Knowing Your Name

Picture this. I am fresh out of university. I have long, shaggy hair (back in those days I would cut my hair roughly twice a year). I’m starting to lead worship at my church more often and a kid’s camp has asked me to help them out for a week.

The kids love “Uncle Sathiya” (every leader was called ‘uncle’ or ‘aunt’ before their name). But there’s a problem…

They can’t pronounce his name.

Say-thee-uh. Suh-thai-uh. Samantha (one kid actually called me that). I was hearing every ugly mispronunciation in the book. Rather than teaching these innocent kids to pronounce my complicated, Indo-Canadian name, I decided to go by a moniker. A bold one.

The rest of that week, the kids called me “Uncle Brown Sugar.” We joked that it was because I had great brown eyes. I often joke now that my nickname is the reason I love sweets so much, including this absolutely decadently delicious, to-die-for chocolate peanut butter mousse.

Jokes aside, it is a good reminder that the names we take on have power. Sathiya means “truthful one” and that is something I don’t take lightly. It’s one of the reasons I am so passionate about helping men like you live with high integrity.

One of the final exercises our men go through in DeepClean is a label exercise where they identify old monikers that limited or poorly defined them, and we replace them with the truth that God thinks about them. Self-labels are prophetic in nature, so it’s important that we identify with things that lay the framework for a glorious future. Some of the truths that are revealed in this exercise are absolutely staggering.

When you think about how you talk about yourself – is it healthy? Does it convey value? Is it aligned with God’s thoughts towards you? I’d love to hear.

Cheering you on,
Sathiya