What's In A Name?

June 21, 2026
What's In A Name?
Sermon Audio

CENTRAL TEXT: Genesis 11:1-9

Now the whole earth had one language and the same words. 2 And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. 3 And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. 4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.” 5 And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. 6 And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech.” 8 So the LORD dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. 9 Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of all the earth. And from there the LORD dispersed them over the face of all the earth.

CALL TO WORSHIP: Psalm 127:1-3

LEADER: Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. 

ALL: Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.  

LEADER: It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; 

ALL: for he gives to his beloved sleep.

PRAYER/SCRIPTURE READING/CONFESSION OF FAITH: Hebrews 11:8-10

LEADER: By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. 9 By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. 

The Word of the Lord.

ALL: Thanks be to God!

CELEBRATION OF THE LORD’S SUPPER: 

CONFESSION OF SIN:

LEADER:  Let us confess our sin to the Lord.

ALL: As Israel was made to make bricks without straw, so we choose to build a name with materials too brittle to bear the weight of life. We think ourselves skilled to form an identity apart from You. We find that life vulnerable to fear and liable to folly. Forgive us. Help us see your Name above all others, and to take the Name you give us in your Son.

ASSURANCE OF PARDON: Colossians 1:15-20

LEADER:      He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.

ALL: Thanks be to God!

Related Scriptures:

Isaiah 14:13-14

Discussion Questions:

  1. Review your extended family’s history if you know it that far back. When did your ancestry first live in a city? (or has it always been city-dwellers as long as you can remember?) If they relocated to a city, why did they move?
  2. Read Genesis 10 and 11 again. Do you see how 10, while before 11, is describing the outcome of what happens in 11?
  3. What is the building of a city and a tower a metaphor for in the story? What words are used to get to the heart of their motivation?
  4. Why does the Lord see fit to overturn their plans?
  5. What names from history–or your own family, or (gulp) your own life–are cautionary tales of seeking to make a name for oneself, at cost to themselves and others? What’s the draw of that impulse, even in the face of the risk?
  6. Sit and simmer on the contrast being drawn between what the inhabitants of Babel are seeking (Gen 11:4)  and what God means to give Abraham in time (Gen 12:2). What is that contrast? Why could it matter?
  7. How does Jesus embody the vision for life hinted at in what the Lord promises Abraham?
  8. Fathers, do you ever feel the tug to make a name for yourself, at the expense of those entrusted to you? Read up here on Dr Bradley’s research. What do you think of his claims? What even small change is in order?

Illustrations:

Jun 21, 2026

QUOTES:

Human disunity and exile are not God’s final wish, however, as the next chapter shows. Whereas the builders of Babel sought “to make a name for [them]selves” on their own, the Lord, in the next ch, promises to make Abram’s “name great” Himself (12:2). And whereas they feared being “scattered all over the world” (11:4), the Lord calls Abram out of Mesopotamia and promises him a land of his own (12:1, 7). Whereas the builders of Babel are cursed with an inability to understand each other (11:7, 9), the Lord blesses not only Abram but all those who bless him (12:2-3). 
- Jewish Study Bible
The image of myself which I try to create in my own mind in order that I may love myself is very different from the image which I try to create in the minds of others in order that they may love me. 
- W. H. Auden
Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don’t mean to do harm; but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves. 
- T.S. Eliot
Our relationship with life seems to be in crisis today. Everything that appears as a “limit” — incapacity, illness, old age, suffering, vulnerability — tends to be seen primarily as a defect to be corrected, rather than as a reality through which our humanity matures and opens itself to relationship. And yet we must remember that humanity flourishes not despite limitations, but often through them. 
- Pope Leo, Magnifica Humanitas
From William Blake to Lady Gaga, from Rousseau to Rumi to Tosca to Mister Rogers, it's a curiously uniform message, accepted from high to low: when in doubt, what to do? How do we know what's right for us? Every shrink, every career counsellor, every Disney princess knows the answer: "Be yourself." "Follow your heart." Only here's what I really, really want someone to explain to me. What if one happens to be possessed of a heart that can't be trusted? What if the heart, for its own unfathomable reasons, leads one wilfully and in a cloud of unspeakable radiance away from health, domesticity, civic responsibility and strong social connections and all the blandly-held common virtues and instead straight towards a beautiful flare of ruin, self-immolation, disaster? . . . If your deepest self is singing and coaxing you straight toward the bonfire, is it better to turn away?
- Donna Tarrt, The Goldfinch
I believe that in all men's lives at certain periods, and in many men's lives at all periods between infancy and extreme old age, one of the most dominant elements is the desire to be inside the local Ring and the terror of being left outside. . . . .Unless you take measures to prevent it, this desire is going to be one of the chief motives of your life, from the first day on which you enter your profession until the day when you are too old to care. 
- C.S. Lewis, “The Inner Ring,”
Of all the passions the passion for the Inner Ring is most skillful in making a man who is not yet a very bad man do very bad things. . . .As long as you are governed by that desire you will never get what you want. You are trying to peel an onion: if you succeed there will be nothing left. Until you conquer the fear of being an outsider, an outsider you will remain. 
- C.S. Lewis, “The Inner Ring,”

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