Expert: Dean Gade - 4/25/2008

Question
Dear Sir:
I would appreciate very much if you throw some light on the following:
I have manifested thy name unto the men (John 17:6); I have declared unto them thy name (John 17:26)
What was the name that Christ is speaking of?  What was the name of the Creator that Christ believed?
Thanks a lot.
Respectfully yours
Farooq

Answer
In the Bible,  both Old and New Testament,  a "name" was far more than just a few letters or a sound that one spoke.   "Name" was more descriptive of the person.  

God chose to answer the first who asked Him to give them His "name" that it was "I am who I am".  This was to say that He was completely unique and quite indescribable.  Yet in many places of the OT He gives His name descriptively of what He has DONE, or describing something of His character;  like El Shaddi or El Elohe Israel.  God even changed the names of those who walked with Him in both the OT and NT to tell us something about them.

A person's "name" also included their authority in somewhat the same way as we still sign our names to documents as signs that we have a right to enter the agreement and to take responsibility over what is written.

Jesus was sent to earth by the authority of His Father.  He came to give glory to Him and never stepped out of that authority.  He was sought by both those who knew that He did things in God's name/authority and wanted to receive what God had to give them.....and those believed that He was only a man and so was misusing God's authority and name. It was for that reason that they had Him crucified.

Jesus, the Christ, was the revealer of God who no man had ever seen until Jesus came into the world.  

I will give you some parts of scripture which will shed light on Jesus as the revealer of God's "name"/person:



Matt 11:27

27 "All things have been committed to me by my Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.
NIV

John 5:36-38

36 "I have testimony weightier than that of John. For the very work that the Father has given me to finish, and which I am doing, testifies that the Father has sent me. 37 And the Father who sent me has himself testified concerning me. You have never heard his voice nor seen his form, 38 nor does his word dwell in you, for you do not believe the one he sent.
NIV

John 6:42-47
42 They said, "Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, 'I came down from heaven'?"

43 "Stop grumbling among yourselves," Jesus answered. 44 "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day. 45 It is written in the Prophets: 'They will all be taught by God.' Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me. 46 No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father.
NIV

John 14:5-14

5 Thomas said to him, "Lord, we don't know where you are going, so how can we know the way?"

6 Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him."

8 Philip said, "Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us."

9 Jesus answered: "Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'? 10 Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you are not just my own. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. 11 Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves. 12 I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. 13 And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. 14 You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.
NIV

Jesus IS THE NAME of the Creator.  He is that Word of God by which all things were created and are still sustained:

John 1:1-5
1:1 In the beginning was the Word , and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning.

3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.
NIV

John 1:10-14

10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.

14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
NIV

1 Cor 8:6
6 yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.
NIV

Col 1:12-20
13 For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16 For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. 17 He is before all things , and in him all things hold together. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. 19 For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things , whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
NIV