Hard names

The 11th chapter of Hebrews recounts a number of stories of Old Testament people who were known for their lives of faith and their courageous venturing with God. One reads of Abel and Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Joseph and Moses. Many of these are not everyday names to us, except as we may have become familiar with them in the Bible.

A number of other notable names appear together in verses 32 and 33 of Hebrews 11. “And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets - who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, received promises, stopped the mouths of lions….” Other than the name David, and perhaps Samuel, few of these names are commonly passed on to our children today. Some of the names are hard for our English tongues to pronounce. Yet the Bible preserves the names for us as some of God’s great people, who lived courageously and faithfully in their times, and whose lives have become a witness of faith to peoples everywhere and of every age and station in life.

Two of the harder biblical names which come to mind as I write this are Shealtiel, who was a priest who led in the re-dedication of Jerusalem’s wall after the return from Babylonian exile in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah; and Shetharbozenai, who was an o◊cial of the Persian Empire in a province near Jerusalem. Even these persons with very hard names played a part as God brought about the restoration of his people in their homeland after the exile.

Far more familiar, but still hard, are the names of Daniel’s friends who by faith survived Nebuchadnezzar’s fiery furnace, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego.

The Bible preserves these names for us as people of great faith through whom God worked in that time.

Others, like Shetharbozenai or Nebuchadnezzar, were empire o◊cials whom God worked around to accomplish his purposes.

For us today, usually our names are basically individualized labels. But in biblical times, often the name given a person had a meaning. For example, names such as Daniel, ending in “el” refer to God. Daniel means “God is judge.” In Numbers 1:6, Shelumiel the son of Zurishaddai, was namedas an assistant to Moses in numbering the people.

She-lum-ee-el means “God is peace.” His father’s name also derives from “Shaddai” which recognizes God as the Almighty.

As we look at the generations of God’s people, some of whom had long and hard names, (at least to us they seem long and hard), there are several things that I want to note and remember. First, these were a people who from the time of their ancestor Abraham saw their lives in light of their covenant with God. In Genesis 12, God called Abraham to leave his old country and go to a land God would show him, promising to make him a great nation; not only to bless him, but to make him a blessing; promising, in fact, that all the families of the earth should fi nd blessing through his witness of faith in God. So, secondly, these were a people whose mission in the world was not only to seek blessing and prosperity for themselves, but to seek to be a blessing to others in the world, to commend all to God, and to share God’s grace and vision with all peoples everywhere.

Our calling, as a people who by grace through faith become people of the Covenant today, is not to idealize the past or to sentimentalize the good ole days, but to take up our part of the mission for our time, and like those earlier people of God, to be willing to undertake great things for God, to venture in great hope as they ventured with God against great odds and oppositions. They saw life, not as a fi ne fi xed existence, but as a pilgrimage with God, having a great destination to be going on for, understanding that the generations who come after will have a part to play in completing what they began in their lifetimes, and trusting that God goes with them through life’s challenges and su◊erings as well as in the grand triumphs of the ages.

◊◊◊

Editor’s note: Jerry Nichols, a native of Pea Ridge, is an award-winning columnist, a retired Methodist minister with a passion for history. He is vice president of the Pea Ridge Historical Society. He can be contacted by e-mail at [email protected], or call 621-1621.