miraculous power, not merely because He wrought miracles when on
earth, but because from heaven He gave the power of which Peter was
but the channel. Now it seems to me that in these emphatic and
singularly reduplicated words of the Apostle there are two or three
very important lessons which I offer for your consideration.

I. The first is the power of the Name.

Now the Name of which Peter is speaking is not the collocation of
syllables which are sounded 'Jesus Christ.' His hearers were familiar
with the ancient and Eastern method of regarding names as very much
more than distinguishing labels. They are, in the view of the Old
Testament, attempts at a summary description of things by their
prominent characteristics. They are condensed definitions. And so the
Old Testament uses the expression, the 'Name' of God, as equivalent
to 'that which God is manifested to be.' Hence, in later days--and
there are some tendencies thither even in Scripture--in Jewish
literature 'the Name' came to be a reverential synonym for God
Himself. And there are traces that this peculiar usage with regard to
the divine Name was beginning to shape itself in the Church with
reference to the name of Jesus, even at that period in which my text
was spoken. For instance, in the fifth chapter we read that the
Apostles 'departed from the council rejoicing that they were counted
worthy to suffer shame for the Name,' and we find at a much later
date that missionaries of the Gospel are described by the Apostle
John as going forth 'for the sake of the Name.'

The name of Christ, then, is the representation or embodiment of that
which Christ is declared to be for us men, and it is that Name, the
totality of what He is manifested to be, in which lies all power for