Tag: Names of God

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The Lord is Our Banner – Exodus 17:8-16

Yahweh Nissi means “the Lord is Our Banner” – in Exodus 17, Moses named an altar this after defeating the Amalekites. Banners were key to pre-modern warfare, telling soldiers who is leading and where to attack. “Under the banner” can also mean “in the name of” – “under the banner of love* for example.

The name is used only once, in a passage that is ultimately problematic. The Amalekites ambushed the people of Israel, and after God enables victory, the Amalekites are marked out as a people for destruction.

This destruction becomes relevant again in 1 Samuel, when Samuel instructs Saul to wipe out the Amalekites, down to the children.

This story is hard to square with the teachings of Christ, and is even difficult to reconcile with the teachings of the Old Testament like “do not kill.” This is important because we see leaders today justifying violence in God’s name as well. In reality, if the Lord is our banner then it redefines our relationship with our enemies.

Irenaeus was an early church father who struggled with this difference as well. He sees the story of the Old Testament as one of “gradual pedagogy” where His gradually moves a primitive, violent people to a full understanding of the God who is Love. Origen was another, who saw over time a development and revelation of how to interact with enemies, finding its fullness in the Cross.

If the Lord is our banner, He redefines the source of our security. We no longer place our faith in our own strength or resources, but rather in God Himself. We no longer need to have a scarcity mindset, but can rest in His abundance, letting that impact our engagement with others in love rather than fear and competition.

If the Lord is our banner, it redefines our identity, our vocation and equips us with a different ethic. We are to participate in God’s work of lifting up the marginalized, freeing the captives and giving sight to the blind.

— Guillermo Jimenez, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, July 21, 2024

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I Am – The God of Surprise

God first calls himself I Am when he reveals himself to Moses in the burning bush. This is one of the key “theophanies” in the Old Testament – the visible, physical appearance of God to humans.

There are many of these across scriptures, mostly by surprise. The appearance to Hagar in the wilderness, the promise of a child to Abraham, the wrestling with Jacob, the appearance to Samson’s parents, the call of Samuel and many others. He also appears in other forms, like the pillars of cloud and fire, or the storm on Mount Sinai.

If you look at a map of these theophanies, the miracles of Jesus, or even all the locations mentioned in scripture, you will see a relatively small window of geography. But if you consider the eternal nature of the name “I Am” you’ll understand that God is everywhere and can work in any and all places – hence the surprise.

We get a taste of this in the story of Jonah – Jonah thinks by leaving the physical location of Israel he will escape the call of God. In reality, God meets him in the middle of the sea, and in a notably surprising way. Jonah’s prayer from the depths gives us a picture of what this surprising encounter can look like when we are at our lowest.

And so he finally obeys and heads to Nineveh where something equally surprising happens – they listen, and are forgiven. Like Jonah, many of us seek for justice, even vengeance, and so the end of the story where Jonah rages at the compassion of God. Ever dramatic, he wishes he would just die. Then comes the story of sitting beneath a plant God causes to grow, but then that God causes to be destroyed by a worm. Again, he wants to die. The story of vengeance deferred because of the mercy of God is a surprise and also a challenge.

— Sermon Notes, Melanie Malone, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, June 16, 2024

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Immanuel

Many of us grew up with a theology that emphasized performance. Work hard to earn the love of God and the people around you, do what is right in order to get into heaven and avoid hell. Seeking God can feel like a video game, often with a difficult boss that we cannot overcome.

In life, we often feel ugly, invisible, rejected, unworthy, impure, broken, lonely or abandoned.

But in reality, God comes to us in grace, unmerited favor. The painter Scott Erickson describes grace as “presence not withheld. ” And the way Jesus brought that grace and presence to us was through the bloody, painful process of childbirth, entering the world through the womb of a woman.

God’s presence and love are not limited. We have no reason to live in a scarcity mindset, because the love of God is abundant like nothing else. As a church let us be a place that brings this presence and love to our world.

— Sermon Notes, Eunice Cho, Renew Church, Lynnwood, WA, March 17, 2024

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Names of God: The Unknown God – Acts 17:18-28

Paul here is speaking to two very discrete groups of Athenian scholars. On the one hand, the Stoics, dutiful pantheists who literally give their name to being stoic. On the other, there are the Epicureans, essentially hedonistic deists, to simplify things. And all throughout, of course, you have the standard polytheists of paganism. They are all interested in what Paul has to say but accuse him of being a “spermologos, ” sperm meaning seed and logos meaning word or idea – the picture being of a bird picking and choosing between seeds.

And so Paul gets in front of the Aereopagus, both a governing body and a philosophical debate society. He dives into a “first principles” version of the gospel, one that touches on many names of God.

God “made the world and everything in it” – He is Creator. This is in direct opposition to the Stoics who saw God and nature as the same.

God “is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything” – a strike against paganism and polytheism that saw the need for service and sacrifice. He is the All-Sufficient One.

“From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth, and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.” – God is the King of Kings, and this cuts directly against the Epicurean idea of a distant, uninvolved God.

Then Paul starts quoting the Greeks’ own philosophers. “For in him we live and move and have our being,” – He is the sustainer. “We are his offspring,” He is Father.

When we meditate on the attributes and names of God, it draws us closer to Him. Let us go forward and think on this in our daily life.

— Sermon Notes, Alison Robison, Renew Church, Lynnwood WA, January 21, 2024