I absolutely hate it when I take my kids to the doctor and the staff all call me “dad”. Can’t you take the extra five seconds to call me “Mr. Fralick”, or even better, “Andrew”, “Drew”, “Zhu Zi Long”, “Xiao Zhu”, “Moo Fralick”, “Chief”, “Dude”, “Big Guy”, “Homie” or “Baba D”? Just say my name!

“Dad” comes across as lazy and flippant and impersonal. I am nothing more than a role attached to my children…

But at the end of the day, I guess I can understand. They see so many patients and people’s names are so hard to remember. So, in a pinch, if you don’t have the chart in front of you, just default to calling every adult male “dad”.

I mean, how can humans be expected to recall another person’s name when we haven’t even been able to remember God’s name since the beginning of time? Even when we’re cursing we can’t recall his name…

“What in [God’s name] were you thinking you idiot!?”

I’ll bet God found it so frustrating when we kept forgetting his name. After all he’s done for us, the least we could do is not have to look down at his nametag next time we run into each other.

Despite this frustration, God tried to make it as easy as possible to remember his name by giving himself a BUNCH of ALTERNATE NAMES. Just remember one of the following and we’re good he said: “Lord”, “God”, “Elohim”, “Adonnai”, “Jehovah”, “El Shaddai”, and finally, the easiest to remember of them all “ha shem” (which literally means “the name”)

For a little while he even tried making his name something you couldn’t say out loud without getting in trouble - YHWH. Having a deep grasp of human psychology, God probably thought making his name off limits would make it easier to remember. Kinda like the only words you still recall from high school French class are the dirty ones.

But after all of that, we still couldn’t remember his name. He just gave up one day and said “You know what? Just tell em’ my name is… I AM WHO I AM.”

And that seemed to settle it for a while.

I guess it’s slightly easier to remember someone’s voice. After all, you can tell after about five seconds on the phone whether someone is trustworthy or just wants your vote for county sheriff. And it states explicitly in the bible: “the sheep know the shepherd's voice.”

But let’s be clear, people ate dinner with God all the time and were oblivious throughout the entire meal.

Maybe they thought his voice could split rocks or something. They were expecting something more unique - a sweetly caramelized baritone timbre or the voice of mid 80s Michael Jackson. But apparently God just sounded like the guy answering phones at Johnson’s Heating and Cooling up the street.

He even called young Samuel outside of business hours one time. Poor kid had to answer any inquiries that came in after the temple had closed for the day. At first Samuel thought old Eli was trolling him but he quickly realized it was God.

“Eli, I’ve got God on the line!”

“Take a message and I’ll call him back tomorrow when we’re open.”

“OK God, let me make sure I’ve got your number down right here, it’s 586-668-8888?”

But even after talking to God he still couldn’t remember the name.

“And who should I say is calling?”

Apparently if you really want to know God you’ve got to see his face. Which is a high price to pay because making eye contact with God is SOOO awkward!

Moses once made direct eye contact with God and his face didn’t stop glowing for weeks afterwards. They made him wear a mask because the silly look on his face made everyone so uncomfortable.

What could Moses have seen that was so unforgettable? Did God look like an intensely glowing orb of radiant light? Was God a seven foot four Chinese cat lady with rainbow colored wings and a halo? Was Moses unable to shake that knowing grin off his face because God in fact looked EXACTLY like the guy answering phones at Johnson’s Heating and Cooling up the street?

We may never know…

Anyhow… this whole “theological conundrum of recognizing God” was eventually sorted out by God’s far-more-laid-back son who taught us - if you can’t recall their name and you don’t have the chart right in front of you, just call him “dad”.

Say My Name!