Mentoring Minutes

Yahweh or Jehovah – The Lord God (Genesis 2:4)

As we continue with this series and move through Scripture, another Name of God that we encounter, allowing us to know more fully Who He Is and His impact and involvement in our lives, is Yahweh or Jehovah. The Jewish people reverenced (and many still do so today) God in such a way that they won’t even say or write His full name so it was often displayed as YHWH with no vowels (as we know them) to exhibit His Holiness and their recognition thereof. Something worthy of our thoughts and honor still today!

The Name Yahweh is profound and may mess with our minds as we think about it. It means “I Will Be” or “I Will Be What I Will Be,” and is a fitting Name for the eternal Creator of all things, a profound statement that this God is the ultimate author of all reality, the Eternal One without beginning or end. This Name also carries with it the understanding and meaning of Lord of All, Master and Ruler over all!

This is the most commonly used name of God in all of Scripture used 6,519 times. You think God wanted us to know Him as the Authority and Lord? Absolutely and that is why there is no such thing as Christ as Savior only…He must be our Lord because He is The Sovereign Lord!

This Name for God as the Lord God appears first in Genesis 2:4 in creation. However, God did not reveal Himself specifically by this Name until He did so with Moses in Exodus 3:14 when He declared, “I Am that I Am.”  This is Yahweh!

Christ as God is revealed in Revelation through John the Beloved Apostle as Jehovah or Yahweh when He declares that He is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end…always has been, always is and always will be (Revelation 22:13)

Notice how God’s presence, provision and power are displayed in His Name(s) as He perfectly reveals Himself to those in Scripture and by faith through grace to us today. Notice also how God is revealed for Who He Is in the Old Covenant and in exactly the same way He is revealed in Christ in the New Covenant!

El Roi – The God Who Sees (Genesis 16:13)

In Genesis 16, in a very beautiful way, God reveals Himself to Hagar, Sarai’s handmaid who she offered to her husband Abram, thinking they knew best as to how to fulfill God’s Covenant promise that all the families in the earth would be blessed through his seed. Hagar conceives a child, Ishmael, and Sarai becomes bitterly jealous toward her and mistreats her. Hagar flees with the child, essentially into the wilderness with little or no hope.

It is at this moment that “the angel of The Lord” appears to her and declares God’s blessing on her son and descendants. In that moment we read in v. 13 that Hagar declares what God has revealed of Himself to her (and to us as well)…that His Name is “El Roi – The God Who sees me.”

Once again we find a powerful parallel declaring to us that Christ is El Roi, “The God Who sees me,” with Nathanael in John 1:47-49. It is this interaction that reassures and directs Nathanael to follow Jesus as one of His 12 disciples, just as God directed Hagar to take Ishmael and return to Abram and Sarai, assuring them that He would care for them.

El Roi declares to us that there are no circumstances in our lives that escape God’s watch and care over us. He knows us, our every trial and struggle, and is with us.

El Shaddai – The All-Sufficient God (Genesis 17:1-2)

This Name of God is a powerful one that that should comfort us in any and every situation that we face. This name (as does every Name of God) interconnects with every other Name of God and helps us understand and know Him. I pray that it helps you to look to Him, know and love Him more.

In Genesis 17:1-2 God reveals Himself as EL SHADDAI – the All-Sufficient One. God does this as He reveals Himself to Abraham and declares that He is sufficient and will make a covenant with Abraham that will be eternal! How awesome is that! No matter what we face, our God is not only ever present but also all-powerful and sufficient to handle every circumstance and provide every need. He is Faithful!

Once again we find that Christ as God in the flesh is also the All Sufficient One in Colossians 1:16-19 (all of Creation exists because of Him and all that God is dwells in Him); 1:27-28 (He is sufficient to make us complete in Him) – He alone is sufficient to present us perfect before God The Father; 2:10 (He alone has all authority and can accomplish all things)!

Again, how awesome is that? Do you know EL SHADDAI and do you know Him in Christ as your All-Sufficient God? I pray you do.

Love and Lordship…Food for Thought – God…and Christ…is The Lord God (Yahweh or Jehovah), “The I Am That I Am” or “I Will Be What I Will Be.”  He is El Roi – “The God Who Sees Me” and knows my every need.  He is all this and more because He not only knows and is Lord but He is El Shaddai – “The All-Sufficient One” who meets every need! He desires a personal relationship with you. Do you know Him?  Christ has paid the price so that you can!

Love and Lordship…Action Item –

1. Read the Scriptures in this article and ask The Holy Spirit to teach you.
2. Write down what each of the Names of God in this post mean to you. 
3. How have you seen the Names of God in this post become real in your life?
4. How can you know for certain that you have a relationship with God through Christ?

Contact us at Love and Lordship to find out more about how you can know God the Father, Christ His Son and The Holy Spirit and The Lord God.

Check out this week’s Love & Lordship Mentoring Minute Video –

The Lord our God is One (Deuteronomy 6:4)

If we are going to fulfill the first and greatest command to worship God alone and love Him with all our being (Mark 12:29-31) then we need to spend the time to get to know Him!

The Lord has laid it on my heart to share the Names of God, where they are found and maybe most poignantly, how each of them is fulfilled in Christ! Over the next few posts we will look at several names each week and explore the character that God is revealing to us about Himself in His Word. We will also look at how that can and should impact our understanding of Who He Is and how we can know and love Him more, especially as each name is revealed in His Son and our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ!

Let’s begin with this understanding from God Himself through His Word…there is only One God who exists as Father, Son and Holy Spirit…all of these are clearly taught in Scripture as being God Himself. (Deuteronomy 6:4; Mark 12:29; John 1:1, 14; 1 Timothy 2:5; John 4:24)

My prayer is threefold: 1) We will all know Him more; 2) We will all love Him more fully…with all our being, and; 3) We will desire to make Him known to all others wherever we have the opportunity to do so!

Elohim (Genesis 1:1)

The Lord our God is One…the only One, the Three in One, The One True Sovereign God. He introduces Himself to us in Genesis, right at the beginning, as ELOHIM.

The word for “god” is el and in order to make His point He introduces Himself as El, capitalized to emphasize that He is the only true God and as ELOHIM…a very personal God (Genesis 1:1).

Isn’t that awesome that The ONE True God of all creation would announce Himself to us as a personal God who wants us to know Him and that He desires to be in relationship with us and know us. That’s exactly what He did with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

But sin entered into the world and into each of our lives. So God had to make that personal relationship more evident so He sent Himself in the form of His Son, Jesus Christ, and called Him Immanuel…God With Us! How much more personal can you get. He was there at creation and was the active participant in and of creation (Matthew 1:23; Colossians 1:16-18)!

Let’s thank Him for loving us in such a personal way! How much more personal can you get than intimate Love…and God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit is LOVE!

What an awesome God we can know, serve and love as we can do so as a very personal God, desiring a love relationship with us so much so that He gave His one and only Son, Jesus, to give everyone the opportunity to be restored to that relationship! Praise and thanks to Him!

El Elyon (Genesis 14:20)

Our next name for God is found in Genesis 14:20 – “El Elyon” which means “God (or The Lord) Most High.” He is above all powers, principalities, authorities, “gods,” people, idols…He is above ALL!

In this text we find Abram (name later changed to Abraham) as fighting a number of kings in the land of Canaan who had taken his nephew Lot and his family and household into captivity. God makes it very clear that He was (and is) over all those who would come against His people and Him as He is El Elyon, The Most High God, over all other kingdoms and peoples.

Christ is also revealed as above all in Philippians 2:9-11 where we read that after He faithfully humbled Himself and came to earth as fully man and fully God, dying a criminal’s death on the Cross for our sins, He has been restored to His rightful place with God The Father, El Elyon, above all!

God the Father, Son and Spirit are above all! May we worship Him as He alone deserves all our praise!

Jehovah Adonai (Genesis 2:15)

The next Name of God that we focus on is Jehovah Adonai which means God, Lord or Sovereign Lord, first found in Genesis 2:15 in creation.

Notice in each of these names how God is revealing Himself as the perfect and complete One in each situation and with each person or group to let us know He is all sufficient. God, as Sovereign Creator Lord placed Adam (and Eve) in the garden and He desired that they walk with Him as Jehovah Adonai, the one true Sovereign Lord, knowing that only as they accepted Him as Lord could they be fulfilled…even in the midst of Paradise (The Garden of Eden).

We see Christ revealed as The Sovereign Lord, Jehovah Adonai, in many places in the New Testament.  One of the strongest texts is in Peter’s exhortation to all believers to set apart Christ as Lord in every part of our walk with Him in our lives and relationships. In so doing we can always answer according to His Truth and He is the only One that can fulfill us (1 Peter 3:15).

He is The Sovereign LORD of All! The question…Is He truly LORD of your life?

Love and Lordship…Food for Thought – God…and Christ…is The One True God, The Lord Most High (El Elyon) and Sovereign over all (Jehovah Adonai). Yet He makes Himself known to us right from the beginning as Elohim because above all else He desires for us to be in a personal relationship with Him? Do you know Him?  Christ has made the way!

Love and Lordship…Action Item –

1. Read the Scriptures in this article and ask The Holy Spirit to teach you.
2. Write down what each of the Names of God in this post mean to you. 
3. Every Name of God is manifested and revealed to us in Christ. How does that affect your understanding of, and relationship with, God in Christ?
4. What do you need to do to make sure that Christ is The Lord of your life?

Check out this week’s L&L Mentoring Minute Video

For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work among you will complete it by the day of Christ Jesus. (Philippians 1:6 – emphasis in original)

As we close out 2021 and look to 2022 I think most of us, just as we did in 2020, are hoping and praying that COVID was behind us and the economy would settle down and get back to thriving. We wanted to be able to gather again as families and friends, to worship, visit and shop and entertain without masks or mandates. We wished for a return to happier times and less stress…a return to “normal,” whatever that means. To some degree we have been able to do so. But because we are fallen human beings, it never seems to be enough. We miss the peace because we are never content.

If we stop and ponder all those things mentioned as desiring to return to normal I think we’ll find that, for the most part, it’s the same every year, right? Take away masks, mandates, shutdowns, restrictions and all things COVID related and we still end up pretty much the same. It was in 2020 and 2021. But it was eerily similar in 2019, 2018, 2017…you get the picture.

There are always things that disrupt our plans, pursuits and peace.  Jesus told us they would (John 16:33). COVID just magnified these things. He also promised us a peace that was ours for the taking but not the peace most of us continually desire…it would not be the world’s concept of peace (John 14:27). The world’s idea of peace is that everything goes smoothly and calmly defined by what we want or desire.  But we live in a sinful, broken and troubled world that continues to deceive itself, each other and ourselves and then seek for the ever-elusive calm…“peace.”

The Peace that Christ gives is found only in Him and is in spite of the chaos, uncertainties, trials, losses, pain and death. Yes we can even have peace in the middle of all of these…even as we go through them. 

I pray that you know Him because He offers the only real peace. All other so-called “peace” is only found when we manipulate or wait for the world and all it’s problem to go away, or at least settle down momentarily.  His peace is permanent. The only thing permanent about the peace of the world is that it’s fleeting…always!

He came to give us faith, hope and love and the greatest of these is love (I Corinthians 13:13). If we will learn to live in His Love by faith and with hope we will begin to know His peace. It is found when we choose to rejoice and give thanks in all things (Philippians 4:4-7) because we realize and live with Him on the throne of our hearts and lives.  That’s what real love does…it is the only real love (1 John 4:19) and the only way to have real peace.

I want to share the following with you as an encouragement for your New Year in Christ! I think Oswald Chambers says it best in his New Year’s Eve devotional in My Utmost for His Highest, entitled,

YESTERDAY

The God of Israel will be your rereward. — Isaiah 52:12

Security from Yesterday. “God requires that which is past.” At the end of the year we turn with eagerness to all that God has for the future, and yet anxiety is apt to arise from remembering the yesterdays. Our present enjoyment of God’s grace is apt to be checked by the memory of yesterday’s sins and blunders. But God is the God of our yesterdays, and He allows the memory of them in order to turn the past into a ministry of spiritual culture for the future. God reminds us of the past lest we get into a shallow security in the present.

Security for Tomorrow. “For the Lord will go before you.” This is a gracious revelation, that God will garrison where we have failed to. He will watch lest things trip us up again into like failure, as they assuredly would do if He were not our rereward. God’s hand reaches back to the past and makes a clearinghouse for conscience.

Security for Today. “For ye shall not go out with haste.” As we go forth into the coming year, let it not be in the haste of impetuous, unremembering delight, nor with the flight of impulsive thoughtlessness, but with the patient power of knowing that the God of Israel will go before us. Our yesterdays present irreparable things to us; it is true that we have lost opportunities which will never return, but God can transform this destructive anxiety into a constructive thoughtfulness for the future. Let the past sleep, but let it sleep on the bosom of Christ.

Leave the Irreparable Past in His hands, and step out into the Irresistible Future with Him. (Italics and bold added here)

Here are four things you can do to live by faith, with hope and in His love to know the peace only found in God through Christ:

1) Give thanks to God every day and in all things (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18)

2) Spend time with God in His Word and prayer…do it because you know how much He loves you and you want to know Him more and learn to worship Him alone and love Him with all your being (2 Timothy 2:15; Mark 12:29-30)

3) As you spend time with Him, ask Him to show you who you are in Christ and teach you to love yourself as Christ has recreated you to be (Ephesians 2:10)

4) As He teaches you who you are in Christ, learn to be content and confident in who He has made you to be and then give of yourself to love others just like He loves you and you love yourself (Mark 12:31; John 13:34)!

God literally has all the regrets of your yesterdays, the unknowns of your tomorrows and whatever you may face today! By his grace He can turn all of it for your good and His glory (Romans 8:28). Trust in Him every day!

Love and Lordship…Food for Thought – Don’t worry about yesterday or tomorrow…leave them in God’s hands and trust Him. In so doing you can live TODAY and every day by faith in the peace, joy, hope and love found only in Christ! 

Love and Lordship…Action Item –

1. Read the Scriptures in this article and ask The Holy Spirit to teach you.
2. How is the past impacting TODAY? What do you need to do to let it go? 
3. How is the future impacting TODAY? What do you need to do to stop worrying?
4. How can you live TODAY for Christ? In your life? Relationships? Work? Thoughts? Even your motives? This is where you will find His peace!

Have a Blessed New Year in Christ for this is what we have to look forward to… And He who sits on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” And He said, “Write, for these words are faithful and true.” (Revelation 21:5)

Check out the following or this related video for more on finding His peace…