Jesus’s Secret Name—It’s My Name, Too!

Jesus has a secret name—a name given to him by a prophet, that nobody ever called him in life. You have a secret name, too—It’s the same one!

Man in white tee shirt pointing at himself — Photo by MART PRODUCTION

Matthew 1:23 NIV reveals that private name: “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel, (which means “God with us”).” Of course, Matthew is quoting Isaiah 7:14. While it’s debatable whether this Hebrew scripture points to Jesus, Matthew certainly believed it to be so. But while the evangelist says the child would be called Immanuel, the angel names him Jesus. Maybe Immanuel was a secret name, or even a nickname–Manny for short. Who knows? But it seems this name needs to be unpacked.

Not a Battle Cry

Understood a certain way, the phrase “God with us” is problematic at best. The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges says this was the “battle cry of Gustavus Adolphus in the Thirty Years War, ‘Gott mit uns.’” Countless individuals and nations have waged war against their enemies with the declaration that “God is on our side.” But when two opposing armies believe that God is with them to help them conquer, they can’t both be right. “Immanuel” must mean something else.

Immanuel—God with Us

Most Christians would say that when Matthew names Jesus “Immanuel,” he is pointing to the incarnation. In other words, the Lord of Heaven takes on flesh and moves to earth. For thirty-three years, the God who used to live up there tabernacled among us and lived down here.

After the ascension, believers couldn’t wait for Jesus to come back. The author of the book of Revelation writes about New Jerusalem descending from heaven. John declares that contrary to the way it had been, the dwelling place of God is now with humankind. In 1 Thessalonians, Paul writes about Jesus descending from heaven with a trumpet and the voice of an archangel. For many believers, “Immanuel” means the faraway God has drawn near to us. For a moment, this sounds pretty good…

Heaven is at Hand

Until you realize this is symbolic language, and that God is way beyond proximity. If God is omnipresent, then “Immanuel” is not about the distant Divine drawing near. The universal God supersedes time and space, is never far from us, and therefore can’t come any closer than God already is.

Jesus declared, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.” So “Immanuel” does not mean that God who was once far away has moved next door. Instead, it declares that God is as near as our heartbeat, as close as our breath. God feels our grief and sorrow, joy and ecstasy, just as surely as we experience it. “Immanuel” means God is with us, in us, and through us—completely one with all creation and every creature God made.

Mystical Union with God

Jesus talks about this mystical union in John 17:20-23a NIV:

“My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity.”

The same unity that Jesus has with the Father, we also have with God. “Immanuel” means that God is with us and in us, just as God is with and in Jesus. The incarnation does not mean God came into the world through Jesus in a distinct way that only Jesus experienced. In the incarnation, Jesus shows that instead of bearing the mark of original sin, humanity is completely one with the Divine, the same as our older brother Jesus.

Jesus’s Secret Name—It’s My Name, Too!

The omnipresent God is in us and through us—so that we share the name Immanuel. It isn’t just Jesus’s name—It’s ours. It reminds me of that old song, “John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt, his name is my name, too. Whenever we go out, the people always shout, ‘There goes John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt!’” When people see you, they’re looking at Jesus. When they see Jesus, they’re gazing at God. When they see you, the people shout, “There goes Immanuel—God with us!” This is the incarnation—not that the faraway God has drawn near, but that the ever-present God is in Jesus, and in you.