Jesus’ home was Andrew, the fisherman, who promptly went to fetch his brother
Simon, full of excitement.
And that’s where we find that it’s not just Jesus’ name
which matters in this story, because Jesus takes one look at Simon and tells
him “You are Simon, son of John. You are
to be called Cephas, Peter – the Rock”, He will be the one on whom Jesus
eventually comes to build his new community. He looks into Simon’s heart and he
sees in him things which Simon hadn’t seen in himself, new possibilities, new
hope.
Names matter. The names we call Jesus, the perception we
have of him matter. They tell us what we see in him, what we hope for in him,
what we are looking for in him.
But as we look at Jesus and ask to see him more clearly, he
is also looking at us, hoping that we will see our own reflection in his eyes,
and that by doing that, we will discover what our true name is, what our unique
gifts are, what we are called to be and to do.
In our silence tonight, you might like to imagine yourself
in that house, and imagine what it would be like to look at Jesus, and have him
look at you, and ask him what his name for you might be.
Amen
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