A New Name

Dale Carnegie once said, “a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.” Our name is our primary personal symbol, carrying our identity and our family heritage.

But what if we have another name we haven’t received yet?

Jesus said to the church in Pergamum:

Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give some of the hidden manna. I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it. (Rev 2:17)

Imagine the Lord giving you a white stone with a new name written on it. What’s the significance of this new name? Only the Lord knows who you really are on the deepest level. Only he can define you. And this gets even more personal because John writes that the new name is “known only to the one who receives it.” Imagine only you and the Lord knowing this name. I can’t think of better support for the concept of a “personal relationship with the Lord” than Revelation 2:17. George MacDonald (1824–1905) writes:

The name is one “which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.” Not only then has each man his individual relation to God, but each man has his peculiar relation to God. He is to God a peculiar being, made after his own fashion, and that of no one else. Hence he can worship God as no man else can worship Him.

For each, God has a different response. With every man He has a secret—the secret of a new name.

Why does he call it a “secret”? Because only the individual and the Lord know this name. In the end we won’t be defined by our parents or our family.

What practical difference does this make?

We don’t have to spend our lives trying to stand out in the crowd. Our uniqueness can only come from our Creator. MacDonald adds,

Here there is no room for ambition. Ambition is the desire to be above one’s neighbor; and here there is no possibility of comparison with one’s neighbor: no one knows what the white stone contains except the man who receives it. (George MacDonald: 365 Readings, 8-10)

There will be no selfish ambition in heaven because we will be basking in God’s loving attention.

Our new name will be a perfect match for who we really are. And it will be far sweeter and more important than any name we have ever been called.

Les Bridgeman

After graduating from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, I served as a Bible and theology teacher in Asia and the U.S. My new book explores the amazing doctrine of the Trinity.