Words Are Just Labels

Sometimes when people start getting back into Scripture, they discover things they never knew were there, they get convicted, they get excited... And sometimes they get a little carried away by things they read or hear without considering the greater context. For example, in Exodus 23:13, God said "Pay attention to all that I have said to you, and make no mention of the names of other gods, nor let it be heard on your lips."

Years ago, when I was first getting really serious about trying to obey God, I thought this meant we needed to stop using "Tuesday" and "January" because they were named for pagan gods.

Some people take that even further and say we shouldn't use words like "lord" and "god" because the True God shouldn't be made to share his titles with false gods.

But then there's this:

For your Maker is your husband, the LORD of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called. Isaiah 54:5

We all know this is talking about YHWH, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. (The all-caps LORD always means that the original Hebrew read "YHWH".) There's absolutely no question about it. Isaiah is relaying a message from God about Himself to the people of Israel. Did you also know that the Hebrew word God used to describe himself as a "husband" is ba'al, the exact same word used as to refer to the chief Canaanite god? It can be translated as husband, master, lord, etc.
In other places, God YHWH calls himself El and Adonai, which translate almost exactly to god and lord, respectively.

All words and sounds are abused and co-opted at times for sinful purposes, but there is no such thing as a "pagan" word or sound any more than there can be a pagan hammer or a pagan screwdriver. Words are just tools used to convey information, and, just like hammers, they can be misused.

Some nouns carry more information than others, but in the end they're just labels. God, lord, ba'al... these are generic nouns that are sometimes used as proper nouns, just like Father, Doctor, or President. The chief Canaanite god was often called Ba'al, but YHWH also called himself ba'al.

If pagans worship a god of the trees and they call it Tree, are we then forbidden to use the word "tree" ever again? Of course not. Even if there was a real being masquerading as the god of the trees, that word doesn't belong to him, and it's not really his name.

When God said "Don't let the names of false gods pass your lips" in Exodus 23:13, he didn't mean, "Don't speak the phonetic equivalents of their names and don't ever use those nouns again." No. What he meant was, "Don't call on false gods. Don't swear by their names, don't honor them by talking about them in a favorable manner, don't pray to them, don't act in their names, and don't speak for them."

Words are just tools to represent information through speech and writing. Don't confuse the labels for the realities, and don't let the world dictate your speech.