What Is In A Name?

What is the significance of a name?


A name can tell you a lot about someone or something.  A name can teach you history, culture, and characteristics of some person, a certain place or area, or anything in general.  For example, the name of the city of San Francisco alone can teach us quite a bit. 

San Francisco is Spanish for Saint Francis and is named after the Catholic Saint Francis of Assisi.  The name teaches of San Francisco's history of being founded by Catholic priests from Spain who settled there in the 18th century.

Names of people can also give you historical insight of their genealogy.  My mother's maiden name is Bunker. 

In the American Revolutionary Ward for Independance there was a brutal battle that helped dictate America's chance for victory at a place called Bunker Hill.  That hill was named after my family.  Also, Bunker is derived from the French "Bon Quer", which translates to "Good Heart" in English.

My father's name actually has quite some meaning as well. 

When analyzing it, most would think that it is of English or Welsh origins and tells of ancestors that lived in a land of many wells.  The fact, though, is that my dad was an actor, and when he changed his life around to follow Christ, he legally changed his birth name to his stage name, Chris Wells, and changed it a little farther to the name I know him as and have carried on from him: Christian Wells.   

Just as my dad changed his name in order to follow Christ, we likewise promise to "take upon [ourselves] the name of Christ, by baptism" (2 Nephi 31:13).  In other words, we promise to be Christians when we are baptized.  To be a Christian is more than simply acknowledging that Jesus Christ was something special, but to represent Him and His teachings in all that we do.  A follower of Christ will "bear one another’s burdens... mourn with those that mourn... comfort those that stand in need of comfort, and... stand as [a witness] of God at all times and in all things, and in all places that [they] may be in (Mosiah 18:8-9)."

"A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.  By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. (John 13:34-35)"