What's in a Name? - Genesis 35:10

Genesis 35:10

God said to him, “Your name is Jacob; no longer shall you be called Jacob, but Israel shall be your name.” So he was called Israel. 

The fourteen year old (or there about) girl, sighed into her hand on the balcony, bemoaning her fate. To love someone with such a terrible, and yet wonderful, name.

Montague.

"What's in a name?" she asks. "That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet."

What is in a name indeed! To have a name be so contentious is quite a thing, whether you are a young maiden or a shepherd and aspiring patriarch who has a tendency to trick people.

Jacob was such a man. And in the end, after wrestling with God, his very name came to mean exactly that: Israel means "God contended."

On the surface, such a terrible name.

A name that bespeaks fighting with God.

And yet such a wonderful name. Wonderful enough that an entire nation took that name from the trickster formerly known as Jacob.

Because that is what we do, is it not? We wrestle each and every day with this path that is before us. With this identity that God has given us. With our names being written on God's heart.

It is not easy, God tells us. And shows us.

We struggle.

And yet through each struggle, our name - who we truly are in God - becomes clearer and clearer.

What is in a name? What is in YOUR name?

Who has God called you?

Who is God calling you to be?

Lord of all, my name is written on your heart. Show me who I am. Amen.