"She doesn't have a name"

We were sitting together in a circle as a first grade class, each repeating the simple phrase on the board, “The name of my mother is___” and filling in the name of our own “mamá”. As each child finished the sentence with great excitement to share the name of their mom, it finally landed on one small student who looked up and quietly refused to complete the sentence. Eventually, the teacher was able to coax out the following:

“She doesn’t have a name.”

“She doesn’t have a name? Of course she does. Every mom has a name!”

“No. She doesn’t have a name.”

After a short time I watched her move on to the next child and finish the activity, but this conversation kept repeating in my head. How can you not know the name of your own mom?

Maybe it was cultural, and his parents were called by their last names more frequently. Or with this student, he was just being stubborn and wanting to create a scene. That had to be it I concluded, he was just being his usual self and pretending he didn’t know what was happening in class.

A few days later we learned something very important.

They were an immigrant family recently come to the United States. Only a father in the picture. A father working multiple jobs just trying to make it here in this country. No money for school supplies, for new shoes, or a school uniform.

He doesn’t know her name.

He doesn’t have a mamá.

This week I have been spending a lot of time meditating on the concept of knowing the Lord. Not knowing Him in the sense of understanding a lot of things about Him, or even knowing His Word. Not having all the right answers to all of the questions, or being able to repeat the ten commandments or knowing how to live “morally.”

I’m talking about KNOWING Him. Knowing Him so closely and intimately that at times it’s like you can feel His breath on your back.

Walking so closely with Jesus that when temptation and sin are at war within your heart, so is a love and desire for the Lord. Feeling your heart break for the same things the heart of Jesus broke over.

Weeping at the sin in your life and running to the cross in repentance because you desire so badly for reconciliation with this God.

Do we have that? Do I have that?

Chicago is such a different world to me. Right now I feel “home” is becoming similar to Mexico with the culture, language, and feel of the neighborhood. This weekend I had the opportunity to visit an area of Chicago heavily populated by Pakistani’s and it felt like I had just flown into another country. As I went downtown, it felt overpopulated by Starbucks and consumerism feeding to the white, middle class culture. Such different worlds. Even when I took the bus home I noticed that before the main street leading into Little Village, every single African American got off the bus. Very clearly noticeable was the dividing line between the two communities. An unspoken word between two cultures speaking very clearly where the lines cannot cross. At this place, they are no longer welcome.

And through seeing just the tiniest speck of culture in Chicago, it has all screamed very loudly, “Do you know Him?!!!”

It’s easy to feel the darkness here in certain places, on specific streets, on different corners. The same haunting darkness travels through the city, and this voice inside me starts whimpering as I look around at the millions of people, “Do you know Him?” And yet it’s the same feeling that comes when my car drives through Eureka. “Do you know Him here?” It has begun calling out louder and louder at my apartment, “Do you know Him here?”

And it’s one that beats on in my own heart every day here. “Am I pressing in to know Him?”

I have found answers to such questions often require time. Silence. Reflection. Meditation. Worship. Questioning. Struggling. Fighting lies. Trusting. Clinging to the Word. Hoping in the promises. Waiting.

But the incredible thing even in this constant wrestle to know Him deeper?

I know the name of my best friend, my Perfect Father, my greatest Lover, my King, my Savior and Redeemer, the One who has come to rescue and redeem, the One who makes all things new again, the One who picks up every broken piece and speaks breath and life into it, the One who brings dignity to the forgotten and neglected, the One who prays for me daily, the One who knows the deepest parts of my inner being and sees every mistake, every sin, every mess, every wrong motive, every doubt, the One who is high and seated in His throne….

He told us His name. I don’t have to ask who He is.

He isYahweh.

It’s like I feel His breath on my shoulders when I write it. Yahweh is here. Yahweh has come. Yahweh has KNOWN me.

And He WANTS so badly for me to know Him too.

By whispering His intimate and most personal name, He extends His nail pierced hand and gently calls out, “Come. Come eat with Me. Come commune with Me. Come know my goodness, my mercy, my love, my discipline, my character, all that I am. Come be with Me. Come let me heal you. Come let me make beautiful things out of your mess. I want you. I love you.”

I cried when I found out my student doesn’t know the name of his mom because he doesn’t have one.

And I cried the first time this great God came down to me and spoke life into a deadened soul and whispered gently, “I am Yahweh. Your God.”

And sometimes up here I cry when I talk to Him. Because it’s so amazing that He is fighting way harder than any effort I ever put forth for me to know Him.

I am so longing for the day when all things are made final and complete, healed and whole forever. In my own life. In the lives of those I love. But while I wait in the darkness here for that completion, the voice has started to echo louder and louder, “Tell them. Tell them you know Him. And that they can know Him too!”

(2 Corinthians 5:20) “Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us.”