Simple Things Made Complicated: "In Jesus Name"

Many of us end our prayers with "In Jesus' name ...." It is (or can be) something of a formula, just a way to say "I'm done now." It's origin is probably in Jesus' statement, "I will do whatever you ask in my name" in John 14:13. But asking in Jesus' name is more than just tacking a phrase onto the end of a prayer.

Suppose you know Sally from PTA meetings. One day Sally knocks at your door wearing a City of Mayberry police uniform. This is not Sally the mom coming by for a cup of tea but Sally coming "in the name of the City of Mayberry." She is an agent of the city, who has specific responsibilities and powers. She might identify herself as an agent by presenting a badge. Having done so, she does not have to keep saying "in the name of the City of Mayberry". Doing so would be odd: is there some question as to her authenticity so that she has to keep emphasizing this?

So we, when we pray "in Jesus' name" do not need to keep repeating the phrase; assuming of course that we are indeed speaking as a agent of Jesus, someone to whom Jesus has given a specific duty that we are executing. What is it that Jesus has given you or me to do? In those areas we may indeed pray "in Jesus' name" and expect him to do it because there we are acting as his agent.

Why I'm not a materialist

I'm a programmer. Years ago someone asked me, "what is a program?" I gave the conventional answer, that it's a set of instructions for a computer to do something. But even then I knew that it wasn't a very good answer. Is it the deck of cards in my hand (this was a long time ago)? Is the the source that I edit? The translated executable? The state of the memory of the computer when the program is running?

And if I copy the deck of cards, do I have two programs now? No, only one; just two copies of the same program. So a program is not a tangible, material thing. It is an idea. It is super-material, something I can recognize it when I see it as a material instance but not the instance itself. What would a materialist say? It's epiphenomenal: a by product of brain states. Now that's a kludge if I've every seen one.

You can say the same things about a book, by the way. Paperback and hardback editions are copies of the same book. There's only one book though lots of copies. So am I an idealist in the philosophic sense? Probably not. There are problems with that too. Rather, there's a mystery in the relationship between mind and body that we will probably never understand; and so there is a mystery in body, soul and spirit, in the three persons of the trinity, in the unity of a woman with a man in marriage, in friendship bonds that span decades, in the love of a mother for her children. It is something that somehow involves relationship: I am made in the image of God and fundamentally God is the One who relates. Another mystery.

At any rate, I'm not a materialist who believes that what's we can see and touch is all there is. We live in a world of mystery and walk through it as though we understand it. Yet in the end we never can and must yield ourselves to this reality and embrace it.