God's
Reputation

“I would redeem them, but they speak lies against me.” ¹

‘Speaking lies against me’ sounds like an important charge when it is made by God. Context is God speaking to the favored of Israel, identified with Ephraim, and who are dishonoring Him before the surrounding nations by their disregard for who God is. The Book of Hosea is first a parable about a dishonored covenant relationship and then in the remaining chapters, an application of the parable to the nation of Israel and their disregard for God.

As you read through the Bible, you will find a recurring theme of God demonstrating the truth of who He is ‘for my name’s sake’ and Hosea is such an example. But this demonstration goes back several centuries in the biblical account. Think of it in the modern terms of God building His brand—how all mankind will identify Him accurately according to who He reveals Himself to be.

Back in Exodus 9 when the Lᴏʀᴅ is delivering the Israelites from Egypt, God gives a glimpse into His backstory when addressing Pharaoh He has Moses speak on His behalf,

Then the Lᴏʀᴅ said to Moses, “Rise up early in the morning and present yourself before Pharaoh and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lᴏʀᴅ, the God of the Hebrews, “Let my people go, that they may serve me. For this time I will send all my plagues on you yourself, and on your servants and your people, so that you may know that there is none like Me in all the earth.
For by now I could have put out my hand and struck you and your people with pestilence, and you would have been cut off from the earth. But for this purpose I have raised you up, to show you my power, so that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth. ²

Notice that God’s just not ending the slavery, the immediate concern of the Israelites, but has the greater purpose of making Himself known to the nations through His participation. ‘Know there is none like Me,’ ‘demonstrate His ability to do as He says He will do,’ and ‘that My name be proclaimed in all the earth.’ See the continuing purpose of God that His distinctiveness is known and that His Name is proclaimed everywhere—is this not then repeated in the Ten Precepts of Exodus 20, through the Psalms in the phrase ‘for My Name’s sake,’ then the prophets and ultimately in Jesus’s ministry and ultimately the Great Commission.

Would you be surprised by the number of times God acts for His Name’s sake? Here is a sampling of verses with that common theme:

Psalms 23:3 He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake. ³

Psalms 31:3 For you are my rock and my fortress; and for your name’s sake you lead me and guide me; ⁴

Psalms 79:9 Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of your name; deliver us, and atone for our sins, for your name’s sake! ⁵

Isaiah 48:11 For my own sake, for my own sake, I do it, for how should my name be profaned? My glory I will not give to another. ⁶

Ezekiel 20:9 But I acted for the sake of my name, that it should not be profaned in the sight of the nations among whom they lived, in whose sight I made myself known to them in bringing them out of the land of Egypt. ⁷

The Lᴏʀᴅ is not simply referencing a name as we think of names but rather His identity which is encapsulated in His Name. ‘Lᴏʀᴅ’ is that all-encompassing identity as Jehovah, the existing One! This is not a casual reference but the complete identity of the One who first revealed it as who He is. To clarify the name of the Lᴏʀᴅ, we moderns do not have the respect for the Lᴏʀᴅ that was and is practiced by orthodox Jews. Think of the first time God reveals Himself to Moses in Exodus 3. The angel of the Lord appears to Moses in a supernatural manifestation which prompts Moses to turn aside to see this unexplained site. As soon as Moses turns aside to see, the angel of the Lord calls Moses’s name and Moses responds with the “Here I am” to which the Lord says,

Then he said, “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” ⁸

The holiness of God is respected in the removing of the shoes (seen as an unclean body part). Just as this holiness requires an action before approach, the orthodox Jews would not speak the ‘Lᴏʀᴅ’ name of God believing it is too holy (distinctive) to be spoken. This is also part of the same reverence for God. Likewise, the precept about the use of the Lᴏʀᴅ’s name stresses the same distinctiveness of God’s identity,

“You shall not take the name of the Lᴏʀᴅ your God in vain, for the Lᴏʀᴅ will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.” ⁹

God insists upon being both correctly identified and that those identifying with Him represent Him accurately. This is emphasized in Matthew 7:21-23,

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’ ¹⁰

Identifying with the name of Jesus is more than verbal as pointed to in Colossians 3:17,

And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. ¹¹

God takes the use of His name and His identity represented in that Name seriously enough to repeat “for my Name’s sake” dozens of times across the scope of the Bible. God’s reputation means more than casual words. Then we have the prayers offered back to God ‘in His name’ which definitively means to be in agreement with Him and not just an incantation using His name.