The Only Name that Matters

eDevotion

Encouragement for your daily walk with God

Years ago I attended California Graduate School of Theology. Each year we were blessed with two convocations, one in the Fall and one in the Spring. We were privileged to have some of America’s greatest evangelists, pastors, and scholars to speak to the students. I had a personal favorite, though. He was Dr. E. V. Hill [now deceased], the former pastor of the Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles. Man oh man, could he preach — hours on end!

In his book, A Savior Worth Having, he wrote about an incident when a radical group threatened to kill him if he preached one more sermon about Jesus. We’re not talking about Iraq, Iran, or Afghanistan here. No, this was Los Angeles, California. When he told the police about the threat, they encouraged him not to speak at his church for a few Sundays, to let things cool down a bit. Dr. Hill told them, “It’s your job to keep me alive, and it’s my job to preach Jesus Christ.” 

Sure enough, the next Sunday, there was Dr. Hill standing behind the pulpit. All of the Elders and Deacons came and sat on the front rows of the church. And when he preached, he let it rip! “I want to call His name out loud,” he said. “His name is J-E-S-U-S — Jesus! So if it’s my last time and a bullet strikes me down, I want to go out saying, ‘Jesus!’”

How about that! Jesus, there’s power in His name. Jesus, there’s victory in His name. Jesus, there’s authority in His name. And as the great singer, Andre Crouch, was fond of saying, “Demons tremble at the sound of His name.”

It was Jesus, and only Jesus, who offered Himself as the righteous sacrifice for sin by shedding His blood on our behalf. No name is more powerful. Christ followers know that in the name of Jesus, sinners are saved, lives are changed, sick bodies healed, and eternal destinies secured. 

There is no other name. Say it with me please, Jesus — our beloved Savior. 

Salvation comes no other way; no other name has been or will be given to us by which we can be saved, only this one. Acts 4:12 [The MESSAGE]