Hello everyone, welcome to this week's Follow Him Favorites.

This year we're in the Old Testament and every week we take a question that we've been

asked by one of our listeners, something that maybe draws from the lesson itself.

And this week we're in Genesis and the question comes from chapter 32 of Genesis where Jacob

gets a new name.

This happened earlier to Abram, he got a new name Abraham, but this one's totally different.

Jacob is renamed by the Lord Israel.

And John, I've had students ask me before, especially when I was a seminary teacher, my

younger students would say, I hear that in the temple you get a new name.

What's that all about?

So what would you say?

If someone came up to you and said, why would Jacob get renamed and what is this about

new names?

What would you say?

There's a lot of places where that happens and it's like a new start.

When I was born, my parents gave me a name.

They were very clever.

They came up with John.

But when I'm born again, when I'm baptized, I take upon me the name of Christ.

We looked at Abram and Surah, getting new names, kind of a new start, a new commission.

And I love that idea.

I remember hearing a basketball post game show once where the coach said, my team lost today

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