Your Name

To our son, the boy who was born with no name.  

No child deserves to live the first year of life without a name.  And yet, that is how your story began.  With nothing to identify you.  We are not sure why your birth mother did not name you.  Perhaps she was trying to distance her heart, not wanting to become too attached to the baby she knew she would not keep.  Or maybe she understood what a great honor it is to name a child, and was saving that as a gift for us, the ones who would adopt you.

Whatever her reasons, she could not have possibly foreseen that the adoption process would take so long.  That for nearly a year, “Baby Boy” was officially recorded on your birth certificate, social security card, and medical insurance card.  Every time I took you to the pediatrician, the nurse would open the door to the lobby, look around at the parents and children waiting there, and call out, loud enough for everyone to hear:  Baby Boy?  Sure, those two little words were benign, seemingly harmless by themselves.  But the message they communicated?  You do not belong to a family.  You are not significant enough to have a name.  You are indistinguishable from every other orphaned child in the world.  Unnamed.  Unwanted.  Unimportant.

Nothing, absolutely nothing, could have been further from the truth!  When that happened, I wanted to hold you close and protect you from those words and everything they meant.  I wanted to announce to everyone in that waiting room that you do have a name.  That you are wanted.  Chosen.  Loved.  It’s just that we were waiting for the legal system to catch up to what we already knew with certainty:  that you were our son.

The day finally came when your adoption would be finalized.  We dressed in our finest clothes, drove downtown to the courthouse, and stood before the judge.  Tears streamed down my face as we raised our right hands and solemnly swore that yes, we understood that adoption is a permanent and lifelong commitment, and yes, we vowed to treat you in all respects as our natural born child.

With the bang of the judge’s gavel that day, no longer were you unnamed. Your birth mother had been right:  it was a great honor to name you.  We chose a first name for you that means God has remembered.  Because in our longing to be parents, in our prayers for a child of our own, He remembered us.  But even more importantly, we were asking God to remember you.  To be with you and guide you as you grew older, to help you become the young man He created you to be.

And in that moment, you officially became a part of our family, and as such, your birth certificate would forever be changed.  Our family name became your family name, a name that we proudly shared with you.  A name that you would carry into future generations.  

We knew right from the beginning, from your earliest days, that you were “fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139:14).  We watched in wonder as your curiosity and creativity, as your intellect developed right in front of our eyes.  By the age of 2, you knew the difference between a front loader and a bulldozer.  By the age of 3, you had memorized the names of dozens of different kinds of dinosaurs.  

One day, when you were 4, we were at the local library, browsing through the picture books, when you asked me if you could check out some reader books instead.  I tried to explain to you, You are too young for those books, Honey.  You can’t read yet.  You marched right over to the next section, pulled a book off the shelf, and to my utter astonishment, you started reading it.  By yourself!  At age 4!  I knew then that I was in trouble.  It would only be a matter of time before you outsmarted me.

We also noticed almost from the beginning that along with your unusually high intelligence, or maybe because of it, your brain was wired differently.  We hated the thought of giving you a label, putting that big personality into a predefined box, a box that would possibly limit your potential.  But as you got older, we finally had to admit that we needed help.  We needed help understanding the way you think, the reasons behind your strong emotions, suggestions for managing your baffling and sometimes disruptive behaviors.

After hours and hours of questionnaires, assessments, evaluations, testing, and meetings over the course of several months, the report we received was surprisingly long.  A thick stack of papers that described, in detail, every aspect of your development, behavior, learning style, attention span, and activity level – and how you compare to other children your age.  The report, in essence, assigned you new names.  Diagnoses and labels.  No longer were you “average.”  The labels said you were deficient.  Flawed.  Broken.

Of course, these new names could never, not for one moment, diminish the love in our hearts for you.  But mental illness labels carry a stigma, and these labels did, unfortunately, isolate us from other families, isolate you from other children your age.  As you grew into your teen and young adult years, it was heart-breaking for us to watch you become more and more lonely.  To know that our curious and creative and smart son who once had such a zest for life, was slowly losing hope. Slowly giving up.  And there was not one thing we could do to help you.  Could anything possibly be worse?

As it turns out, things could get worse, and in fact, they did.  As you searched for meaning and purpose in your life, as your heart longed to be loved and accepted, you took a dark and dangerous path, a path that would lead to unwise choices and self-destruction.  Serious mistakes.  A path that would ultimately end in a place where men and women are discarded and forgotten.  A place where, instead of a name, you were assigned a number.  A number that labeled you Unworthy.  Loser.  Failure.

And we were completely devastated.  It was our worst nightmare for you, the son we had prayed for and chosen and loved so deeply.  For months, we lived in fear for your safety.  In uncertainty about your future.  In deep grief at the loss of all of our hopes and dreams for the young man you could have become.  Those months were brutal, almost unbearable.  Countless times I cried out to God, reminding Him of your name.  Begging Him to remember you.  To be with you and guide you, to help you understand that in that dark and hopeless place, you had not been forgotten.

The day finally came when your fate would be decided.  We dressed in our finest clothes, drove downtown to the courthouse, and sat there silently as you stood before the judge.  Tears streamed down my face as we listened to the terrible accusations.   And with the bang of the judge’s gavel that day, you were named Guilty.  Rejected.  Outcast.  Heavy, shameful names that you would be forced to carry for the rest of your life.  Oppressive, crushing names that no one can possibly bear. 

Your birth mother left you unnamed.

We, your adoptive parents, gave you a name filled with faith and hope and promise.  We gave you our family name filled with dreams for the future.

The psychologists gave you diagnostic names filled with stigma.

The justice system gave you harsh names filled with shame.

But here’s the thing.  Here is the truth that will set you free.  Free to be who you were created to be.  None of those names are names that your Heavenly Father has given you.  Even before you were born, when you were still unformed in your birth mother’s womb, He was writing your story in His book.  Every chapter, every page. (1)

And if you will allow Him, if you will only believe that His plans for you are good, that the story He is writing for your life has purpose, these are the words He desires to speak over you.  The names He  longs to give you:

You shall be called by a new name 

that the mouth of the Lord will give.  

You shall no more be termed Forsaken, 

but you shall be called My Delight, 

for the Lord delights in you.  

And you shall be called Holy, 

Redeemed of the Lord; 

and you shall be called Sought Out,

Not Forsaken.  

(Isaiah 62:2, 4, 12)

Can you see that?  These life-giving words?  There is no room for guilt, or stigma, or shame.  There is no condemnation.  (Romans 8:1)  Those names that are too heavy, too crushing to bear?  You do not need to carry them alone.  You are not forsaken!

When you became a part of our family, you were wanted.  Chosen.  Loved.  And we gave you a name that means God has remembered.  And He has!  He has  remembered you!  Not once during all these years, despite all the names, during your loneliest and darkest moments, has He forgotten you.  You are, and have always been, His beloved child.  And just as He has been doing since before you were born He is still faithfully writing your story.  Every chapter.  Every page.  Not only in His book, but on His hands! (2)  Do you see how precious you are to Him?  What a treasure? (3)

Listen.  Even now He is calling you.  He invites you to receive a new name, a name that only He can give.  My Delight.  Holy.  Redeemed.  Sought Out.

All those other names and labels that others have given you?  They are just that - man-made names and labels.  The One who created you, the One who is writing your story stands ready, even now, to give you a new name.  And it’s the only name that matters.

Son.

1.    Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me when as yet there was none of them. Psalm 139:16

2.    I will not forget you.  Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands.  Isaiah 49:15-16

3.    But you are God’s chosen treasure . . . He called you out of darkness to experience his marvelous light, and now he claims you as his very own.  1 Peter 2:9 (The Passion Translation)