IT is instructive to observe the moment at which this new name was given to the saved ones after the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
Up to the time of Christ the Jews alone had been owned as the people of God upon the earth. “He hath chosen thee to be a special people unto Himself above all people.... because the Lord loved you.”
But His pleasant plant, a noble vine, wholly a right seed, yielded no fruit, and until Christ came, ―His elect, in whom His soul delighted, ―there was nothing to meet His requirements. Not until then was there one upon the earth in whom He could find joy. Of this He testified by a voice from heaven: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
But the Jew in his blindness, and the Gentile in his deadness, could see no beauty in Him; and they crucified Him. God raised Him from the dead to His own right hand.
Henceforth there is no earthly center. We are gathered to Him who is raised from the dead. There only can rest and satisfaction as well as salvation be found. God no longer deals with an earthly people to find a return for His love, or an answer to His demands. He has found it all in Christ, and He rests there. Henceforth He will look nowhere else. To meet the desire of God’s heart we must be found IN CHRIST, or headed up under Him.
From Pentecost souls were gathered to Christ as raised from the dead. First, from among the Jews, ― the disciples, even AFTER the persecution that arose about Stephen, went “preaching the word to none but unto the Jews only.” (Acts 11:1919Now they which were scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose about Stephen travelled as far as Phenice, and Cyprus, and Antioch, preaching the word to none but unto the Jews only. (Acts 11:19).)
Still they had no peculiar name. It was after the door had been opened to the Gentiles (Acts 10) that they got a NEW NAME. They were called CHRISTIANS. Both Jew and Gentile gathered in faith by one Spirit to the risen Christ, forming of twain one new man, in Christ (1 Corinthians 12:1212For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ. (1 Corinthians 12:12)), ―part of Himself, ―members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones. No longer Jews nor Gentiles, but the Church of God, having no center upon the earth, but having living union with Christ above, and looking for Him to come and take them up to Himself.
The Jew would naturally think of himself as belonging to a favored race; but we, as not in the flesh, have no room for boasting. Self is buried in the grave of Christ. We are named after Him, and in Him alone do we glory, in whom we have obtained an inheritance, and in whom we are complete.
There is a promise to those who overcome in Rev. 2:1717He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it. (Revelation 2:17) peculiarly precious to the soul: I will give him “a new name.” In human relationships, we know the power of a name; how tenderly it strikes upon the ear! But if it be a name bestowed in token of intimate friendship, or relationship of peculiar love, how deeply it stirs the emotions of the heart This new name corresponds to His new name; there is an echo from one to the other. “I will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.” And again, “I will write upon him my new name.”
May we now glory in His name, ―a name which is above every name, ―and worship at His feet, until that happy day when we “shall see His face,” and His name shall be in our foreheads.