We have a hard time with the name of Jesus not just because
of the name but what went with the naming.
When the New Year was moved from the middle of March—it used to coincide with the Annunciation, March 25 – to the first of January, the feast of Jesus’ circumcision and his naming became the first day of the year.
Now, our modern celebration of New Year’s Day tends to be a feast of exhaustion, particularly
if one stayed up to see the new year in. How did that happen? Well, there are several reasons. One cause was the way the Reformation happened in England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. Many of the old church feasts were abolished. And often this was imposed on ordinary folks with out much input or regard for their customs. As is often the
case, when people are deprived of things to which they are deeply attached,
they find other ways to celebrate, and so the old celebration of the Feast of
the Circumcision was transformed into (or returned to) the secular day of
feasting and sport and sport we know today.
While Anglicans retained the old feast day, we tended not to
keep it, not even our own liturgical recovery and renewal in the Episcopal Church. Which makes me wonder why? I kind of suspect that the mere mention of circumcision sounded a bit
embarrassing; perhaps it made us blush. Now we call New Year’s Day the Feast of
the Holy Name of Jesus.
So what's going on?
What is happening here is an initiation rite. Jesus’ parents
are initiating their son into the covenant people of Israel… the Jewish people.
Luke tells us at the end of the Gospel reading today that when the child of
Mary and Joseph was taken to be circumcised, he was given the name Jesus.
Certainly to the first-century Jew in Palestine there was nothing earth-shaking
about the name. Many male children were given the name Joshua/Jesus, which
means “God with us,” or more precisely “Yahweh saves.”
Today in Latino culture, Jesus is a fairly common name to
give to a baby.
So, what’s in a name?
The collect for today states that the name of Jesus is the
“sign of our salvation.” Some of you may remember a time in the Episcopal
Church when we were taught as children to bow our heads slightly whenever the
name of Jesus was said out loud, especially in church—during a prayer or a
hymn.
In Luke’s Gospel, we hear about two old people, Ana and
Simeon, rejoiced to see the young child. Simeon exclaims that “these eyes of
mine have seen the Savior.”
What’s in a name? These days, we tend to pick names because
of how they sound. We don’t necessarily pick them for symbolic value, but we do
worry if the name might sound too “geeky” or will cause the child to be made
fun of in school.
And even though it was John Wayne’s real first name, we
don’t see many boys named “Marion” these days, do we?
We live in a very materialistic age. We think of ourselves
as very pragmatic, can-do people. So we often discount the symbolic when we
pick out our names; but, as the Scottish Protestants and English Puritans found
when they abolished all the feasts, like Christmas, people will fill in vacuums
these create.
The truth is that the symbol exists and still has its power,
even as we become ignorant of its origin and meaning. Telling our spouses that
we love him or her may be an automatic response, but sometimes on purpose and sometimes
by itself, we live into the deepest meaning of “I love you.”
And what’s the most popular proper name for a mindless
expletive? It’s not “Fred!” I once heard of a Japanese student at West Virginia
University who knew nothing of Christianity except what he observed Americans
do—now there’s a scary thought! He came to believe that we Christians
worshipped a demon named Jesus because the only times ordinary people uttered
the name was as a curse or an expletive. Even though we may use “Jesus” as an
expletive, the meaning of who Jesus is may and often does communicate itself
anew by our mindless utterance. There is power
in a name and in a symbol. We may be unconscious of the
power. We may twist the symbol, but the power is still there.
Jesus is “Yahweh saves.” He is “The Savior.” He is “God with
us.” And that means that we belong to Jesus. It does not mean that he belongs
to us. That’s an important point to understand, because there is more than one
way to twist the power of Jesus’ name in to something perverse— more than just
a mindless expletive. It is so easy for us to decide who Jesus should love or
save and who he should not. In the name of Jesus, Christians have perpetrated
violence and war, oppression and exclusion, and cover for crimes against people
different or weaker than ourselves. When we decided that Jesus belongs to us,
“Yahweh saves” is the last thing on our minds. But “Yahweh saves” will not go
away.
We were named and signed in our baptisms. In baptism we were
claimed, adopted, forgiven, and made members of the priestly body, the Body of
Christ. And when we were named, we were marked as Christ’s own forever. We, like Jesus, are here to be God for
others. What we do, and how we live, and how we are with the people around us
tell others that we belong to Jesus. In baptism, we are part of Christ’s family
and we share the name “Yahweh saves.” And as God is seen in the face of Jesus
Christ, the face of Jesus is seen in us.
There is more: in our baptisms we not only took on the
identity, the face and name of Jesus, we are also called and inspired to see
others as God sees them. So when we look into the faces of the poor, the
lonely, the sick, the disabled, the imprisoned—even our neighbor across the
fence, we see Jesus. We see the people that “Yahweh saves.” This is what it
means when we are called to be Christ-like, or Christians. People see “Yahweh
saves” projected on us, and we see who “Yahweh saves” all around us.
So, what’s in a name? More power than we think. In the midst
of our daily struggles to live with a measure of integrity and dignity, we
exclaim “God help us!” And that is the point. God does help us. God seeks us,
God finds us, and particularly at the family table we gather around today, the
Name of Jesus, the Word, joins with Bread and Wine and transforms us into
newness of life.
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