It is gift to see each of you here today. My name is Ben, I’m the pastor of Chapel Hill Mennonite Fellowship. Raleigh Mennonite – thank you for joining us today! Thanks to pastor Melissa and everyone that collaborated today in this service.
This is the third week after Easter that I will be preaching from the book of Acts. We’ve been pondering together the impact of the resurrection on the early community of Jesus followers and in our lives today.
Last week we heard the story from Acts 3 of an unnamed forty-year old man who was unable to walk from birth and was begging at the gate of the Temple. Peter and John encounter him and they stop to look at each other… and Peter extends his hand and tells the man, “I have no silver or gold – but in the Name of Jesus of Nazareth – stand up and walk.”
And the man not only stands up and walks but he leaps and dances and praises God, entering into the Temple. A crowd gathers in amazement and Peter uses the opportunity to preach about God’s resurrecting power at work in Jesus.
Then we get to our passage for today from Acts 4. Peter’s sermon has gone over well with the crowds but not so well with the religious leaders of the Temple. Peter and John have been tossed into prison overnight and then brought before the council of Jewish leaders in Jerusalem, the Sanhedrin – and then questioned:
“Where did the power to heal this man come from?
What is the name of the one you represent?”
In response- the Holy Spirit moves within Peter – and with boldness another sermon bubbles up. The crux of Peter’s message is that it’s in the name of Jesus that this man was healed and that Jesus is the only human name that represents the powerful freedom and restoration of God.
And the question that I’m left chewing on is:
- What’s the connection between the name of Jesus and the salvation that frees us?
- What is it about the name of Jesus that’s so powerfully healing and liberating?
Please pray with me:
Creator God, Send your Spirit of power and grace among us today, so that we would hear your healing Word and be set free to love, in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Growing up my heroes were soccer players. And when World Cups rolled around I would know all the names of the players on my favorite teams. Names are about identity and power: Who is this person and what can this person do?
That name on the back of the jersey meant something. Wambach meant channeled strength. Rapinoe meant creative bravery. Zidane meant artistry and control. Messi means pure brilliance. But the Brazilian teams always seemed to have the best names, with some of their star players going only by their first name like Rivaldo, Ronaldinho, Roberto Carlos, Cafu, Dani Alves, Neymar, and of course the all-time legends, Marta and Pele.
And after Brazil was victorious in the 2002 Men’s World Cup Final – as a ten-year-old, I wanted so bad to be like the game-winning goal scorer – Ronaldo (the original Ronaldo) – with his powerful shots and dance-like moves – that I got his famous haircut shaved onto my head that summer: everything bald except a small patch up front.
Names are about identity and power. Who is this person? What can they do?
We heard our text from Acts today read in English out of the First Nations Version: An Indigenous Translation of the New Testament. The First Nations Version renders all the names in the text by their translated meaning. So what is Jesus in English, Iesous in Greek and Yeshua in Hebrew – “yah” meaning God and “shua” – to rescue or save – becomes in this translation – “Creator Sets Free.”
Maybe it sounded a little bit cumbersome when you were listening to this passage. We’re used to the English names for people and places in familiar scriptures – but I like how the First Nations Version enlivens the meaning that names hold: Nazareth becomes “Seed Planter Village.” Jerusalem is the “Village of Peace.” The disciple Peter is “Stands on the Rock.”
But in the America that we live in, the name of Jesus has been used and abused to the point that when many hear it they never have experienced Jesus as meaning “Creator Sets Free.” Instead, often when the name of Jesus is invoked or when people claim to wear a uniform with Jesus’ name printed on it – all that name brings to mind is white supremacy and colonialism and judgment and exclusion and superiority and patriarchy and we could rightly so go on and on here.
And so perhaps for us to speak and act “in the name of Jesus” becomes a stumbling block to the very message of hope and the lives of love we are called by God to embody. And a passage like this one from Acts maybe only makes things even more difficult. Because Peter in his spirited sermon uses bold, even exclusive, language:
“It is because of the name of Creator Sets Free (Jesus), the Chosen One, and all he represents that this man stands before you healed and whole… No one else can restore us. No other human being can represent the kind of power needed to rescue us and set us free,” Peter emphatically says.
Why is Peter so adamant that Jesus is the only human name that can save us, that can set us free? Peter knows that there are so many other names and others places where people look for healing, deliverance, rescue and salvation – that ultimately never bring freedom. And because of his own encounter with the risen Jesus and the outpouring of the Spirit – Peter is convinced that Jesus alone is the one whose name has the power to bring life.
There are plenty of other names out there who will gladly offer salvation if you’re willing to listen. The Caesar of ancient Rome offered his own divine peace brought about by acquiescence to or participation in imperial violence.
For the religious leaders that Peter and John are in conflict with – the ability to lock people up, to jail – became its own kind of saving power. We convince ourselves that we are safer when we incarcerate those who represent threat and danger. And I imagine that the forty-year old man who couldn’t walk and had been carried to the temple gate to beg every day had heard all sorts of charitable well-wishes from folks that always ended up ringing a little hollow.
In our own lives we have plenty of names in which we think we find salvation, prosperity, healing, and rescue:
There is the salvation named “retirement fund” – where we know that the steady growth of our funds invested in the mythical market will ensure our long term ability to retire and continue to have housing and food and buy what we want and need. Mine is named Roth.
There is the salvation named “smartphone” – when any time that we are feeling bored or lonely or scared or unsure or curious – we have a device that is always there, simultaneously promising distraction and connection. Mine’s name is iPhone 12Mini.
There is the salvation named “healthcare.” Which in our system is a salvation earned not by grace but through gainful employment, guaranteeing doctors-visits and life-sustaining care. Mine’s name is Contigo.
There is the salvation of having a body some would name “Abled” – that can move through our world without worry. The cousin to “Abled” is “Car” – which is the freedom to move unhindered at high speeds through our concrete streets. Damnation in this world is not being able to move.
But when Jesus invites us into the beloved community – we find our freedom not through the power of our own names and bodies and mobility or through the names on bank accounts and health insurance cards and phones or even soccer jerseys.
We find freedom and rescue in the name of Jesus.
And by name, I mean everything about who Jesus is: his life and teaching and ministry and death and resurrection and ongoing presence with us in the Spirit. Jesus is the name of the human being in whom we encounter the fullness of God’s love.
And as Christians and as churches, whatever works of mercy and justice and care and worship and prayer and potlucks that we do in the name of Jesus – we aren’t just doing them out of sentimentality or duty… as if Jesus name could be tacked to a bulletin board to remind us to be nice or sprinkled out like hot sauce to spice up the blandness of our lives.
But whatever love we extend to one another in our lives, we do so in the name of Jesus, because we see the fullness of who we all are becoming in his name.
We find our freedom in the one named Creator Sets Free. And this journey of being transformed by God’s love takes many forms. Salvation is a textured, multidimensional gift.
To Peter – freedom is God’s resurrecting love that welcomed him back after he earlier deserted and denied Jesus, and now gives him the boldness to tell others. To the unnamed man who was healed and now walks and leaps – salvation is an embodied gift of praise to be shared with a community in celebration. To the early group of Jesus followers – liberation is material, salvation looks like praying together and sharing goods and eliminating economic inequality.
What does it look like for you to trust in the name of Jesus?
What does it look like for us to love others in the name of Creator Sets Free?
When parents name babies they do so with love and hope and aspiration of who this tiny person will become…all of that is packed into the vowels and consonants and resonance of a name. We grow into names and our names grow in us, shaping us into who we are becoming. Sometimes we need reminders of the beauty our names speak over us. And sometimes, people need new names to fit who they truly are.
I look at all you beloved people gathered here with your name tags on and I wonder what stories you carry with you that give meaning to your name. And I also look out and I see Jesus with us, wearing a name-tag too. And under the “Hi My Name is,” line, there scrawled in bright Sharpie for all to see it says, “Creator Sets Free.”
Names are about identity. Names are about power. Names are about becoming. By the power of the name of Jesus, who God raised from the dead, may we also be raised up, to boldly speak grace and truth, to lead lives of love as Creator Sets Free has first loved us.