Names (A Chapel Address)

It's fun to be able to encourage and exhort students here at RVA.  There are opportunities for it everywhere.  Here's the script from a chapel service I spoke for last week.  If any of you whose names I made fun of happen to read this...  thanks for brightening our day, and sorry!
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We’ve been thinking about baby names a lot lately.

Heather’s getting anxious about choosing a name, but I can’t think of anything.  It seems like a big deal.  You can’t just rush into this kind of thing - You don’t want to mess it up!

Heather has a name she likes, but I don’t like the spelling.

You want to spell it so people say it right…  you don’t want people to mess it up… you know the kind of name: Kyalo

But you don’t want to spell it stupidly either.  I once had a student named Nathunn

What were those parents thinking? 

'I don’t know, honey… don’t you think people will say Nay Than?  I like more of an Uh sound…  lets use a U…  and what about an extra N… that’d be awesome.  It really makes that unnnn stick.  Nay thunnn.'

Maybe we should pick a name that really means something:   I looked up some Biblical names and their meanings:

Hephzibah – My delight is in her.  Kind of a nice girl name, right?

Or maybe you choose a name you really like and THEY don’t.  I know a guy who changed his name to Purple Frog Rainbowstar.  What if my child does that!?!

It’s really intimidating!

Sometimes names really DO mean something, but really, more often, the name means something because of what we DO.  As a teacher, there’s a whole list of names that have been contaminated by some punk kid: 

'Honey, How do you like the name Jacob?'

'Jake… uh Jacob… uh… ' And there’s this image of somebody DOING something or BEING someone.  And I don’t like it!

There is one name most of us share:  Christian.

Does that name have meaning?  Look it up and you find: follower of Christ.

But I think like Hephzibah the real meaning comes by observing ‘Christian’ in action.  I think a large part of the world hears the name ‘Christian’ and the meaning that comes to mind is nothing like ‘follower of Christ.’  I think it might be a whole lot more like our understanding of the word Pharisee.

One thing I really like about teaching at RVA is the conversations I don’t hear.  I haven’t sent anybody to Mr. Reber (the principal) for calling me a ____.  I haven’t had to stop any conversations about any activities from this past weekend that were illegal.  But there’s a problem:

It seems to me like most of our ‘Christian’ life is a little bit like Clearplay.  [A movie-editing program used here at RVA.]  We take this movie and cut out all the junk… the foul language, the dirty pictures, the crude jokes… but the THEME is still the same!

To ‘be more Christian’ we stop using certain words, we dress a certain way. We stop telling dirty jokes… but the THEME is still the same!!  We’re just clearplaying our pre-Christian life.   We end up being a lot like those Pharisees that Mr. Hildebrand [our student pastor] talked about yesterday… with our 600 laws, our ‘cleansing’ rituals - all careful self-righteousness.  In an effort to tone down our unsaved life we adhere to strict rules and end up with something that LOOKS and SOUNDS a lot different on the outside but at the core, we’re still the same old sinners.

Sure, becoming a Christian is so easy a caveman could do it!  [Referencing Sunday's message.]  But what about living the Christian… the Christ-following life? 

"I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace."  Ephesians 4:1-3

Completely humble? Every effort? That’s impossible!  So how do we LIVE as CHRISTIANS?

You cannot live as a Christian!

"To this end I labor, struggling with all His energy, which so powerfully works in me."  Colossians 1:29

 "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me."  Galatians 2:20

We’ve got to drop the self-righteous façade… Clearplay doesn’t work!  Cleaning up the rough edges still leaves us with the same sinful life, the same theme on the inside.  Does my life look like CHRIST is living it?  Christ who is within me?  I’m afraid not.  I think most of the time I’m just another Clear-played Christian – a ‘clean’ movie with a worldly theme.  I’m praying that God will work within me to help me to live the life that looks RADICALLY different to the world.  The Christ-like, Christ-following life.