“And at the end of eight days, when He was circumcised, He was called Jesus, the Name given by the angel before He was conceived in the womb.”
(Luke 2:21 ESV)
There are a lot of names God could have chosen for Jesus. So many Hebrew names are statements about God—”God is righteousness,” for example, or “God is my healer.” But God picked none of those when He chose the name He would carry as a human being in our broken world. He chose the most obvious one, “the Lord is salvation,” because that’s exactly what He came to do. Jesus was born to become our Savior—to rescue us from evil, to forgive our sins, and to make us children of God. Nobody else could do this for us—only Jesus, God with us.
It comforts me that God chose the obvious name. It tells me Jesus was clear about what He was going to do for us even before His conception! He came to be born as one of us, to live and to serve and to care for us, and ultimately to lay down His life for us on the cross. By dying He destroyed the power of death over us; and by rising to life again on the third day, He gave life to everyone who trusts in Him. Jesus Himself tells us so: “For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will but the will of Him who sent Me. … For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:38, 40 ESV).
We Pray: Lord Jesus, keep me as Your own forever. Amen.
Reflection Questions:
* Do you know what your own name means?
* When are you most clear that you need a Savior?
* Why did God come Himself, instead of sending someone else?
Advent Devotions were written by Dr. Kari Vo.
Originally published in The Lutheran Hour on December 27, 2024
Used by permission from International Lutheran Laymen’s League, all rights