We begin to deal with the section of God..the SON! We must know Him in His names as the names are given to Him by God Himself!

Meaning: The catechism asked why did God call Him the Son of God instead of why is the Son of God called Jesus as some try to establish His divinity apart from faith. His name came from GOD! The angel foretold and gave Joseph and Mary His name and what it meant. "Thou shalt call Him Jesus for He shall save His people from their sins." Joshua was the typical of the reality! "Jehovah's salvation." Joshua was named after Jesus as it was in His eternal good pleasure being a shadow and illustration of the reality! God took His people from the bondage house of sin and into the eternal! He was the arm of God's salvation!

Significance: God called His name Jesus. When God calls He does so effectively and He calls Him Jesus because that is WHO HE IS! He calls and works that salvation effectively in His people. He so calls His Son by the very essence of His Son setting Him at the center of all history to save a church unto His glory. God names by the very essence (as He can see even the heart.) God calls Him as our salvation from sin and the debt that He paid for it! We live in a day that talks a lot about Jesus so much so that we often lose the Triune God. Do we realize that He received that name from GOD and that He was called of the Triune God to die for sin as the sacrifice for sinners slain?! Understand the weight of the name Jesus and why God called Him by this name being HIS purpose of salvation from all of eternity!

Comfort: When God calls His Son Jesus He not only talks about His Son but about us! The church and the redemption of the church, the forgiveness of their sins, and their life eternal. From eternity He calls His name Jesus. Would He call Him Jesus without a church and people to be saved? When He calls His name Jesus He calls US and every last saint who would spend eternity with Him...the very heart and soul of the Gospel! And He calls you and me to recognize and to see Him as our Savior, our sin, and our salvation!