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“Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain.” ~ Exodus 20:7

Remember how, in children’s session growing up, this was one of the verses they used to instill the fear of God in us? It was one of the scariest Bible verses, and at the time, it was interpreted to us as, “Saying God’s name anyhow is a sin,” one that God takes very seriously.

It wasn’t until recently when I watched this YouTube that I began to understand the verse differently. Not that saying God’s name carelessly is completely unrelated to the commandment, but that the commandment goes deeper than simply saying “God” or “Jesus” in the wrong context.

The Hebrew word translated as “take” is nasa, which carries the idea of lifting, carrying, bearing, or taking up. So there is something about carrying the name of God that this commandment addresses.

And that got me thinking.

By calling ourselves Christians, we take on an identity, we identify with Christ, we carry His name.

Which means that perhaps taking His name in vain is not only about what comes out of our mouths when we mention God. It is also about what our lives say when we carry His name.

Because people may never open a Bible, but they will meet Christians.

They will meet us in our workplaces, in school, in relationships, in traffic, in arguments, in group chats, in the way we treat people who cannot do anything for us, and in the way we behave when nobody is watching.

And when we say, “I am a Christian,” we are attaching the name of Christ to all of that.

That makes the commandment a little more sobering to me.

What does it mean to carry the name of Christ and then live in a way that makes the name look empty? What does it mean to say we belong to Him but continually represent Him in ways that contradict who He is?

I think sometimes we are so afraid of misusing God’s name with our lips that we forget we can also misuse it with our lives, we carry His name.

And perhaps the question is not only, “Am I saying God’s name carelessly?” It is also, “Am I carrying His name carelessly?”

Dearest reader, if you call yourself a Christian, remember that you are carrying a name bigger than your own. You do not have to be perfect, but may your life never make Christ’s name an empty thing. May the way you love, forgive, speak, serve, and even apologise point back to the One whose name you bear. And when people encounter you, may they not only hear that you belong to Christ, but see something of Him in the way you live.

Shalom!

@favvy_Okwans🖤.