What's In a Name?

To the right of my desk at home hang two documents that I treasure much more than their monetary value. They are each nearly 150 years old. I inherited them from a cousin over 30 years ago and the older I get, the more I appreciate them. They are the Civil War promotion and discharge papers of Smith Povenmire, my great great grandfather. Smith served with the 179th Ohio Infantry in the Union Army. I’m hoping my dear old friends from Louisiana will be able to overlook that fact and read on.

I’ve done some research on Smith Povenmire. By all accounts he was an honorable husband and father. I have a couple of pictures of Smith that I’ve come across over the years. While they tell me little about the man himself, they do serve to put a face with the name. His son, John W. Povenmire, my great grandfather, had two daughters and four sons, one of which was my grandfather, John Orville Povenmire. While my grandfather died when my dad was just a small child, his brothers, my great uncles Smith, Ira, and Otis, all left lasting impressions as men of strength and integrity. I remember them as a boy as grandfather figures whom I admired greatly.

Growing up, my mother used to tell me to never "smear the good name your father gave you." I didn’t realize it at the time, but that "good name" had been passed down for many generations. I’m thankful for the name, and as I’ve grown older, realize the influence of men I never knew that set a standard for living that I’ve tried to uphold.

Psalm 78: 5-7 tells us that God

"...commanded our ancestors
to teach their children,
6 so the next generation would know them,
even the children yet to be born,
and they in turn would tell their children.
7 Then they would put their trust in God
and would not forget his deeds
but would keep his commands.

You ever think about what message you are sending your grandchildren, your great grandchildren, or even your great great grandchildren? I hope some day my grandchildren and their children and so on will read what I had to say in these blog passages. Not because they’re great pieces of literature, but because they somewhat reflect what God has done in my life. They’re part of my testimony, if you will.

I’ve gone to funerals before where the minister conducting the funeral read from notes written in the margins of the diseased’s own Bible to eulogize the person. The notes represented how God had spoken to those particular people at various times in their lives, and they served as a voice from the grave to those gathering to remember a loved one or friend.

I suppose everyone wonders how they will be remembered. I’d like my descendants to know I came from good stock, tried to uphold the name, and most importantly, trusted my life to God through belief and acceptance of Jesus Christ as Lord of my life. That’s the influence and legacy I’d like to leave.