WHAT’S IN A NAME?

A forwarded email listed the following clever business names:

Cut & Face, a parlor in San Juan. Cafe Pindot, a small internet café. Summa Cum Laundry, a laundry shop in Manila. Bread Pit, a bakery. Lito Lapida, a tombstone maker in Antipolo.

Very Noy-Pi, they’re not just funny, but apt and memorable. Branding coups if you ask me—a key factor for successful marketing.

What’s in a name really? And why all the fuss about having the right name?

Names were carefully chosen even in biblical times because parents believed that whatever they called their children influenced their future.

Noah, for example, meant “comfort,” because his father wanted comfort for his family as they toiled the earth’s cursed ground.

Remember Jacob? God changed his name to Israel because one night, he actually wrestled with God and he overcame. And that’s the promise every Jew banks on even today—that as a people, they will prevail.

But this name calling business becomes more interesting. He says in Isaiah 43:1, “Fear not for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine.”

There’s more. He promised David in 2 Samuel 7:9: I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have cut off all your enemies from before you. Now I will make your name great, like the names of the greatest men of the earth.

Wow, not only does He redeem us, but He calls us by name, with promises of victory and success to boot!

However, only one name matters. By that name, every knee shall bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth. And there’s no other name given by which everyone may be saved—but by the name of Jesus.

And His is the only name that will never fail our expectations. Bread Pit's pandesal may once in a while disappoint but this Bread from Heaven will forever satisfy.