Our lesson was on Luke 5:17-26, the story of the men who brought the lame friend to Jesus. But that's not what caught my attention. It was the "heading" above the next section, "Jesus calls Levi and eats with sinners."
Most of my readers already know my son's name is Levi, and the remarkable way he got his name. What many don't know, and honestly I had forgotten, was something else that makes his name a gift from God.
Quick background for those who don't know. Years before we adopted Samantha and Levi, we'd adopted a baby boy and named him Matthew, gift of God. After over seven months, the adoption fell through and Matthew went back to his birth mother...and our lives changed forever. It was a time when I questioned God and His love for me. I literally shook my fist at God at one point and said, "if this is who You are, I choose not to serve You." Yeah, I know. I should have been struck dead at that point, but as I've often mentioned, God loves despite our stupidity and rebellious nature. Instead of striking me dead, He poured out His love and showed me that I had no clue Who He is, or how much He loves me. (Kind of felt like Job at this point, with God asking him was he around when the world was created?)
Anyway, fast forward a lot of years. God had not only blessed us with a beautiful baby girl but now with a baby boy that we named Levi. We didn't know that Levi meant "unity" when we chose that name, but he really has lived up to his name. He brings people together wherever he goes! He carries the name of my grandfather, even though I had no idea of that when we named him. It was a name that "fit".
Then, one day at church, a friend said something that stopped me in my tracks. He said something about how cool it was about Levi's name. I thought he meant any one of the many stories I've already shared, but then he said, "you know, Matthew...Levi." That's when, for the first time, I realized that in the Bible, Matthew and Levi were one and the same.
God had truly brought us full circle from losing Matthew, to finding Levi.
That brings me back to the section in Luke that I stumbled on while studying. Luke 5:27-28,
"After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. “Follow me,” Jesus said to him, 28 and Levi got up, left everything and followed him." There it was...a promise and a reassurance that God has it all under control.
Even though my son sometimes acts like, well, a typical son, God's not finished with him yet. The call over his life may not be clear to him yet, but it's still there. I just need to let go and trust that.
For those who wonder if my son will read this - are you kidding? Of course, he won't! I'm sharing because I know the things I go through are not that unique. Somewhere out there is another mom who is looking at her grown-up baby and wondering what happened. When did they quit believing we'd hung the moon and could fix any problem? When did they decide that we actually didn't know anything? Will they ever look at us the same again? Well, no...probably not. But we can trust God's Word when it says "Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it." Proverbs 22:6 Even the knuckleheads...
Take heart fellow moms. What's in a name? A whole lot, especially when it's called by Jesus.
Photo by Ben White on Unsplash
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