So I'm reading
The Master's Artist, a collective blog, and see the post by
Madison. Go check it out, great stuff. (Basically Madison is admitting that this isn't her real name.) Anyway, a lot of what she said in the post got me thinking about my own name.
When I was born back in 1968, my mother, then 18 years old, decided to name me after an actor, James Stacy. Except she names me John Stacy since my daddy's name is John. Not bad, I suppose, especially considering some of the names bestowed by very young mothers (and dads of course). I mean, I could have been named Rufus and almost was (but that's another story altogether). Okay, I'll go ahead and tell you that story too: when I was born I came forth with red hair; Rufus means red-haired. So my mother contemplated that name for me. It soon fell out and was replaced by blonde hair, which has since turned brown and fallen out, to be replaced by nothing. Anywho, thank you
James Stacy (which is, ironically, not even his real name) for being such a riveting actor.
Only problem is, the name Stacy also becomes a popular girl's name around the same time that I'm born and for a few years afterwards. So I grow up with this androgynous name, which is often mispelled - actually to this very day. (I still have the morning's work assignment to prove it.) It doesn't help that a lot of folks called me Tracy, another androgynous name. And add to that the fact that it is my middle name, and the whole world seems to insist that you provide this little piece of biographical data in the form of a mere initial, and then proceeds to inaccurately assume that the name you are called by is 'John'. Long story short, all this confusion caused me to come to loathe my own name.
Until I found out, many years later, what it means.
I'm not sure when, but sometime in my late twenties or early thirties, due to the internet, I learned the literal meaning of my name.
Resurrection. How cool is that!
The name comes from the Greek Anastasis (which is where the female name Anastasia and its male counterpart Anastasios come from). Anastasis is composed of the words Ana (up) and stasis (standing), or to stand up. The literal meaning being Resurrection.
I found all this out long after becoming a Jesus follower, so it just made me really really like my name again. (So much so that I married a beautiful girl named--you guessed it--Staci). Add this to the fact that my first name is John (God is gracious), and I can't think of a more apt name for myself:
God is gracious, Resurrection, Worth.
So, whether I'm called John Stacy, John, Stacy, or Skeach-a-roid (Skeach being the shortened form of Stacy Keach (another actor)
, and a-roid being one of the many modifiers to that oh-so-creative nick-name) I am quite satisfied with my name. To loathe your own name for years and then discover that it was a prophetic word over your very soul, is beyond awesome. It is a redemption. Like I was called by my Saviour, named by Him when I didn't even understand the power of that name. Which, you do realize, there is a whole lotta power in a Name.
So then, as I make my way into my destiny, pulled toward it by my name, much like Jacob/Israel, Simon/Peter, and Saul/Paul, I know that at some point all this naming business will culminate with a white stone, handed to me by the Maker himself, with my most special name of all written upon it.
It may not be Resurrection, but at the moment I can't think of a better one.
Then again, wouldn't it be a riot if it were Rufus after all.
