If you were given a completely new first name, you’d have to practice identifying yourself differently. As you persistently wrote and rewrote your new name in your heart, though, you’d become comfortable with the change of ID.
The first book of the Bible relates the experience of a person who was struggling mightily. But then, he yielded to God’s loving guidance in such a complete way that God gave him a new name: “Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed” (Genesis 32:28).
In her book “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” the Monitor’s founder, Mary Baker Eddy, says this about Jacob’s experience: “He had conquered material error with the understanding of Spirit and of spiritual power. This changed the man. He was no longer called Jacob, but Israel, – a prince of God, or a soldier of God, who had fought a good fight” (p. 309).
Could it be that today, too, people like you and me might also be valued and loved by God to such a degree that we’d see ourselves in completely new ways? Yes!
When I was a little kid, my world revolved around exploring outside, playing baseball, watching cartoons – all of the things that children have fun doing. Then my parents began bringing me to the nearby Christian Science Sunday School class, where I was introduced to God.
“God is Love,” said a big sign on the wall. Only three words – yet as I learned about the nature of God, not as a human super-being, but as infinite Love itself, I felt myself changing radically. I enjoyed thinking about God as Love and even began talking with God. It was wonderful, and even at that young age I could tell that my life was taking a most significant turn.
Getting to know God in this way also revealed a new sense of “me” that really captured my interest. I began to see that I was created by God – made spiritually, because God is Spirit. God has created us to show forth His nature – our true nature is not mortal or in matter. The spiritual reality is that we reflect God alone, here and now. God loves us all so much that He expresses in us pure spirituality and changeless goodness, today and always.
God’s wonderful creation is never inferior or lacking. God expresses in all of us intelligence, balance, and goodness. And we don’t have to earn our status as Love’s children. Our identity as God’s expression is always in place. As His spiritual offspring, we’re created for God’s glory!
To recognize this, even a little, is so refreshing; it’s like a new birth. I felt something of that as a child, and as I grew up – and now as an adult – my love for God and what God does in us has grown as well. And it has made a real difference – helping me to see the good in others, to be a better person, and to experience healing.
Besides Jacob, who became Israel, two other individuals in the Bible so embraced God-given inspiration that they were blessed with new names. They are Simon, who became Peter, and Saul, who became Paul. Each proved by his actions that the change wasn’t superficial; it truly was a new beginning.
Paul said, “This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13, 14).
We, too, can look to a higher calling by yielding our thoughts and hearts to God, becoming more Christlike in the way we think and act. It takes something much more radical than just a change of name. Humbly and persistently, we can look to God, Spirit, Love, for a whole new perspective on who we are as God’s spiritual and loved children.
To write and rewrite this new view in our hearts – letting go of old, habitual ways of seeing ourselves and others – is to embark on a journey of healing. As God has promised, “I will put a new spirit within you” (Ezekiel 11:19).
