Why Does God Have a Name? (And Why It Matters A LOT!)

Let’s dive into the surprising story behind God revealing Himself as Yahweh. Why does the Bible sometimes say God, sometimes LORD, and why do we almost never see “Yahweh” printed in English translations? Kaitlyn and Mike explore how this ancient name points to God’s character, His promise of presence, and why the “philosophical God” and the “personal God” are actually the same God. They also unpack how knowing God’s name shapes the way we read Scripture, pray, and understand Jesus.

And with Advent coming soon, Kaitlyn and Mike invite you to send in your kids’ Christmas and Advent questions at holypost.com/curiously. The weirder the better.

0:00 - Theme Song

2:33 - Why Did God Name Himself God?

4:47 - How the Bible Introduces God

9:45 - God’s Name and His People

15:54 - Sponsor - Check out the Gracebased Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts or learn more at https://gracebased.com/podcasts/

16:54 - Sponsor - SelectQuote - Go to https://www.selectquote.com/kaitlyn to get started on your new life insurance policy

23:00 - Should We Say the Divine Name?

33:00 - God’s Name

36:33 - End Credits

Kaitlyn: God calls to Moses from the burning bush. Moses says, “Here I am.” And God gives him this commission of what he’s going to do. He is going to be the leader that leads his people out of Egypt.

God has seen the misery, he has seen the oppression, and then he gives him this commission: You’re gonna go to Pharaoh and say, “Let my people go.” And then Moses says, “I go to the Israelites. I say to them, ‘The God of my fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”

And already we’re getting a sense of what’s happened here. You’ve got this first book of Genesis where all of these people have these encounters with God. God says to Abraham, “I’m going to make a nation out of you.” God makes a covenant and a promise, and he sets off this story. Already we’ve gotten to a point where not only is Moses a character that’s not really trusted by God’s people, but there’s been some distance from those encounters with God.

So Moses has this recognition of like, even if I say to you, “The God of your fathers,” I need some more here. Like, they’ve been groaning and you haven’t done anything. And we’re really disconnected at this point from Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and the covenant and the story and the promise. And so what do I do?

God says to Moses in this English translation: “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, the name you shall call me from generation to generation.”

So it’s important. I love the way the kid asked this question: “Why did God name himself this?” Whether she means this or knows this or not, there's a recognition that it’s not just about what the name means—why did he name himself this?

And there is a story in which the purpose of giving the name is not just, “Hey, I need something to put on my name tag.” The purpose is to qualify and legitimize this prophet Moses—to give him information that will say, “I really have sent you; I know God’s name.” But also to describe this personal relationship with the people: the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. “This name I’m giving you is for generation to generation.”

And for God to really kick off this new thing he’s doing—“I’m gonna set my people free from Egypt, I’m gonna use my servant Moses to do that”—this is the name that you need to tell them to say who I am and what my relationship is with you.

And it even says a few chapters later in Exodus: God did not make himself fully known to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob because this name wasn’t given yet. But in this crucial moment, this name is given, which kicks off a whole bunch of uses of this name. The name that he uses—in English, trying to pronounce the Hebrew sounds—we would say today, Yahweh.

That name shows up tons and tons of times in the Old Testament. And it becomes not only significant for identifying who this God that Israel worships is in distinction to all these other gods that are rivals or idols, but also significant because this is how Israel is identified: they worship this one specific God, Yahweh, who they would say is not just one god among many, but the creator of all things, sovereign over all things, who defeats all of the other gods.

Mike: I was doing some research. That’s right, everyone, I can do some research too.

And there’s so much significance in the meaning of Yahweh and how all of this came to be.

So even when you go to that passage in Exodus: God tells Moses what he wants him to do, and Moses first says, “Well, who am I? Who am I that I could go do this?” And at that point in our English translations it says, “And God said, ‘I will be with you.’”

Well, that’s the first part of what God says later. The Hebrew word is ehyeh, which is “I will be.” Essentially this “I will be who I am.”

And then later, once again, Moses says, “Ah, but I don’t even know your name.” And God says ehyeh asher ehyeh—“I will be who I will be.” That is my name. And then it gets changed to Yahweh because the eh is the “I will be,” eh, and the yah is the “he.”

Kaitlyn: That’s right.

Mike: Are you so impressed right now?

Kaitlyn: That’s great.

Mike: I’m just telling you everything you already know. Okay, why does this matter? I love two things about this. I love that when Moses says to God, “Who am I?” God’s response is not to build up Moses. It’s to say, “It doesn’t matter who you are. This is who I am.”

And then that God identifies his name not in “the Almighty, the Powerful, the Wonderful, the Magnificent,” but in his presence: “I will be with you. I am the God who is and forever will be with you.” And so it does not matter, Moses, how powerful Pharaoh is—I am with you. And I think there is so much meaning there.

And we see this theme throughout scripture: how do you know someone? Well, you know someone by their name and by their story. And over and over again, God tells his people, “This is my name—I’m the God who is with you—and this is the story: I’m the God of Abraham, of Isaac. I’m the God who brought you out of slavery, out of oppression. I’m the God who keeps my promises and forever I will be with you.”

And I just think, oh, that’s so powerful for us. It’s so easy to look over that English phrase “I AM WHO I AM”—okay, that sounds kind of profound and deep but I’m confused. But in reality, it sets up the very premise of God’s relationship with his people.

Kaitlyn: I love that. And it reminds me—something I go back to so often—is in the beginning of the Ten Commandments. Before you get into “Do all of these things, don’t do all of these things,” it doesn’t just start with “Do it because I told you to.”

It starts with: “I am the LORD your God who brought you out of Egypt.”

And even later, when it’s talking about teaching the law to your children and to further generations, it begins with: “I am the LORD who brought you out of Egypt.”

So there’s both this recognition that of course God is all-powerful and sovereign and so can dictate, “Here are the terms I want you to live by—not only because I’m all-powerful and all-sovereign, but I made you, I know how you should live, I’m gonna give that to you.” But it doesn’t just start with an abstract philosophical defense of who God is and then “because of that, do these things.”

It starts with: “Remember this story.” When you’re passing down to your children—which we have failed to do very often—when you’re passing down to your children these laws I told you to keep, it comes encapsulated in a story about what I have done for you before you even respond to me by obeying these laws I’ve given.

And too often, especially in parts of evangelicalism, we’ve said the important thing is teaching our children these moral rules. And even in scripture where there are parts with tons of moral rules, it starts with: This is who God is. This is what God has already done for you—which is, I mean, not even directly for us. Like, this is who God has been in the past. These are the people you belong to, and my relationship I’ve already had with them. And because of that, then you respond by living this way.