No Other Name? But it's Wrong.

It seems that Christians should be more disturbed by the fact that “Jesus” is not really the name of the person they’re intending to worship. “Jesus” is a meaningless mutation of his actual name Yeshua, the result of passing through several language barriers and time. If we traveled back in time and asked the disciples where Jesus is, they probably wouldn’t be sure who we’re talking about. Every pastor knows that Jesus isn’t the right name, and yet there’s no effort taken to try to pronounce his name correctly. But the Christian is not about to ditch the name he’s been worshipping and praying to for so many years, it would feel like heresy. To worship the name “Jesus” with full knowledge that it’s the wrong name, you’re conveying that getting the name right is of little importance. Well then you may as well call him Bob; “Jesus” has little advantage over “Bob”. It may seem like a petty point to many people, but if a believer wants to deeply respect his Lord in any way possible, knowingly calling him the wrong name is a bad start. It also seems to mock Biblical and traditional Christianity. Regarding the Bible, Acts 4:12 says “there is no other name under Heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” Regarding Christian tradition, no bigger deal has ever been made out of any other name. Take the old hymn, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, there’s just something about that name”, multiply it by the number of Christian songs that have been written, by the number of times they’ve been sung, the number of sermons that have been preached, the number of prayers prayed, the number of Bibles in print, and the number of Christian books written. And they all got the name wrong. Christianity is thoroughly and irreversibly soaked in that incorrect mutation. This is just one example of how Christianity is often more committed to tradition than truth, and how hard it is to change something about Christianity even when the facts are in. The masses don’t like change, because it’s hard and uncomfortable and calls into question their “one true religion”. Imagine the headline from a church who wants to acknowledge the facts, “To pay maximum honor to our Savior and Lord, we are removing the meaningless name of Jesus from all church proceedings, to be replaced by his true name, Yeshua.” There would most likely be an uproar and the church staff would be out of their jobs, which is precisely why this won’t happen.