Let's Examine the Scriptures Every Day 2025
Friday, August 29, 2025
I have made your name known to them (John 17:26).
Jesus didn’t just tell people that God’s name is Jehovah. The Jews already knew that. Rather, he explained “what he is like” (John 1:17, 18). For example, the Hebrew Scriptures said that Jehovah is merciful and compassionate (Ex. 34:5-7). But Jesus made this truth come alive when he told the parable of the prodigal son. When we read that his father caught sight of him “while he was still a long way off,” ran to him, hugged him, and truly forgave him, it’s crystal clear that Jehovah is merciful and compassionate (Luke 15:11-32). Jesus certainly helped people understand what Jehovah is like. w24.02 10 pars. 8, 9.
Why is Jesus the best example of someone who praised Jehovah's name?
In all the universe, no one knows the Father as well as the Son (Matt. 11:27). Jesus loves his Father and has left us the best example of what it means to praise Jehovah's name (John 14:31). When he prayed to his Father the night before he died, he summed up his entire ministry this way: "I have made your name known" (John 17:26). How did he do it?
Why do we know that Jesus used his Father's name and wanted others to do so as well?
Did Jesus want others to use his Father's name as well? Of course. It's possible that some religious leaders of the time believed that God's name was so sacred that it shouldn't be spoken. But Jesus didn't allow that tradition—which had no support in Scripture—to prevent him from honoring his Father's name.
Consider the time he healed a demon-possessed man in the region of the Gerasenes. The people were so frightened that they begged Jesus to leave. (Mark 5:16, 17) But he wanted everyone to know Jehovah's name. So before he left, he told the man to tell the people what Jehovah—not Jesus himself—had done for him. (Read Mark 5:19.)
What does Jesus want us to do?
Our King, Jesus, did not allow that tradition—which had no support in Scripture—to prevent him from honoring his Father's name, and he wants us to do the same: to teach Jehovah's name to everyone. (Matt. 24:14; 28:19, 20) When we do, it brings him joy.
What did Jesus tell his followers to include in their prayers? And, according to Ezekiel 36:23, why is it so important?
Jesus knew that Jehovah's purpose is to sanctify his name—to cleanse it of all the lies that have stained it. That's why he taught his followers to pray: "Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name" (Matt. 6:9).
Jesus understood that in all the universe there is nothing more important than that (read Ezekiel 36:23). And in all creation, no one has done as much as he has to sanctify Jehovah's name. Yet, when he was arrested, what did his enemies accuse him of? It was blasphemy—that is, of besmirching his Father's holy name.
For him, there was no sin more repugnant than that. And before he was arrested, he already felt terribly sick because he knew he would be accused and condemned for that sin. In fact, that may have been the main reason why, at that moment, “his agony was so great” (Luke 22:41-44).
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