When I first saw the short clip; a beautiful blond girl in white trying to find her way- her identity, through the maze of mud-caked “names” reaching for her something about it gripped at my heart pulling me in. Shortly after that you announced you’d be doing the “Secret Name” study with the youth and I knew it was something I wanted in on even if my age was a bit over the top of the “youth” definition.

I asked and when you heartily welcomed me, I ordered the book. When the book arrived I began to read. The “secret name” idea was new to me & I wasn’t sure if I was ready to buy into the whole thing. I remember getting to the part about Jacob wrestling with God and receiving his new name and I figured if God has a secret name for me than I’d like to know it and so I asked. Growing up I’d known my birth name meant things like strong, womanly, song of joy and while I understood my “secret name” was different I somehow thought something like that might be it. Yet as I asked, there was almost immediately one word, one name that I heard but it definitely wasn’t one on my “possibility list” and well, hadn’t Jacob “wrestled” for his name. I had simply asked and received.

It seemed almost too easy. I figured I’d think on it awhile. As the word appeared in church services, in verses I read, I became increasingly assured… I knew my name. At the final class you began by asking if anyone knew their name… I kept my hand down & promptly wished I hadn’t. By then I knew that I knew my name. It was simply up to me if I was going to Claim it. I had asked and my Father had answered. I didn’t have to understand all the significance of it or how this name linked with my past, or how it would define my future. I simply had to claim it, walk in it, rejoice in having heard my name.

My Father had called me by name because He loves me–I’m his daughter. He’s not going to give me a “bad” name or suddenly jerk it back from me but neither is He going to change it just because my brain didn’t necessarily think it was the “perfect” one. I had asked, He had given, now it was simply a matter if I would receive and be blessed. And with that assurance I picked up my pen and wrote four letters on my white stone….PURE.

God has been after me, trying to give me my name for so long, but I’ve been too stubborn. Instead I’ve clung to unsatisfying  names that others bestow upon me or that I grasp at on my own. I’ve tried to run from those names, but without my TRUE name to replace them, I always return.

These names are the faults, shortcomings, and failures that others see in me and the failure, inadequacies, and struggles that I try to hide and cover. Complaining, self-loathing, depressed, afraid, angry, mean, failure, trash. All of these, and so many more that I’m not yet brave enough to share here. It’s better to have a horrible identity, than no identity at all. But these names don’t offer healing.

Through a question in the middle of the night, a postcard in a bookstore, a facebook connection, and a gracious gesture from a person that I have never met, but I am honored to know even the least bit now, I am seeing how God has been pursuing me with this for so long. I have a name, my TRUE name.

I am hesitant to say I know it, although I believe I do. It is beautiful, but if I try to look at it from the perspective of what I am capable of doing on my own, it is daunting. Only through God’s gracious gift of His Son and His continuing work and strength in a person so fallen, will I ever truly be able to embody this beautiful name: REDEEMED.

Did you ever look at all of the meanings of the word redeem? To buy or pay off; to buy back; to recover by payment; to exchange for money or goods; to discharge or fulfill (a promise); make amends for, offset; to obtain the release or restoration of, as from captivity, by paying a ransom.

Do you know what the opposite of REDEEMED is?

ABANDONED.

If any of you know me, truly know me, you know that I have felt abandoned and have been abandoned in various ways. I have felt the weight of that abandonment. For a long time it led me to question whether or not God really cared for me at all. I truly believed that God existed. I believed wholeheartedly that God loved other people. But, somehow, that God simply couldn’t love me, not if He really knew me the way everyone insisted He did.

If He knew my facade, maybe He could love me, but not if He truly knew all of the dirt. Then during my first semester of sophomore year, while in my Exploring the Bible class, God allowed me to hear. I didn’t learn His name for me that day, but I did find my name for Him.

Genesis 16:13- “You are the God who sees me.”

In the desert, alone, running away after being mistreated by her master for bragging up the fact that she was pregnant, God met Hagar. He saw her. He knew what she had done, He knew what Sarai had done, He knew that she was pregnant and not with the child He had promised Abram. But He SAW her. He comforted her and promised that her son would also become a father of a nation.

He saw her. He knew her. He comforted her. EL ROI- the God who sees me.This name impacted me so much that I now wear this reminder permanently in black ink on my wrist.

I have my name for God. I have His name for me. It is a large name to live up to. In fact, there is no way to embody that name on my own. God is the only one capable of getting me there and I know it’s going to be a long and hard journey.

Thank you, to everyone that God has been using in my life, and continues to use in my life, to bring me to the place of knowing my SECRET NAME.

Some of this might be confusing to some of you. I had never thought of such a thing as a secret name before, even though it’s mentioned in the Bible. Not to mention the fact that I’ve been trying to carve out a name for myself for years, not knowing the whole time I was merely seeking something to fill the gap that was meant for true name.

Anyway, this might clear a little bit up and maybe, if you don’t already know God’s name for you, begin the journey of finding it. 🙂 www.yoursecretname.com