Speaking out of reverence to God.

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

This past weekend our son Josh affirmed his faith at church through Confirmation. Through this process the confirmands went through a series of conversations where they talked about the Ten Commandments, the Apostles Creed, the Lord’s Prayer and Holy Communion, and what these things meant to them.

“Because He has inclined His ear to me, Therefore I shall call upon Him as long as I live.
-Psalm 116:2

At one point during the conversations, our Associate Pastor asked these young people, “What does ‘Hallowed be Thy name’ mean in modern eighth grade language?” I expected someone to pipe up with a name like “Righteous Dude.” No one did. Bummer. Must be something from my generation, or perhaps they are more mature than I am.

Then there was a question about what it means to take the Lord’s name in vain.

This got me thinking about calling God “Dude.” Is that being disrespectful? I mean, often when I go to God in prayer, it is a conversation between the two of us and I tend to be very frank about my thoughts and feelings including saying such things as, “Dude, really? You’ve got to be kidding me with this!”

I also thought about all of the different names that God has. One website listed over 900, from “Abba Father” and “Bread of Life,” to “Yahweh” and “Zebaot.” The list on this particular website was literally from A to Z. Alas, “Dude” was not listed. Yet, when our Senior Pastor was giving his sermon on Confirmation Sunday, he told the confirmands that prayer is just like talking to a friend. “And it shall be that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”(Acts 2:21) I believe that God just wants us to call on Him with a reverent heart. And as long as we keep these lines of communication open, I think God can be pretty understanding of whatever name we choose to call on Him, and He will incline His ear to us.

Copyright: Larissa Odell