The reality principle is an arche, a starting point. It establishes a baseline as well as sets a trajectory. It points in a particular direction (or perhaps in multiple directions), and creates space and makes room for man’s creativity to soar. The creativity principle, when it’s used faithfully, presses beyond what’s (presently) there to the as-yet-unseen destination. Naming, then, includes both God’s design and intent in creation on the one hand, as well as man’s recognition of God’s design and advancement of God’s reign through his act of naming on the other.
Naming, therefore, transcends mere labeling. Naming is a way of moving forward, of making progress. It entails both recognition of what God has done and development beyond what God has done. It includes both discovery and invention. In naming, we both receive what God has done and build upon what God has done. Or better, human naming is actually God’s way of building, developing and subduing creation, enlisting man as co-laborer in the work of bringing the world from one degree of glory to another.
Naming Is Our Great Privilege
This is the great privilege of being made in God’s image. We are called to subdue the earth. We are called to name God’s world. God has unleashed us to transform the world through our faithful naming. Music, visual arts, engineering, mathematics, business, education, preaching: In all of them, our goal is to internalize God’s word, thoughtfully engaging with God’s works, and then to faithfully and creatively transform God’s world through our words and actions.
When engineers and scientists analyze the world, they attempt to name it. With numbers. They represent reality (that’s naming) with ones and twos and threes and fours. Sometimes they throw letters in there just to confuse the rest of us. When a physicist translates reality into math, when a mathematician represents God’s world with her equations, they are engaged in naming. The only question will be whether they are faithful or not, whether they operate within the boundaries established by God in his word and whether their names fit with the world as we find it.
When photographers point and click, they too are naming the world. Pictures, as they say, are worth a thousand words, and so photographers speak to us through colors and pixels. They seek to capture something about the world—a smile, a child, a sunset or an experience—with lenses and lighting. Their camera is a tongue and a pen, and they employ it to creatively and imaginatively frame and highlight givens in God’s world.
And, of course, when God’s faithful ministers ascend into the pulpit, they are seeking to name God’s world. All week they saturate themselves in the living word of the living God, hearing from him and having their eyes shaped and reshaped by Holy Writ. Then they attend to givens in their culture and congregation—felt needs, hidden sins, deep pains and sweet blessings. Then, in reliance on God’s Spirit, they speak, connecting God’s word to God’s works in the lives of God’s people, praying that their naming would not only be faithful, but gloriously fruitful.
“God has granted you the spectacular power of speech.”
So whether you’re behind the pulpit or behind the lens, whether you’re working with numbers, working with words or working with paint, whether you’re typing emails, wiping noses or swiping credit cards, remember: God has granted you the spectacular power of speech. So open your mouth, and faithfully name his world.
