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My lovely niece, Angela, gave birth to a son this year. She called him Archie! Now this is not a name I would have chosen because I associate it with a ventriloquist’s dummy. However, Angela and her husband must like the sound of it. As far as I know there are no famous Archie’s and certainly no-one in the family has this name. It means ‘truly bold’ and I hope it proves a harbinger of what Angela’s son becomes.
I think my mother chose my name, John, because of its meaning: ‘God is gracious’. She probably thought I was a gift from God but whether she continued to think so as I got older is open to doubt. According to the gospel account an angel told Joseph what Mary’s child should be called: "You are to give him the name Jesus because he will save his people from their sins." Mt1v21. Jesus means: ‘God’s salvation.’ I have just finished reading a book entitled, ‘Leaps in the dark,’ about important scientific advances. I suppose few people, other than historians of medicine, have ever heard the name, Philippe Pinel. He was a pioneering French psychiatrist who lived from 1745 to 1826. He was the first psychiatrist to propose that mentally ill patients would benefit from the way of gentleness and compassion. Instead of the old methods of bleeding, emetics, purgatives, electric shocks, freezing cold baths and rotating chairs Pinel advocated the doctor should form an intense, supportive and respectful relationship with the mentally disturbed patient. One evening while I was visiting a friend in hospital an old lady in the next bed suffering from Alzheimer’s disease was highly distressed and kept calling out, "I want to go home. I want to go home. Why doesn’t anyone take me home." It was very upsetting to hear her. It wouldn’t have helped to tell her roughly to, "Shut up." Before I left I stopped to talk to the demented woman. I spoke to her quietly and in a re-assuring way. I persuaded her that it was getting late, it was dark outside, that she was well looked after where she was. Gradually the poor lady began to relax and quieten down. In this instance gentleness and compassion brought for a time some peace of mind. When God looked down on a disturbed, diseased and depraved world he chose to act in gentleness and compassion. A baby boy was born to be man-kind’s saviour and to bring peace. I used to give Jack, a rather irascible gentleman, a lift to chapel. He would invariably inveigh against the ills of the world. Sometimes he would get worked up and shout, "I just wish God would put me in charge for 15 minutes - I would show them." Fortunately for some of us Jack never got his wish. Jesus, himself, was determined to go the way of gentleness and compassion. He said, "For I did not come to judge the world, but to save it." Jn12v47. Jesus was tempted to become a warrior king - to conquer by the sword. That is what his rag-bag of followers expected of him. But he did not choose to impose righteousness by force. He did not come to coerce men to be good. Jesus came to win hearts and minds. And he has! That is why his name remains so precious to so many.
In a believer’s ear! It sooths his sorrows, heals his wounds, And drives away his fear.
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