George, Mary, David, Elizabeth, Robert, Victoria, Adam, Condoleeza. Some children are named after relatives or friends, some after people their parents admire, or qualities parents wish they had, like Patience. In the Bible, names often have a meaning, and children are often named for a reason: Isaac ("laughter"), Reuben ("he has seen my misery"), John ("God is gracious"), Jesus ("God saves"), though, as with Mary (perhaps "bitterness") or Caleb ("dog"), not always pleasantly. And pity any child named Mahershalalhashbaz ("hasten the spoil, hurry the plunder", after Isaiah's second son).
A name not only helps to identify someone, it also gives a certain power over someone (remember Rumpelstiltskin!) People who seek to hide take pseudonyms. People misbehaving in a crowd try hard not to give their names.
This is why God reminds us "I have called you by your name. You are mine." (Is. 43:1). We are God's possession, God's children.
But God's name (Yahweh, interpreted as "I am who I am") is quite different. God reveals it to Moses beside the burning bush (Ex. 3:14), but commands the wanderers in the desert not to misuse it. People were so afraid of misusing the name that they replaced it with "the Lord" whenever they read the Bible aloud, and hence the modern version of the name Jehovah, which has the consonants of Yahweh, but the vowels of adonai, Lord. In Revelation 19:12, Jesus, the Word of God, has "a name that no one knows but himself." God's name, like God's nature, is something special, something holy.
So in the Psalms we find the refrain "How majestic is your name in all the earth" (8:9), "All that is within me bless God's holy name" (103:1), "I will bless your name for ever and ever" (145:1), "Let the peoples bless your great and awesome name" (99:3). And in the prayer Jesus gave us as a model, we ask "Hallowed be your name."
This not only echoes Ps.99:3, but reminds us that ultimately God's kingdom will extend to every part of the universe, and that all will come together in a sea of praise - not just for a name, but for God in person. The Lord's Prayer is first and foremost a prayer for the coming of that kingdom, and for our own share in it.
In a secondary sense, having a good name means having a good reputation - and a bad name just the reverse. The builders of the Tower of Babel wanted to "make a name" for themselves (Gen. 11:4) - what sort of a name was a question of interpretation! We read of Jerusalem "making a name among the heathen" (Ezek. 16:14). And we remember, in the words of the King James version, that "some there be, which have no memorial, who are perished as though they had never been.... Their bodies are buried in peace, but their name liveth for evermore." (Ecclus. 44:9,14).
The Letter to the Philippians, however, goes even further. In the Lord's Prayer, we pray for the day when God's name will be honoured everywhere. But Jesus, having emptied himself and taken the form of a servant, has received "the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."
HD