A New Name

Conceiving a child proved difficult for Rachel, and at one stage she said to her husband Jacob:  "Give me children or I die!"  He was angry with her request, for she demanded children from him that can only be given by God.  Jacob had done his part best he could, but Rachel's conception was beyond his power.  In time she did bring her request to God who responded to her in Genesis 30:22:  "Then God remembered Rachel, and God listened to her and opened her womb."  Rachel's firstborn son was Joseph, and she was confident God would give her another son.  He was birthed into the world in sorrowful circumstances.

Genesis 35:16-19 says, "Then they journeyed from Bethel. And when there was but a little distance to go to Ephrath, Rachel labored in childbirth, and she had hard labour. ¹⁷ Now it came to pass, when she was in hard labor, that the midwife said to her, "Do not fear; you will have this son also." ¹⁸ And so it was, as her soul was departing (for she died), that she called his name Ben-Oni; but his father called him Benjamin. ¹⁹ So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem)."  Rachel could not have known the last thing she would do as she was losing consciousness was name her son Ben-Oni which means, "son of sorrow."  Perhaps she realised she was not long for the world and sorrowed to leave her sons.

Though Rachel called her son Ben-Oni, Jacob overruled her and called him Benjamin--son of the right hand.  He did not allow Rachel's sorrowful passing overshadow his newborn son's life and future.  Jacob himself had been given a new name by God.  Jacob means "supplanter" or "heel-catcher" but he was called Israel by God he had wrestled with and prevailed with his tearful pleas to be blessed.  He became "one who struggles with God" and prevailed because of God's grace and goodness.  The remainder of his life Israel (Jacob) walked with a limp because of his encounter with God, and Benjamin embarked on the rest of his life without a mother and a new name because his father loved him.

This tragic and endearing passage reminds me how God brings life out of death, for while we were dead in sins, Christ demonstrated His love to die for us.  Because of who Jesus is and all He has done we can be born again and receive eternal life--something better than a name change.  Our sin only brought sorrow to God, us and the world, yet God has looked upon us favourably and adopted us as His own children by the Gospel.  We even read Jesus has a new name yet to be revealed for each one who overcomes through faith in Him in Revelation 2:17:  "He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give some of the hidden manna to eat. And I will give him a white stone, and on the stone a new name written which no one knows except him who receives it."  Aren't we blessed beyond measure God has overruled sorrow and death and given us a new life and identity in Him?  Our new birth comes with fullness of joy and peace forever.