His WORD above His Name

I will worship toward Your holy temple and praise Your name, For Your lovingkindness and Your truth; For You have magnified Your word above all Your name (Psalm 138:2)

The book of Psalms is loved by many as we find words of encouragement penned down by the writer. It presents to us the acknowledgement of God in daily living.  The Psalmist covers different elements of life, including the painful and fearful ones and in the same vein, he lifts up the name of Jehovah, His eternal rock and strength.  Chapter 138 opens up with praise, and reading the very first verses, leads our hearts to spontaneous worship of God, reflecting the very first words of the preceding verses that the Psalmist will praise the Lord with his whole heart.  It is the awareness of who God is that made the Psalmist break out in praise.  The chapter speaks of God’s lovingkindness, His truth, His strength, His glory and His heart of mercy, that though high and lifted up, He reaches down to the lowly and hears the cry of their hearts.  Indeed, our God is great in power and majesty and yet gentle in His love and mercy towards us, His children.  When we get a glimpse of God in His glory and love, we cannot but bow and agree with the Psalmist that we shall praise Him with abandon.

As I read this beautiful chapter, the last phrase in verse 2 stands out for me – that God has chosen to magnify, exalt, and lift up His word above His name.  We often get to know people by their names, and there are names in our world that, once mentioned, we think of as power, authority etc. Their names represent something to us.  The same is also true about our God, His name represents a whole lot of things to us as individuals, depending on how we have known and experienced Him, for example, Father, shepherd, protector, provider, etc. Our natural way of knowing others, including God, would therefore be by what their names represent to us, but God has chosen a different higher paradigm, knowing Him by His word; prominence is to His word, not His name.

As I pondered on this, I wondered whether names referred to how we call and see others but not necessarily to the characters and personalities of the individual.  The names we call each other are more of a title but not a true reflection of the actual person within, his preferences, ambitions, attributes etc.  Yet we get to know people by their actions, not by their names.

God’s word is His message to us of who He is.  We, therefore, cannot know Him only by name if we do not know His character, His promises and His actions, which are all found in His word.  To know Him, then, we must know His word.  He gives us the assurances of who He is in His word, encouraging us to taste and see that He is good (Psalm 34:8), confirming that He is faithful and just to forgive our sins  (1 John 1:9), His word is truth (John 17:17) we learn who we are in Him (2 Corinthians 5:17 and Galatians 3:26), His plans for us (Jeremiah 29:11) His provisions (Philippians 4:19), His love for righteousness and justice (Psalm 33:5) etc. Ooh, there is so much to know of the character of God, all placed in plain sight in His word, no wonder He exalts it so highly.

The Bible tells us that as believers, we are representatives of God to the world, and it is often said that for some, we are the only bible that they will know.  Glory to God that He does not leave us to do this by ourselves, but He has perfected His love in us so that we are like Him in this world (1 Peter 4:17).  This being the case then, our behaviours must also be an area that we give attention to so that others know us not so much by our names but by our inner man, our character. We might share a name with another person, but it is the character that differentiates us. 

Today’s reflection encourages us to consider our words as a representation of our characters, not just what we say but our faithfulness and commitment to what we have said. There is honour in keeping one’s word.  We are invited to live our lives like unto the Lord so that others are drawn to His saving grace simply by observing our characters.  We are called to be different, children of light.

Thoughts:

Does the above speak to your life?

How much of God’s character do I know?

Am I representing God as revealed in His word?

How do others experience my character?