God Has a Name, by John Mark Comer (Zondervan, 2017)
Why is it important to know that God has a name other than “God”? That He revealed His name to Moses and to the people He had chosen?
Lots of people talk about God… with lots of variations on who they think He is. So His name, as revealed in the Bible, tells us who we’re talking about. So to quote the prologue, “The question at the heart of this book [is]: Who is God?” And the answer is important, because the prologue also asserts that “We become like what we worship.”
So this is a book for Christians (others are welcome too) where we can check our ideas about God against what He says about Himself, with a view to learning to follow in His ways. There’s a lot of misinformation about God floating loose in society, and we’re not immune to absorbing some of it. That’s why we need books like this one.
In six chapters, God Has a Name dives deep (yet accessibly) into the text of Exodus 34:4-7, where God told Moses His name: Yahweh, often rendered in our Bibles as “The LORD.”
Lest that sound heavy or dry, let me say I love the friendly, conversational tone. This is not your great-grandparents’ stilted theology text. It’s deeply researched, drawing from many contemporary and long-past writers, and the occasional Hebrew word does pop up, but I found the delivery refreshing.
We can (and should) read this Bible passage on our own, prayerfully spending regular time in the Scriptures. There’s much more to it than I’ve ever dug up on my own, though, and I’m grateful for John Mark Comer’s teaching on it.
Each chapter begins with a portion of the passage. The pattern is to: 1) explore the original language, 2) look at where the passage shows up elsewhere in the Bible (it’s quoted or referenced so many times!), 3) look at how Jesus reveals this Exodus-Named God in the New Testament, and 4) “think about what who God is means for who we are” (prologue) and how that might reshape us.
I found this book invigorating, and I definitely need to read it again. Highly recommended! You can read the first chapter online here. Or for a taste of the full contents, check out the author’s God Has a Name sermon series at Bridgetown Church, Oregon. Just click the name of each installment to listen.
New York Times bestselling author John Mark Comer is currently based in Los Angeles, working with Practicing the Way (check the site for spiritual formation resources). To learn more about the author and his ministry, visit johnmarkcomer.com. Scroll down far enough, and you’ll find various podcast options as well as his books.
[Review copy from the public library via Hoopla Digital.]
