THE POWER IN A NAME BY PASTOR AGUMAH REUBEN

The religious say that to speak the truth is to ashame the devil, but philosophers will argue that you need to know whether or not that truth will please the one you are telling it to. I have all along thought in line with the latter but I have reached a point where I cannot go any further, so I need to work on the former – speak the truth and ashame the devil.

The Bible in Proverbs 22:1 teaches that

A good name is to be chosen than great riches… (ESV) while

Ecclesiastes 7:1 says that

A good name is better than precious ointment (ESV), but also the Banyankore say that, “Eiziina ribi riroga nyinaryo” literally meaning that ‘a bad name bewitches its bearer’.

Now, if a good name is to be chosen rather than great riches and a good name is better than precious ointment, then why should bad names exist? Why should a man bearing a bad name run after other things instead of first thinking about his name? Why should there be bad names and nobody pays attention? Why should somebody cling to a bad name? But why…..?

As I continued asking myself these questions, I began to see names that are so interesting that you really wonder what could have been behind the scenes in such a naming arrangement. What was at the back of the mind of someone to name his or her child--

Zinkuratiire = sorrows keep following me,

Itakarirya = the soil eats (meaning that soil keeps swallowing people when they die),

Kijunde = rotten or decomposing,

Gaharubungo = dung dumped on the rubbish heap, also of a place

Kabwohe = a hill of misfortune.

As I secluded myself and listened, an idea came into my mind. I feel convinced that this must be real. God in His supremacy created the Heavens and the Earth with all things visible and invisible. His original intention was that all creation – the big and the small, mammals and reptiles, amphibians and birds, macro and micro-organisms, the skies and the clouds, the plants and the waters, the rocks and the deserts, the fish and all, co-exist in harmony. For some time this harmony was maintained with certainty. A perfect example is seen in Noah’s Ark where carnivores, herbivores and omnivores all lived together in the Ark for more than twelve months without one antagonizing the other. In fact, Isaiah the prophet predicts a future restoration of this divine order, (Isa 11:6--8).