Honor His Name

Matthew 6:9b (HCSB) - "Our Father in heaven, Your name be honored as holy...." 

Honoring God's name isn't about having some fetish about speaking His name, talking only in hushed tones, being afraid to say His name. This has been an awkward embellishment that people have put upon the Mosaic Law's statement in the Ten Commandments - "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain." (Exodus 20:7 KJV).

Honoring the Name of God is about honoring all that He is. The word honor in the Greek used here (hagiazo) means to make holy - to be sanctified or set apart. In the King James (which is what we basically recite in the Lord's Prayer) it says "Hallowed be thine name." we are to set apart as holy all that God is - His qualities, attributes, and character. We are to focus upon Who He is - all that makes up the One that we worship. when the Psalmist stated in Psalm 102:15 (HCSB) - "Then the nations will fear the name of Yahweh, and all the kings of the earth Your glory..." he was not saying that the peoples of the world would fear the letters in the name, the pronunciation of the name, the very speaking of the name - the Psalmist was saying that they would fear God Himself.

Today, pause and muse over the Name of God - Yahweh, Elohim, Jehovah, God - however you think of it - and consider it holy - and that it is holy because the One it is speaking of is Holy. Join me in pausing to worship Him today.