Named by the Promise

"The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I also give to you, and I will give this land to your descendants after you."  Genesis 35:12


Named by the Promise
By Rev. William Dohle

I often wonder, looking at my children as they sleep in their beds, what in their lives will define them.  What events, conversations, and situations will be self-defining for them?  What will name them and shape them in their adult lives?

Will it be the trip we took to St. Louis as they gazed down from the arch?  Or the book on astronomy that we just read together?  Will it be the time we went kite flying or the game they played?  Will it be a word misspoken in anger or one quietly whispered at bedtime?  What will shape them and name them as people in adulthood?


There are self-defining moments in everyone's life.  One of them occurred, for me, when I was confirmed when an old, retired pastor whispered in my mother's ear: "He's gonna be a pastor someday."  That word, passed on jokingly by my mother, worked to shape my life into what it is today.

Another self-defining moment came at high school graduation.  One of the churches I attended was a Nazarene church at the time and the pastor had both of its high school graduates(one other girl and I) kneel and be prayed over.  The pastor prayed that each of us would find a spouse in college that would complete us and help us on our journey.  God answered that prayer in my wife whom I met in college.

If Jacob was here among us, he would describe the defining moment that happened to him at Bethel with God.  There God called him... HIM!  The loser son of Isaac who stole his brother's inheritance and ripped off his blessing.  There God called HIM!  He claimed Jacob as his very own.  No longer will he be the deceiver.  That life is behind him.  For, on that mountain God gives Jacob a new name.  A reminder of the night he wrestled with God, here the name change is made official: "Your name is Jacob, but you will no longer be called Jacob; your name will be Israel."(Gen. 35:10)

Jacob would no longer be the same person.  Now he would be Israel.  The one who wrestled with God.  His sons would be the surnames of the twelve tribes of Israel.  From his family and from his issue, all the world would be blessed.  In the end, out of him would come the savior of the world!

But something else happened on that mountain too.  Something even more significant than a name change.  A promise was reaffirmed.  A promise given to Jacob's grandfather years and years before was made into Jacob's promise:  "I am God Almighty...The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I also give to you and I will give this land to your descendants after you."

Jacob might have heard of this promise.  Might have been told by his father and grandfather of what God had said and done for them, but Jacob didn't know it for himself.  Only in the stories of others.  But now, here at Bethel, Jacob finds out that God was serious about what he promised.  And that those promises are HIS too!

Jacob's defining moments are our defining moments too for we have been claimed by a promise.  The promise of baptism.  Baptism does to us what God did for Jacob.

Baptism NAMES us!  In older days, children use to receive their names when they were baptized.  Now they receive them at birth.  But at baptism, God names us child of God.  Before baptism we are different people.  After baptism we are called child of God.  So... young Mary comes to baptism as just Mary, she leaves as Mary, child of God.  A whole new identity is given to her in those simple waters.

But baptism doesn't just name us.  It makes us heirs of a promise.  Like Jacob was reaffirmed to be heir of the promises of Abraham, so we too are reminded of God's promise to us in baptism.  That in those waters, God reminds us that He will never let us go.  That He's always with us.  And, most of all, that nothing in all creation will separate us from His love in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Those are promises worth keeping.

So, whatever else happens in our lives, may we me shaped by our baptism.  May we be shaped and reshaped by the waters which continue to flow over us.  May we remember the name we receive there.  And may we know the promises we have in baptism, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

God of Promises, mold me and shape me into our image by the promises you have given me and all believers, through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.