God Knows My Name!

Have you ever thought about how personal our God is? We understand that God is omniscient – all knowing. That means, among other things, that He knows our names, our personality traits and our “quirks.” Each of us had to come to God by faith in Christ, personally, for our salvation. And God continues to deal with us personally and individually.

In our TCE courses, we often remind our students of the importance of personalizing their teaching. We encourage them to avoid using terms such as we, us and everybody. Though inclusive, those terms are impersonal and may not communicate to a child the relationship God desires to have with him or her. Instead, we say “God loves you; you have sinned; Jesus died and rose again for you.” When they trust in Christ as Savior, we teach them to remember on their hand, “I (Jesus) will never leave you (child’s name).”

Recently, a testimony came across our desk that was a beautiful reminder of two things: how important it is for a child to know God in a personal way and how far our loving God will go to reach out to His children.

Our thanks to Emily Ramsdell, CEF director in Syracuse, NY, for sending us this wonderful testimony. It comes from one of her teachers, Gail Buel, who teaches an after-school GNC. Her club was beginning the Wordless Book Visualized lessons to go along with a witnessing emphasis using the Wordless Book bracelets:

Last week we began teaching the gold page, which is about Heaven. One of the illustrated pages contains pictures of "things that will be in Heaven,” including a picture of the Lamb's Book of Life.

One of our little girls, Alicia, grade 2, was listening so intently to the teaching. When I said that each person who has placed their faith in Christ for the forgiveness of their sins will have their name written in the Book of Life, she smiled to think her name was there since she had made that decision, but then frowned and raised her hand.

When I called on her, she said she was very sad because she just knew that her name would not be spelled correctly in the Book—apparently, this has been an ongoing problem for her, and she had tears in her eyes and a quivering little lip as she told us all about it. After reassuring her that Jesus knew how to spell her name and giving her a hug, we moved on, but she seemed unconvinced.

After the lesson, we moved on to the review game provided with the lesson. Around question #7, Mr. Drew called on Alicia to answer a question and she got it right - this entitled her to pick a special card from a stack, at random, and to say whether the picture on the card would be something that would be in Heaven, or would not be in Heaven.

Alicia leaned over to pick a card, turned it over, and was staring at a picture of the Book of Life! She proudly announced the correct answer and then called out in disbelief, "Mrs. Buel, look! My name is in the Book, and it is SPELLED RIGHT!"

Sure enough, I looked, and there was her name, "Alicia", along with a list of other names, on the pre-printed card! What an incredible gift God gave to that little girl that day in club – we were all so happy and rejoicing with her over this small miracle! He is in the details of our lives, every day, all the time! Praise the Lord!

Isn’t that a precious testimony? How special of God to provide such reassurance to Alicia!

This could be a great illustration in some of your TCE classes. Obviously, it could be used in TCE Level 1, when you teach the sessions on How to Lead a Child to Christ. It could also be used in teaching Counseling a Child for Salvation or Encouraging the Newly-Converted Child.

In TCE Level 2, this illustration might be used in teaching Developing the Child’s Appreciation of God, Bible Lesson Preparation and Presentation (related to applications) or Basic Needs of the Child.

Beyond its illustrative value though, this testimony should be a joy and comfort to your own heart. God knows you, individually and personally, and He delights in assuring you of His love. As He said to Israel: “Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine” (Isaiah 43:1).