Thursday, September 2, 2010

Gavin James

I read James today. I am preparing to tell my son, why James was such a powerful name in scripture. I never thought I would be one with biblical names, but as I grew older I felt like it is a beautiful way to communicate scripture to them. Jacob was easy. He is one of my favorite characters in the Bible. Mindy said will you tell him about Jacob in scripture and why it is your favorite story? I have of course agreed, but in naming my second son I saw the challenges. I picked my favorite guy in scripture for Jacob, but now what will I do with my second son. Names were tossed around, but G James Hanke was what we liked the most. I loved Gideon feeling like that would be a great story to tell. Mindy liked Gabriel, but that seemed like a harder story to tell. Gavin was the name we came up with. There is not scriptural base with that one, yet we held to our idea of using the grandpa's first names, as middle names. This was great to have James. With Gavin not being in scripture, James became the way to talk about the bible.

James seemed to alleviate my problem about worrying about picking my favorite character for Jacob. James was a book I held dear in college. I still won't forget the Supertones song that talked about reading the book of James and praying for a wife. I did that several times. James is full of controversy. James speaks about one of the major issues in my life. The battle between law and Gospel is very vivid in this book. As a father I look at the potential to share so much with my son about my trials. James, being the brother of Jesus may have felt the challenges of a perfect brother. Although James spending so much time with Jesus, created doubt, but then greater belief. This book is showing his strong convictions towards Jesus and the Gospel.

Gavin will be faced with many challenges with a father who spends so much time with Jesus. We have seen the PK issues in the past. I pray his name will give us the very chance to discuss some of these very challenging situations.

No comments: