Should we use the form Jehovah today?
I feel it safe to say that the Christ knew his Fathers name, evidenced by the fact that he said he had made it known in the first Century to all of his followers.
6"I made your name
known to the people you gave me. They are from this world. They belonged to you, and you gave them to me. They did what you told them." {John 17:6 GWT}
25"O just and righteous Father, although
the world has not known You and has failed to recognize You and has never acknowledged You, I have known You [continually]; and these men understand and know that You have sent Me. 26 I have made Your Name known to them and revealed Your character and Your very Self, and I will continue to make [You] known, that the love which You have bestowed upon Me may be in them [felt in their hearts] and that I [Myself] may be in them." {John `17:25,26 AB}
One outstanding thing should be notice right at the outset. These ones who actually knew God's name had first belonged to the Father, who had given them to his Son. Jesus had said that they did what the Father had told them. As result of such obedience were turned over to the Son. These all knew God's name, and knew well God's character and makeup; while by contrast the World did not know neither his name, nor what he was like. Neither then, nor now! The World in general knew nothing about the God who Jesus had introduced, nor did they want to know him; and for good reasons:
18"If the world hates you, know that it hated Me before it hated you."{John 15:18-20 AB}
23"Whoever hates Me also hates My Father."{John 15:23 AB}
So, even though this World is made up out of a variety of Christian's, or self proclaimed as such; they in actuality hate the Father and the Son. As strange as that may seem but then, too, there is very good reasons for that, as well. Which I'll go on to explain now: Let me focus in Luke 4:1 something of great importance to this subject at hand. That is the following:
1"Jesus,
full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert" ... "Luke 4:1 NIV}
As you see, I draw on the fact that Jesus was full of the Holy Spirit. Led by it! Notice something else Luke wrote about:
16 "And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and he entered, as his custom was, into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up to read. 17 And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Isaiah. And he opened the book, and found the place where it was written, 18
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, Because he anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor: He hath sent me to proclaim release to the captives, And recovering of sight to the blind, To set at liberty them that are bruised, 19 To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." {Luke 4:16-19 ASV}
Jesus was here talking about his Father, and the fact that his Fathers Holy Spirit was operative upon him. Now, I don't care what anyone else believes; Jesus, at this point would never have referrred to his Father as Lord; he would have used the divine name, because as he himself said in prayer to his Father: "I have made your name known to the men you gave me out of the World, and will make it known." Do not forget too, in teaching the Model Prayer he said:"Let your name be sanctified." So the Trasnslators of this Bible will insert the word Lord, but Jesus never would have, that's clear. Jesus Loved that grand name, while quite clearly the Translators of this Bible did not. The same is true of almost every Bible Translation in Religious Christendom. Where the ancient Tetragrammaton was used, they remove it, and insert LORD capitilized. In so doing fulfilling the Prophecy at Jeremiah 23:27 Which tells us this:
26 "How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets that prophesy lies, even the prophets of the deceit of their own heart? 27
that think to cause my people to forget my name by their dreams which they tell every man to his neighbor, as their fathers forgot my name for Baal." {Jeremiah 23:26,27 ASV} Baal was another name for satan the devil, along with beelzebub who, we learn, was the ruler of the demons:
34 But the Pharisees said, "He drives out demons by the ruler of the demons!" {Matthew 9:34 HCSB}
This was the reason behind the cause of the Fathers great name being forgotten. It was the devils influence. The Fathers great adversary, satan the devil. To Jehovah, these ones were dreamers, deceitful liars, trying to influence their neighbors that the divine name is quite lost, cannot be known today.' As it was then, so too, is it now; the devil never changes his hateful tactics against the Sovereign ruler of the Universe, and never will.
What type of defence has Jehovah prepared to thwart those that would belittle his great name, and assure us that, that great name could never ever be lost or forgotten.
This brings us back to the words of Luke who told us that Jesus was filled with the Holy Spirit; that, that 'Holy Spirit was upon him;' that he was the anointed one to declare the acceptable year of the LORD." We know that all of the first Century Christian's were in direct association with him, so would have been doing something that Religious Christendom would never even understand. Keep in mind the Holy Spirit plays the major roll in all of this! With that in mind, consider something else Jesus has told us at John 14:6 Which is the following:
6 Jesus told him, "I am
the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me." {John 14:6 HCSB}
From that we learn, there is only one way to learn the Truth, to gain everlasting life. Only through Jesus. There is no other way than through him. Jesus further explains how we gain can approach to him; and there is no other way than this:
44
"No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day." {John 6:44 HCSB}
What occurs for the ones drawn by the Father to the Son? The conversation Jesus had with the Samaritan Woman at the Well-Side will explain that:
20 "Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, yet you [Jews] say that the place to worship is in Jerusalem." 21 Jesus told her, "Believe Me, woman,
an hour is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know. We worship what we do know, because salvation is from the Jews. 23 But an hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. Yes, the Father wants such people to worship Him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." {John 4:20-24 HCSB}
Notice! The type of Worship the Father was looking for was there, at that time, in the form of Jesus, the Twelve Apostles, and all the first Century Christian's. and he clearly told the Woman that they worshipped what they knew, and that Worship was done in Spirit and in truth, and he clearly told her, that, that was the only kind of worship his Father would accept; nothing else would do; he said they MUST Worship that way; in Spirit and in Truth. Because that was the only kind the Father was looking for to Worship him. He also told her that, that' kind of Worship was coming again; when it did come again, those Worshipping in Spirit and in Truth, would also know what they Worshipped. So, all of the first Century Christian's knew the name of the God they Worshipped, because Jesus had made it known to them all. In similar fashion today! Those chosen by Jehovah to Worship in Spirit and in Truth, given to his Son, would also know his name. They are chosen by Jehovah, in that he is the one who draws them all to his Son. Was Jehovah not to do that drawing no one would gain approach to the Christ; and no approach to the Christ would mean no approach to the Father. In that case, no one would come to know Jehovah's name, nor anything much else of the Bible, because it is the Holy Spirit now in the hands of the Christ that does all of the teaching of the Bible. Add to that you would never be able to Worship in Spirit and in Truth as required, lacking the Holy Spirit, as you would be. {Acts 2:33} This type of Worship Religious Christendom knows absolutely nothing about, not being able to gain the Holy Spirit, as they are not. {John 14:15-17}
As to this Baal or Beelzebub, better known to all of us as satan the devil the ruler of the demons we know, he is, as Paul tells us the god of this World, who holds the entire World in his Power, blinding them all, misleading them all, is naturally still up to his old tricks of influencing individuals into believing the divine name cannot be known, is quite lost; but being misled and blinded as they are, they discount something of crucial importance that shows the divine name could never possibly be lost or forgotten; but being blinded and misled by him would never see it, or get the sense of it. What is that you may well ask? It is, in actuality, the power of the Holy Spirit. To say that the divine name could ever be lost or forgotten, or no one knows how to properly pronounce it has to be the most ludicrous idea anyone could ever entertain in their minds. That is tantamount to saying Jehovah doesn't remember his own name; cannot reveal it to anyone through the power of his Holy Spirit. Doesn't know how to pronounce it himself. When you really think about that, it is quite laughable, but expected from those under satan's power. Who himself knows absolutely nothing about Jehovah's word the Bible. He can quote scripture alright but doesn't understand a word of what he's quoting. Not being granted to understand it of course. {2 Corinthians 4:3,4} {1 John 5:19} {Revelation 12:9}
26 "But the Father will send the Friend in my name to help you. The Friend is the Holy Spirit.
He will teach you all things. He will remind you of everything I have said to you." {John 14:26 NIRV}
One of the things Jesus said to them, was teaching them all the divine name; that Holy Spirit would ever remind what that great name was. No chance they could ever forget it. One of the 'all things' that would be taught to them then, and now today, would be the Fathers name. Through the medium of the Holy Spirit.
13 "But when the Spirit of truth comes,
he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own. He will speak only what he hears. And he will tell you what is still going to happen." {John 16:13 NIRV}
Are we to believe that Jehovah, through the power of his Holy Spirit would guide them into all Truth, and fail to remind them of the name of the God who guided them all into all of the Truth; and wouldn't all of the Truth include his Divine name? Or may it be, that the Holy Spirit somehow forgot to mention it? Perhaps couldn't remember it? Lost track of it somehow? Like all of Religious Christendom's Religious leaders and their adherents do? Then too, if there were any changes made to the proper pronunciation of his name made, wouldn't he reveal those changes, in that future events were revealed to them also, by means of the Holy Spirit? It also must be considered, that Jehovah's purpose to make his name known will never change as we see from the words of Ezekiel the Prophet:
7 "And
my holy name will I make known in the midst of my people Israel; neither will I suffer my holy name to be profaned any more: and the nations shall know that I am Jehovah, the Holy One in Israel." {Ezekiel 39:7 ASV}
There are very dishonest Bible Scholars today who will point to John 8:58 where Jesus made the statement, "I am." Then they will direct attention to Exodus 3:13,14 to try to prove Jesus was Jehovah; but they very carefully omit verse 15 which is a major part of the context.; but was they to focus on it, it would prove them all liars; because there Jehovah clearly indentified himself by his memorial name that was to be remembered throughout all generations, and absolutely never forgotten. It was his name forever, as the entire context brings out. Read it for yourself:
13 "And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? What shall I say unto them? 14 And God said unto Moses,
I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you. 15 And God said moreover unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, Jehovah, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name forever, and this is my memorial unto all generations." {Exodus 3:13-15 ASV}
So! While you people who go to so much trouble trying to convince others that the divine name cannot be known, or is lost and no one knows how it was properly prounced; I would remind you all; Jehovah knows well how to pronounce his own memorial name, and he tells you all that name will be in existence forever. If anything gets lost, it will be those trying to lose the divine name. Bet on that! Lets look at how a true faithful worshipper felt about Jehovah's great name"
32"Also concerning the stranger who is not of Your people Israel but has come from a far country for
Your great name's sake and Your mighty power and Your outstretched arm--if he comes and prays toward this house, 33Hear from heaven, from Your dwelling place, and do all for which the stranger calls to You, that all peoples of the earth may know Your name and fear You [reverently and worshipfully], as do Your people Israel, and may know that this house which I have built is called by Your Name." {2 Chronicles 6:32,33 AB} King Solomon didn't want to see that great name lost, now did he? His desire, was, that everyone on earth knew that name and feared it as Israel did. Quite a contrast between Solomon and Religious Christendom , wasn't there? Consider too what Jehovah told Pharoah of ancient Egypt, in harmony with Solomon's wish:
16"But for this very purpose have I let you live, that I might show you My power,
and that My name may be declared throughout all the earth." {Exodus 9:16 AB}, That scripture speaks for itself.
I will set forth a list of names that identify the Supreme Being. One can use any one of them today without raising a hair, but use the form Jehovah you have a real bone of contention on your hands. Those of Religious Christendom very suddenly get all excited over the use of that one particular name. Why is that? Why doesn't LORD, El-ohim- El-Shaddai- El-Elyon set them, all in a dither; for they all mean the same thing. The reason is, Jehovah has a familiarity and currency everyone today understands, and when used everyone knows right away just exactly whom you are speaking about where everyone does not understand the few I mentioned.
The very fact, that they raise such a fuss over that name, should tell anyone with even half a brain, that Jehovah is the correct name of God, because if it wasn't, no one among them would even open their mouths over the use of it. So without even realising it themselves, they prove by their attitude towards it, that it is definitely God's real memorial name that was to continue in existence for every generation forever, just as JEHOVAH said it would at Exodus 3:15.
*The Primary Names of God
El-Shaddai
, yD;v'-la,, God Almighty290 (Gen 1:17)
El-Elyon
, @/yl][,i lae, God Most-High292 (Gen 14:18)El-Olam
, !l;w[o lae, God Everlasting293 (Gen 21:33)El-Gibbor
, r/BGI lae, Mighty God414 (Isaiah 9:6)El Hana’eman,
@m;a>N<h' laeh;, the faithful God 286 (Deut 7:9)There are many more names besides these.
Compound Names with Yehovah
Yehovah Elohim
, !yhila> h/;hy], Yehovah God432 (Gen 2:7)Adoni Yehovah
, h/;hy] yn:doa}, Lord Yehovah295 (Gen 15:5)Yehovah Tsava’ot
, twaob;x] hw:hy, Yehovah of Hosts294 (1 Sam 1:3)If one wishes, they can use any one of these preceding names; for myself I rather favor the form JEHOVAH, because when I use that rendering I know who I'm talking about and so does anyone else hearing me use it. Even more important than anything else is the fact that Jehovah knows I'm treating his great name with honor and great respect. Just as all of his faithful people did. They all knew his name! They all loved his name. {Psalm 5:11} They all remembered his name; and someday and perhaps soon that grand name well reverberate throughout this entire earth.
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