“Whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”
— Colossians 3:17
If the Third Commandment tells us what not to do with God’s name, the New Testament is full of instruction about what to do with it. And what we are called to do is magnificent. We are to love His name, live His name, and lean on His name. These three are not a checklist. They are a lifestyle.
To love His name is to treat it with the same tenderness and fierceness you would show anything you genuinely treasure. I would not allow someone to drag my wife’s name through the gutter without saying something. How much more should I be willing to speak up when the name of my Savior is being misused around me? This does not mean confronting every stranger with a lecture. It means that in the circles where I have relationship and influence, I hold the name of Jesus in the high and holy place it deserves.
To live His name is to understand that because I am called a Christian, my life is a visible representation of Christ to everyone who knows me. The early Christians did not give themselves that name. The people of Antioch gave it to them because they said: these people remind us of Jesus. That is the standard. Not perfection, but resemblance. When people think of you, does Christ come to mind? I challenge you today to live so consistently, so authentically, so genuinely in the character of Jesus that someone who does not yet know Him looks at you and wants to.
And to lean on His name is to actually use it, in prayer, in spiritual warfare, in the daily dependence on His power rather than your own. Jesus said “whatever you ask in my name, this I will do” (John 14:13). To pray in His name is not a formula tacked onto the end of a sentence. It is to come before the Father in the authority of the Son, asking according to His character and His will. There is immeasurable power in that name. Use it.
Love it. Live it. Lean on it. The name of Jesus is the most powerful word in the universe, and it belongs to you.
THE NAME OF JESUS IS POWER. LOVE IT, LIVE IT, AND LEAN ON IT EVERY DAY.
