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That's Not My Name!
'His father called him Benjamin' Genesis 35:18
You can hear the screams right across the camp. Long into the dark night the woman tosses and turns on her makeshift bed.
The midwife mops the sweat from the wet hair of the woman. Each pain, each contraction makes Jacob wince. This is hard labour. Hard, hard labour. And there are no epidurals, no gas and air, no nothing out here in the desert.
The woman strains to push, colour drains from her face - this unborn child is taking the very life out of Rachel. She's barely conscious as she urges these last words out of her dying body: 'Name the child Ben-oni for he is the son of my pain'.
Moments later Jacob is cradling his newborn son from the cold, lifeless arms of his deceased wife. From this moment on, every time Jacob looks into the eyes of his son he will see the very eyes of his wife. He will remember the pain and the way life seemed to drift out of those eyes at the very moment he held his son for the first time. And so 'Son of my pain' seems the apt name.
Yet Jacob renames the child 'Benjamin', the 'Son of Power'. Benjamin will not be a reminder of pain but of God's sovereign power. Now hear this: you are who God says you are, not who others say you are! If God didn't give you the name, it's not yours. Only believe what God says about you.
written by Bob Gass
'His father called him Benjamin' Genesis 35:18
You can hear the screams right across the camp. Long into the dark night the woman tosses and turns on her makeshift bed.
The midwife mops the sweat from the wet hair of the woman. Each pain, each contraction makes Jacob wince. This is hard labour. Hard, hard labour. And there are no epidurals, no gas and air, no nothing out here in the desert.
The woman strains to push, colour drains from her face - this unborn child is taking the very life out of Rachel. She's barely conscious as she urges these last words out of her dying body: 'Name the child Ben-oni for he is the son of my pain'.
Moments later Jacob is cradling his newborn son from the cold, lifeless arms of his deceased wife. From this moment on, every time Jacob looks into the eyes of his son he will see the very eyes of his wife. He will remember the pain and the way life seemed to drift out of those eyes at the very moment he held his son for the first time. And so 'Son of my pain' seems the apt name.
Yet Jacob renames the child 'Benjamin', the 'Son of Power'. Benjamin will not be a reminder of pain but of God's sovereign power. Now hear this: you are who God says you are, not who others say you are! If God didn't give you the name, it's not yours. Only believe what God says about you.
written by Bob Gass
