April 18, 2023
Do you have a new name?
Our grandkids lost their great grandmother (Nanny) a while back. Nanny was a great Christian lady whom everyone loved. Their great grandfather recently remarried. When 8-year-old Amelia met her great grandfather’s new wife she affectionately named her “New Nanny”. In her 8-year-old mind it was a great compliment to call this new lady a new version of the (Original) Nany that she loved so much. The New Nanny was very gracious and took it for the compliment as it was intended.
Do you have a “New” name? The Bible says that when we get saved, we are a new creation. We see in II Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”. So we no longer act or behave like the “old” sinful person that we were. Sometimes it is literal like Saul becoming Paul.
But most of the time it is more symbolic like the old sinful Gary now becoming the new spiritual child of God Gary. *This is where the analogy loses a little bit because in her eyes Amelia’s original Nanny wasn’t sinful and thus replaced with a Godly new Nanny, but it still is a good analogy.
When we become children of God the Bible says in Romans 6:6-7, “We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. 7 For a dead person has been absolved from sin. 8 If, then, we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him”. And in Galatians 2:20, “My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me”
So truly a saved person is a new creation with a new name. John 1:12 says, “But as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become children of God” Part of our name as “Christians” is that we are “Little Christ” so we should hold up the family name and act like Christ would act. I have some relatives that I don’t want to claim because they don’t live up to the Mimbs name. If asked if I am kin to them, I try to avoid the question. Praise God that Christ never stops claiming kin to me when I don’t behave like a Christian.
There is an old gospel hymn that says, “See I’m now a new creation in Christ (The old has gone). The old has gone, there’s new life (I live by faith. I live by faith, not by sight (Yeah) There is a new name written down in glory And it’s mine, yes, it’s mine (I’ve met Jesus)
I pray that you have a new name and that it means that you are a new creation. A “Little Christ ” living as the original name Christ would live and upholding the “Family” name.
In love with Jesus – Gary Mimbs