I vividly remember some of my earliest phrases in Spanish class. Aside from the alphabet, a beginning Spanish student usually learns expressions, questions such as
What is your name?
My name is______.
Where are you from?
How old are you?
Do you like______?
I always laughed when the instructor would remind us that the literal translations do not always come out the same way in English, because they would generally sound a bit odd. Obviously, the meaning would be the same, but the word-for-word translation would sound a bit humorous at times. For example, the literal translation for asking someone their name in Spanish comes out “How do you call yourself?”, and in response, you would answer (again in Spanish)…”I call myself_____”. As a teenager, I would giggle a bit, because it always sounded so silly to me. However, the longer I took these Spanish classes, and the more fluent I grew, the language started to make sense, and I never had to question the translation – no matter how silly it may have sounded when breaking it down word by word.
So, how do you call yourself? Yes…what is your name? Is it Brave One…Princess…maybe Leader of Many…or Captive Breaker…how about Mighty Warrior? OK – so maybe we don’t go around stating our names in this way, but do you know that God is calling you by a special name (and perhaps by more than one)? We read in Judges 6:12 the following:
When the angel of the LORD appeared to Gideon, he said, “The LORD is with you, mighty warrior.”
This has huge significance! If you study the book a little further, you’ll see that Gideon had done nothing worthy of the name “mighty warrior”. He even boldly admitted that he was from the weakest clan in Manasseh. So, why would God call him a mighty warrior? He called him by what He was making him – knew he was going to be – what He saw in him even before Gideon recognized it in himself. Gideon was being called out by God to save Israel from the Midianites. God knew that Gideon was going to be that mighty warrior, and he was because he obeyed God.
So, I ask again…how do you call yourself? Or better yet, what is God calling you? Like in my Spanish classes, the longer I study God’s language – His Word – the more fluent I become and the more it makes sense. His names for me also begin to make sense, even if they seem so far from reality at the moment.
Are you willing to walk in obedience to live up to that name or calling even if all you can see right now is something drastically different or significantly weaker than the name He is calling you? Let Him shape you and mold you to fit that name He is calling you! Do it friend, and be very, very blessed!