I HAVE GIVEN THEM YOUR NAME AND THEY HAVE KEPT IT (John 17.6)
These where the words from the Son of God in His dialogue to the Father on His fateful night leading up to the cross. Keeping the Fathers name was this important for us to receive it, so much so in fact that He reported that back to our Father before He left. So the Fathers name should be of monumental importance for us to try to understand in meaning at least if not in spelling but in context.
For you see there is a difference between a name and a title. For example your neighbor could be a man, a husband and a father who is a doctor who believes in God who likes to fish who came from Europe, but none of those descriptions tell us his name. We consider these all to be aspects of character, however each title is only part of who this person is.
So it goes with scripture and the various names, definitions and titles of God. And however, of the whole collection of scripture with all commentaries and sermons , we only talk about NOT Gods names so much, but His tasks, for you see even the name of the Son of God they call Jesus is not a name but a title because the name/title given to Him is just a description of a task He had to perform for our deliverance, saving, protection and sanctification. As scripture attests that “God (already) sent His Son into the world NOT to condemn but to save. But after we are saved, we see Him in another light.
For this reason people call Him “Savior” because that was central to the work that He did for the redemption of humanity. But after He redeems, saves and delivers, that name, task and title no longer clearly depicts who He is to us but something that He did and who He became temporarily to accomplish the task. But He returned to The Father and is now “seated in heavenly places far above ALL principalities and powers”. However His work is still being played out to us today through “the Gospel once and for all delivered to the saints” because that’s the way the Godhead does things. They do them once and they do them right, that’s what righteous means. They don’t modify as they go as though their calculations need corrected.
Christ was only left behind in Word form to be repeated, for our assimilation to be absorbed in the respirated mind of faith to become godly. This is why it is written in Romans 12 to “be ye renewed in the spirit of your mind”. And that word renewed is also translated “transformed” but more correctly from the Greek, it is for us to be “transfigured” from the word “metamorphosis” like a caterpillar to a butterfly. Yes this is the same word “transfiguration” that the disciples saw with Christ on the Mount, that happens to us through scripture.
Yes this is our transformation “into the self same image, from the Glory to the Glory as by the Spirit”, that whisks about you even now being The Comforter and Helper to assist us in our pursuit for our cause. The gospel message in no way infers that Christ will put on the flesh (become a caterpillar) again for “flesh and blood does not inherit The Kingdom. So how can His Kingdom be of Earthen matter? If so, how can it be said that the Kingdom of God is at hand now”
Christ came to reset humanity, to wipe away the obscurities from the Old Covenant and those stewards of the faith, and to make the way to the Father clean, cleared and opened for our unhindered interaction with God In His various titles, but God is one, God is Echad, but broken down in concept only for our spiritual consumption of Word (John 1.1) And now we are called to associate with Him without the surrogate names for they all have the singular purpose to fulfill and expire each in their own order. Even as we read from the Psalms I will worship toward thy holy temple, and praise thy name for thy lovingkindness and for thy truth: for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name. In this way Gods Word is like Jacob’s ladder with Bethel, meaning “the House of God” at the top. For in Gods word are His titles, names for tasks and characteristics like rungs on a ladder to clamor up to a seat with your new name on it with the Father, to absorb and be like Him where it counts “in Spirit and Truth”.
And when it comes to the title “Christ” and the name “Jesus”, it comes from the Hebrew name Joshua, or more clearly Yeshua, because if you trace them all back through the obscurities through interpretations, that is where we simply trace that title to, but the Savior who saved, had a different title/name before His saving act. And because “He is the same yesterday, today and forever” He removed His flesh to occupy only the spirit being His original composition of Spirit and Truth . However His saving task is done or He could not have joined The Father in His rest, and why Christ is seated waiting for His enemies to become His footstool because the game is over. Wickedness just does not know that yet. (Hebrews 1)
So in truth Christ and Jesus, Joshua and Yashua describe a task that had to be done because all those names mean the same thing. But now that the saving price was paid at the cross for all of humanity, now who is He? Even as the Godhead conferred and they said “who shall go from among us (to save mankind) and who shall we send and I (The Son of God) said here I am send Me”. And the Son of God came forth during that proverbial Rock, Paper and scissor game. He became The Savior Redeemer and Extractor of evil because that is what Yashuah, Joshua, Jesus and Christ means, each from their respective language. But more accurately and clearly put “In the Beginning was the Word, the Word was with God and the Word was God, He was in the beginning with God” before God ever spoke a word, who was the Christ? Because that role was not needed until God said so. So it is The Word that Saves with the Witness of the Holy Spirit.
The Son is more clearly the collection of everything about the Father that we’ve inherited as “joint heirs. And because nothing existed outside of God, He assigned to the Son to be NOT the Architect and designer of creation so much but the agency and the power to do so with the impedes of the Holy Spirit. For God said… and His Son called Word came forth for the task, at the behest and the thrust of Gods Breath called The Holy Spirit who “Brooded over the face of the waters” showing the Holy Spirits role in creation.
So there you see the Engineer being the mind of God before His spoken Word went forth by the power and the unction of the Holy Breath and Spirit of God as being the three who said. But still even with these performing creation, these are examples of tasks that had to be done. They All retired from those titles for those tasks because that is what the Sabbath Days Rest is to remind us. It is the retirement that refers to a job well done. And from the saying of God, “it was good, very good”.
So here you see the tasks for creation distributed among the Godhead Body at creation and redemption. Salvation for humanity is secured to the completion of the harvest as the wheat and the tares mature.
That is why God calls us to His reassembled self, that we too can rest from our works and weary task of trying to find Him. With us now being “living stones assembled as a habitation of God in the Spirit”.
It is as people look for another work as though God forgot or overlooked something, thinking He is like man to return that way. But because He is every where all the time, we just have to clear up our foggy thinking and wake up to these truths and sit down with Them there.
Kind of like the proverbial game of musical chairs. Some of us have already sat in our chair while the music’s playing. Where will you be when the music stops for you and the lights come on?
Because creation was created in 6 days, and with Them being done, the only thing left to do is for you to be saved, sanctified and set apart not set in limbo to wait for the next Jesus because if that is the case then the Word of God who became the Christ Jesus, Joshua, Yashuah could not have entered His Rest, to be seated with the Father because His saving work would not be done if He has to come again like at a second coming to perform some sort of rescue mission because the Savior of the world already performed His one time rescue act. And too with His Kingdom, since it is “At Hand”. What is it that you still need for that to be true for you? He would then be on standby still working. But because as He said to The Father in John 17 that “Father I have finished the work you have given Me to do. I have given those You have given Me your name and they Have kept it”. He was speaking of more than just a title or titles for tasks to be done, but of those who have collected the various titles and tasks given to the Son, re-assemble them in ourselves, receive the invitation to be seated with them in the Heavens far above all principalities and powers”. We have set aside the wranglings the fretting and wringing of hands in irritation, in exchange for the peace of God .
This is the Gospel completed in us. As James said to be “full and complete lacking nothing”. And James would not have said that if it was not possible. This is the place where we see all the titles for all of the tasks of God reassembled.
This is like Joseph’s coat of many colors. The coat is the first glance with its many colors or patches are His various titles of tasks He had to do to be able to sit back down, having told the Father “it is done”. Eternal beings do things only once and not repetitive like the feasts of God and the Word/words of God, but they are not. For even as the Father said “For so shall My Word be that goes forth from My mouth. It shall accomplish all of My desire and it shall not return to me void, for you will go out with joy and you will be led forth by peace”. And so we do!
The Word of God is given for our own discovery, not just of God, but the components of the Godhead and who we are as “the man in the mirror” as we put on His word for the new creation of our transformation.
For this reason we see in the book of Joshua right before they cross over the River Jordan to topple Jericho with shouts to drop the wall, Joshua sees a man stand opposite him who says “I have now come forth as commander… This one who stood before Joshua was the true deliverer who Joshua was to shadow in temporary things the Son of God in the invisible. As with all the pictures in scripture they have their Eternal counterpart and that’s what Joshua was, a commander, chief a leader and a Savior for Gods Israel. (Joshua 5.13-15)
We know this because as we research the name Jesus, we can trace it directly to Joshua. Do you know that of all the times that the title/name Jesus is translated, there is one only place it is translated correctly and that is with Joshua in the book of Hebrews. Why did they translate it Joshua? Because if they didn’t, if they used the title Jesus, it would not have made the correct association with the character Joshua. But the real lesson here is that the title Jesus is not an accurate rendering from His Old Testament picture.
Think about it, when you go anywhere, you may go as a lest us say “doctor”, and the title “doctor” may have a completely different pronunciation from every other language, but you always use the same name. Meaning that if, and we mean if, if The Son of Gods name was Jesus, wouldn’t that be His name always? Would Matthew introduce himself as Frank or Salvador because he went to a different country or culture? No!
It is for the same reason the name Jesus should not be changed to Joshua or Yehoshuah or any of the variables. Meaning that the titles given to God and His Only Begotten Son may be many, but their names never change. Even as God said though Micah “I am… and I change not!” But we can learn this lesson from His word from Psalms 138.2 “ For You have magnified Your word above all Your name.
”All your Name” because a collection of Gods titles and names is the fuller revelation. For just as His names/titles are many”. However “I Am that I Am and I change not”, and I Am what you need when you need it, as it pertains to us growing and becoming more like Him. And this is all done by putting Word on
And this is the point. What is the difference between a name and a title? In Gods honest truth the name given to Christ is just a title. Jesus derives from Joshua who is derived from Yahshua to Yahshuah, which originates from the tetronogram of YHVH, which is also the source word for the title “ savior” for that was central to the work The Son of God had to do. But after he saves, He is no longer a savior, and if He has to come and save, make safe again, He did a crappy job. But as He said in John 17. Father, I have completed the work you have given Me to do. I have kept those whom you have given Me out the world, I have given them your name and they have kept it. Now they know truly that I came forth from you, that I return to you and they see Me no more”. It was with these words and the saving savior of the cross expired.
In John 13, this Jesus, Joshua, Yahshua, savior was seated with His disciples and He walked out a parable for them. He was sitting and raised himself up (think of the invisible here). He then took off His robe, wrapped himself with a towel, dipped it in water and washed His disciples and said “if I do not wash you, you have no part IN Me. After washing them, He laid down the towel, put back on His robe and sat back down (Eternally) and said to them “do you realize what I have just done to you? And they ignorantly said “yes lord”. But what He did is to become one of us is that He got up from sitting with the Father, “became flesh and dwelt among us”, He washed us and sat back down. With this task accomplished the titles of Jesus, Joshua, Yeshua were all describing the work that He did to be expired in purpose. He just walked out in John 13 His purpose in parable form for becoming one of us. He rose up from the Father and took off His Deity, Putting on the robe was putting on a temporal purpose such is our time here. Then with the towel his flesh, He cleaned them then returned to His original disposition. And as Christ repeated in John16 that “I go to the Father and you see Me no more”, meaning any of those Savior titles you call Him. We know Him as “The Name no man can say because “eye has not seen nor man heard” nor can they say with their mouth correctly the name of God.
The point here is that if we can understand that none of those titles are names but job descriptions
, then we don’t have to argue about the name, but we do have to recognize them as titles only. And in truth Christ can take on the form of a servant as we’ve just seen, he can take on the form of a bus driver, a passer by on the street or in a store or take on the form of a street person or a child. For even John the Apostle in his book called “The Revelation of Jesus Christ”. He was seen at the end of the boom bowing to an angel thinking it was Jesus, Joshua, Yashuah, the savior and that angel told John “ see that you do NOT do that for I am one of thy brethren of those who keep the testimony of Christ, worship Him.
In closing there are two introductions we should remember. One was the rider on a white horse “11 Now I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse. And He who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and makes war. 12 His eyes were like a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns (titles). He had a name written that no one knew except Himself. 13 He was clothed with a robe dipped in blood, and His name is called The Word of God”.
But lucky for those of us who are born again and borne from above in that, we can see His Kingdom, and we can enter His Kingdom because we have been borne from above of Spirit and Truth.
“The Kingdom of God is at hand” in this way, and we call it “The Word of God” which is the collection of The Names, places and persons of His Kingdom.