That’s what a friend of many years declared aloud one day in bible study.
The phrase blurted from his mouth in a loud burst, like a perfunctory exclamation point, as if he had been pondering the matters for years and years and finally reached a conclusion. He said he had been singing the old gospel songs since his youth, reading the Word dutifully, and repeating the phrase in times of trouble, “there is power in the Name of Jesus. Oh yes, there is power in the Name of Jesus.”
But for some reason, on that day, in the middle of an ordinary bible study session that was soon ending, he finally got it. He said he finally understood why there is power in the Name of Jesus.
The answer, he realized, is in His Kingship. And this is what he told us:
First, God is God
We know that God is the King, the Creator. He was first.
No one created God, but God created everyone and everything.
- Genesis 1:1 says “God created the heavens and the earth.”
- Genesis 1:3 says “God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.”
- Genesis 1:6 says “God said, ‘Let there be a dome in the middle of the waters, to separate one body of water from another.’ And so it happened….”
- Genesis 1:9 says “God said, ‘Let the water under the sky be gathered into a single basis, so that the dry land may appear.”
- Genesis 1:10 says “God called the dry land ‘the earth,’ and the basis of the water he called ‘the sea.’”
- Genesis 1:11 says “God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth vegetation…And so it happened.”
- Genesis 1:14 says “God said ‘Let there be lights in the dome of the sky, the separate day from night…And so it happened.”
- Genesis 1:20 says” God said, ‘Let the water teem with an abundance of living creatures…And so it happened.”
- Genesis 1:24 says “God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth all kinds of living creatures…And so it happened.”
- Genesis 1:27 says “God created man in his image.”
And we know that Jesus is God’s Son. The New Testament tell us so.
- Luke 1:35 says “Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.”
- John 1:14 says: “And the Word became flesh. And made his dwelling among us,
- And we saw his glory, The glory as of the Father’s only Son, Full of grace and truth.”
- John 3:16 says: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son…”
- John 5:17: [Jesus speaking:] “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.”
We (…and Kanye) also know that Jesus is King. He shares His Father’s power.
- John 3:35 says: “The Father loves the Son and has given everything over to him.”
- John 5:21 says: “For just as the Father raises the dead and gives life, so also does the Son give life to whomever he wishes.”
- John 5:26-27 says: “For just as the Father has life in himself, so also he gave to his Son the possession of life in himself. And he gave him the power to exercise judgment, because he is the Son of Man.”
- John 6:27 says: “Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him the Father, God, has set his seal.”
- John 6:32 says: “My Father gives you the true bread from heaven.”
- John 6:48 says: “I am the bread of life.”
- John 8:16 says: “And even if I should judge, my judgment is valid, because I am not alone, but it is I and the Father who sent me.”
- John 8:26 says: “But the one who sent me is true, and what I heard from him I tell the world.”
- John 8:38 says: “I tell you what I have seen in the Father’s presence; then do what you have heard from the Father.”
- John 10:15 says: “Just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I will lay down my life for the sheep.”
- John 18:11 says: “Holy Father, keep them in your Name that you have given me, so that they may be one just as we are.”
- John 18:25 says: “Righteous Father, the world also does not know you, but I know you, and they know that you sent me.”
- John 20:17 says: “I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”
- John 21:21 says: “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
- John 11:22 says: “The Father and I are one.”
So what does Jesus’ Name mean for us mere mortals?
Everything about Jesus, including His Name, encompasses the whole power, glory, and awesome, terrifying authority of God, His Father.
- We glorify God when we glorify Jesus’ Name.
- We glorify the Holy Spirit when we glorify Jesus’ Name.
- We affirm our position in His body when we glorify Jesus’ Name.
- We confirm our humility and total dependence on Him when we glorify Jesus’ Name.
- We show our fidelity and our small, human love for Him when we glorify Jesus’ Name.
- No matter the language or translation it is spoken in, Jesus’ Name has power.
What about satan?
All creation that is subject to God, the Father, is also subject to Jesus, the Son, including the devil and his demons.
The demons trembled in the presence of Jesus, remember?
Matthew 9:29 has the demons crying out to Jesus: “What have you to do with us, Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the appointed time?”
The demons fled from Jesus when He rebuked them. So we, who share in Jesus’ body, are capable of rebuking the devil, too. But we must do so not in our name, but in His.
- We send the demons fleeing when we speak in Jesus’ Name.
- We crush the serpent’s head when we speak in Jesus’ Name.
- We open doors that the devil closed when we pray in Jesus’ Name.
- We conquer the wickedness of the world, and even the wickedness within ourselves, when we declare in Jesus’ Name.
- We share a sliver of Jesus’ spiritual power when we profess in Jesus’ Name.
His Name, with its divine power derived from His Sonship and Kingship, is yet another tool in our spiritual toolbox.
Whether uttered in times of celebration, of prayer, of sickness, of distress, of glory, or of joy, we find power in that Name, Jesus.
[By the way, my friend ended that bible study on a happy note, singing ‘Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, there’s just something about that Name….’]
MSC
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