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The Rev. Canon Eugene T. Sutton Scripture lessons: Numbers 6:22-27 and Luke 2:15-21 Happy New Year! Now that we are well into it, how are your New Year’s resolutions coming? You’ve now had several hours to not act on any of them! How many resolutions have you made through the years? And how often have you kept them? There was a newspaper comic that showed a man holding his New Year’s resolutions on a card which read: “Overeat, Never Exercise, Smoke Daily, Drink Often.” He gave them to his wife saying, “Now these are resolutions I can stick with!” We all know that resolutions don’t work. We are already overloaded, overscheduled and overburdened as a society, so when we pile resolutions on top of all that we are already doing, those are the first to get knocked off the list of things we have to do. So, the only resolution that seems to stick is the resolution that New Year’s resolutions don’t work. Several years ago, however, I learned from the great spiritual leader, Basil Pennington, of something that does work; it is to take a stand and make a declaration, not resolutions. So, I invite you to consider one thing this year, and that is to “Live up to your name!” Let me explain. Names are important. Today, January 1, is New Year’s Day in the secular calendar, but in the church’s calendar it is the Feast of The Holy Name of Our Lord. In the gospel lesson from Luke, a child is given a very good Jewish name by his parents Mary and Joseph, and that name is “Jesus.” Jesus is the Greek form of the Hebrew name “Jehosha”—or Joshua for short—which means “Yahweh” (God) saves. It is the equivalent of the word “Savior,” or Deliverer. In the Scriptures, the naming of people was of utmost importance. Boys were to be named eight days after their birth at the time of their circumcision, and that name was to reflect some relationship with their history, and some dedication of their future. The name Jesus was given to Mary in her vision, and to Joseph in a dream, because this holy child was to become the embodiment of God’s desire to save all people, and deliver us from sin and death. Jesus lived into his name. Today, however, we don’t pay nearly enough attention to the names we assign to people. There’s a good deal of evidence that a child named with an odd name will become an odd child. A Chicago high school teacher once told of twins in one class who were named Orangejello and Lemonjello, pronounced “orangelo” and “lemongelo.” God help them to become solid citizens, pun intended. A child named Lee Harvey Oswald these days would have a stigma attached to him, as would someone named John Wayne Gacy, the serial killer in Chicago who was executed in 1994. By the way, there is a newspaper column in the local weekly City Paper called “News of the Weird” that for several years now has been tracking the extraordinary prevalence of the classic middle name “Wayne” in convicted criminals, beginning with John Wayne Gacy. A sample from one three-month period (1998): Monty Wayne Lamb, Robert Wayne Shelton, Gary Wayne Etheridge, Morris Wayne Givens, and Andrae Dewayne Barnett, all convicted of murder. So parents, you might want to think twice about assigning that middle name. Names aren’t completely deterministic, however, so even if your middle name is Wayne you’re not predestined to become an axe murderer. In fact, sometimes a name backfires on us! I named my oldest son Kyle, because a generation ago Kyle Rote, Jr., was a famous soccer player. My son was to accomplish great feats on the soccer field, win titles, fame and fortune—things that eluded his Dad. It didn’t work, however, and Kyle is wasting his life away as a successful poet performing in high schools and colleges across the country. I should have named him Wadsworth so that he could play soccer. The other children in our blended family are named Ben, Sophia, and Stefan—not so much because of any great cosmic significance, although there is some of that, but because they sounded like good names. So far the strategy has worked; they are good kids. The point is this: just as in the Bible when people’s names suggested who they were, so we need to live into the name that God has given us. And what is that name? Early in the Book of Exodus (3:1–14) Moses has a little encounter with God who speaks to him in a burning bush saying, “I am the God your father, the God of Abraham, the God of your ancestors, and I want you to go to Pharaoh and direct him to release my people from slavery.” But Moses kept asking him, “Who are you?” “If I come to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” (v. 13) God said to Moses, “I am who I am—thus you shall say to the Israelites, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” In making that declaration, God wanted to be known simply as the great “I AM.” When Moses then asked, well, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh?” God replied, “I will be with you.” That is, we, who are all made in the image of God, are little “i am”s, and thus we are defined: I am a man, or I am a woman. I am a rational being. I am a kind person. Etc. Many of the words we use to describe ourselves are just plain fact: man/woman, rational, old, young, etc. But the descriptors that really make a difference are the ones we choose. When we take a stand and declare who we are, we open the space to become the persons we declare we are. Now, many of us make declarations about ourselves that have the effect of cementing our feet to the floor. “I am,” you might say, “a lazy person.” Or, I am very shy. Or, I am a person who gets angry very easily. But those declarations about who we are don’t get us to where we want to be. We do not get very far when we have one foot cemented to the floor. Try it! Why would we make such declarations? Well, take a look at the payoff. If I am a shy person, then there are a lot of things people just can’t ask me to do. If I am a lazy person, then you or I cannot expect very much from me, can we? And if I get angry pretty easily, then you shouldn’t tell me things that I don’t want to hear. And so it goes. What we need to ask ourselves, then, is not only what the payoff is, but what is the cost the declarations we make? Is the cost to ourselves worth the payoff we receive? Such declarations are not always consciously chosen; they just seem to have become part of our self-identification. We probably can easily think of times we have heard others make such declarations about us, and gradually we began to think of them as true. “I am.” well, you fill in the blank I am lazy, angry, stupid, shy, aggressive, slow, ugly, clumsy, and so on and so on and so on. In moments of quiet, reflection, contemplation and prayer, we can begin to see and understand some of the declarations about ourselves that we are hanging on to, but are weighing us down in cement. If some of our declarations do cement us to the ground, how can we get rid of them and free ourselves? Here is one practical piece of wisdom: simply make new, contrary declarations. By taking a stand and re-naming ourselves, we enlarge the space for God to help us to become who we declare we are: I am a child of God. I am a kind person. I am a generous person. And despite everything, I am filled with joy, hope, peace and love. Once you have taken a stand and made a declaration, then you begin to spontaneously and unconsciously live according to that declaration. Of course, you and I will fail. We will fall down at times. But, here is another declaration: I am a biped, so when I fall down I don’t spend the rest of my life crawling in the dirt. I get right back up, and go from there. I am a biped. You can be whatever you have the courage to take a stand for. Don’t make resolutions this new year; make a declaration that is true, and that transforms. Remember: “I am.” This “I Am” is the same God who says in today’s first lesson, “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace.” So shall God put God’s name upon all who call upon his name, and they will be blessed. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. |