First Church Redwood City

NAMES

The cake on the table was covered with sugar roses:  purple, green, yellow, pink.  The words in the center– “Happy Birthday!” — reminded us that we were celebrating a very special time.  But more beautiful than anything else were the names that were written across the cake:  Millie, Kathleen, Bob, June, Betty, Mary, Opal, Evelyn, Shirley, Lois, Margo. Names of friends and loved ones who were “90 or Better” during this past year, whose total ages added up to more than 1,000 years! 

As I stood and looked at the cake, I was struck by the power of those names; they brought to mind each individual, each one uniquely gifted by God, each one a  precious gift from God to the world, unlike any other.  More beautiful than the roses were the names of these well loved friends, and as I said each one silently, I sent up a prayer of gratitude for their lives and their love.

When the Hillcrest Ministry Team met recently to reflect on their work with teenagers at Juvenile Hall over the past several years, we learned that the names of each of these boys is still a potent and living presence in our midst.  Each time we are with them, we take some time to speak individually to the boys, asking for their prayer requests, and taking their (first) names home to pray over.  Paul has been the keeper of the prayer lists, typing them up and then distributing them to the other members of the team.  I never thought about what happened to his computer list after he sent the names out to us.  I suppose I just assumed he deleted them, making space on his hard drive for newer information.  He told us, however, that he has never deleted one of the names or any of the prayer requests.  The reality of each boy and each individual life is so profound to him that he keeps them, knowing somehow that to hold them in that way is to continue to hold them in prayer.  They are real; they make a difference; they are remembered. 

After 9/11, the New York Times started printing the names, pictures, and brief biographies of each person who had died in the attacks.  They started very soon afterwards to publish these remembrances, and I, who didn’t know any of the people involved, still found myself drawn each day to read through the bios, to look at the pictures, and to lift the names in prayer.  Every day after I was done reading the paper, I took that section, gently refolded it, and placed in the bottom drawer of my dresser.  The drawer grew fuller as the days and weeks went on, and it occurred to me that I might have to get rid of some of the papers, after all.  But I never did.  They are there still, held in that quiet place, a place where each person is named and remembered, even by this stranger.

Names.  They are powerful reminders that each person is specially created by God, with an identity uniquely his or her own. Every name represents a person whose presence in the world reflects a particular facet of the Divine.  So when we speak the names of our friends, our family members, those whom we have met, or those strangers whose lives have touched ours, let us speak them as if we were saying holy words, for we are.  Thanks be to God!                                                 

Kim