“A Name Like No Other” Acts 4:1–12, Easter 4 April 29th, 2012 Series B

1.             Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Amen.  The message from God’s Word today is taken from Acts chapter 4:1-12.  We will specifically be looking at verse 12 where the Apostle Peter proclaims to us, “And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”  The message is entitled, “A Name Like No Other,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2.              While still vice president, former President Bush (that’s Bush Sr.) told an interesting story of an event that occurred during the Spanish-American War. Apparently the Congress of the United States came up with the idea of renaming captured Spanish vessels after American universities.  Admiral Dewey, the officer in charge of American Naval Forces, heard that two ships already captured were to be renamed the Harvard and the Yale. He received orders to follow that pattern as the war progressed. The Admiral understood education and naval warfare, but failed to see why the two should be mixed. Nevertheless, obedient to his superiors, he named the next captured Spanish vessel The Massachusetts Institute of Technology and yet a fourth, The Vermont Normal College for Women. As Bush tells the story, Congress abandoned the idea for a college fleet.  Two things surface in Dewey’s response. The first shows his courage in defying Congress while achieving an end he felt important for the navy, namely, giving warships appropriate names. We also see a relationship between act and attitude in the process of obedience. Dewey obeyed in act but demonstrated that his heart wasn’t in it.  In our chapter, the early Christians demonstrated the opposite. Here we see act and attitude going hand in hand. The courage was there. Holy boldness permeates all the verses as believers put into practice what they claimed they knew and understood about the Savior. We focus on Peter and John courageously proclaiming God’s message in the name of Jesus. These Apostles both knew that names are important, especially the name of Jesus, for there is salvation in no one else for there’s no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.  Jesus’ name is a name like no other.
3.             Our text from Acts 4 is a warning not to reject Jesus, and it’s also a gracious invitation to place our whole trust in him, for he’s God’s only Savior for mankind. His resurrection and the power he showed through his apostles testify to this.  There’s nothing funny about a broken crutch. The lame man who leans on it will fall and possibly injure himself. Similarly, anyone who would seek salvation in one other than Jesus Christ will be sadly disappointed. There are other christs and other gospels, but none that will save.  The Buddha and Muhammed can’t save you, nor can the Hindu gods and yes, you can’t save yourself by your own good works.   As sinful people we need the reminder that “there is no other name under heaven by which we must be saved,” because all of us can be tempted to have itching ears for other false gospels.  We need these words, because we live in a world where the statement is often made, “It matters not so much what you believe, as long as you are sincere.” We do our fellow man a great disservice if we leave the impression that there’s another way to heaven beside the Lord Jesus.  Finally, we need the message of this text so that we remember our purpose as the church. It’s not a community action group, but its calling is to point mankind to its only Savior, Christ.
4.             Biblical names have special significance, and the most significant name in all of Scripture is Jesus, the name of the only Savior of the world. In the Old Testament, God promised to make his name dwell in Jerusalem (Deut 12:5, 11, etc.), where the temple was built for his name (1 Ki 8:16–20, etc.). But now God’s name is forever bound to the person of Jesus Christ, in whom the Godhead dwells (Col 2:9), and whose body is the new temple (John 2:21).
5.             Jesus is the universal Savior. There’s no other way to the Father, no alternative route, no other option. Those who will not use the name of Jesus will not be saved, but those who call on his name and trust in Jesus will be saved. Our task is to proclaim the saving name of Jesus to our people, for “salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).
6.             Sometimes the name of Jesus is ignored or omitted. The Apostle Peter in Acts 4:11 says, “11This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone.” Here we see that the one name that’s suitable for building one’s life on is often rejected, even by those who ought to know better because they are familiar with how things are built. The religious leaders who had arrested Peter and John had rejected the name of Jesus and found no salvation in him.
7.             But, some of you might be thinking here this morning… “What about the people who have never heard the name of Jesus? Can they be saved?” Dear friends the issue isn’t “what about them?” but “what about you?” When the gospel of Jesus Christ is proclaimed you are challenged to receive or reject the name of Jesus in a most personal manner.
8.             The name of Jesus is the only source of salvation. The angel commanded Joseph to call Mary’s son Jesus because “he will save his people from their sins” (Matt 1:21). Though others have borne the name, Jesus Christ is the only one to live up to the name, since he alone is the Lord, and he alone has saved his people from their sins. Paul says that he was determined to know only Jesus Christ crucified (1 Cor 2:2); you don’t know the name of Jesus unless you know that he was crucified for your sins and the sins of all people. Because of his Easter victory over death and the grave, he is proclaimed as Lord. His is the name that is above every other name, and at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow (Phil 2:9–10).
9.             A person’s name is equivalent to his or her reputation. In the Eighth Commandment God calls us to preserve the good name of our neighbor by defending him, speaking well of him and explaining everything about him in the kindest possible way.  In the Second Commandment God even forbids the misuse of His name. Even from the commandments we see that names are important to God and to other people.
10.             Did you know that name of God was placed upon you when you were baptized? The baptismal liturgy starts by calling on the triune name of God, and the Apostles’ Creed is confessed to explain the theology of the triune name. Immediately before the baptism, the name of the candidate is asked, and then it is repeated as he or she is baptized in the triune name. In this way the person’s name is connected to God’s name. In contrast to the person’s last name, which is inherited automatically from the parents as a result of natural birth, the first (Christian) and middle names traditionally have been bestowed in baptism, the second birth. The baptized person then always bears God’s name and is objectively a child of God. The name of God given in baptism defines our identity as God’s redeemed. The invocation of God’s name also begins our worship services and is a reminder of our baptism.
11.             We have seen from Acts 4 that the Apostle Peter was able to speak about Jesus and make bold claims about Christ’s name only because he was filled with the Holy Spirit (Acts 4:8). The promise of Matt 10:18–20 is that when we as Christians are called to testify before authorities (as Peter was), the appropriate words will be given them and the Holy Spirit will speak through us. In Luke 21:15 Jesus promises words and wisdom that can’t be refuted by enemies of the kingdom. When we don’t know what to say, we can rely on the name of Jesus.  He will speak through us to tell others that God has placed into our lives that there’s “…salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”  The name of Jesus is a name like no other.  Amen.