Before I get started, three and a half years ago I went on my first date with Michelle, who is now my beautiful wife. Incredible. I am so grateful for the voice of wisdom, the passion for purity, the drive for discipline and integrity that she has shared with, and passed on to me. Thank you Michelle, for three and a half years of relationship. Thank you for your patience with me, for your love toward me, and above all, for your absolute pursuit of God – with or without me. I love you so much.
And thank you, Jesus, for bringing such an undeserved blessing into my life. You have grabbed my life for yourself, O God, and have joined it with Michelle, and for that I will be eternally grateful. My only hope is that the rest of my life can be lived out in fullness to the gratitude I feel toward you for the many overwhelming blessings you have given to me. Thank you.
Matthew 1:1,17
An account of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham…So all the generations from Abraham to David were fourteen generations; and from David to the deportation to Babylon, fourteen generations; and from the deportation to Babylon to the Messiah, fourteen generations.
This might be my most rarely read passage of Matthew, and I’m fairly certain I am not alone. It gets rather redundant to read name after name after name after name. Today was not that different. I don’t think I religiously read the list of names – they don’t mean much to me. But that’s just the point. Genealogies don’t mean to us what they did to the Jews to whom Matthew was writing this Godspel.
In our culture, part of the American dream is that everyone can make a name for themselves – independent of the name their parents or ancestors had. This is an incredible freedom that we experience, that there is no fear of being limited by our parents faults or brokenness, but we are able, through effort, vision, and persistence, to achieve greatness. I say this in recognition that there is no greatness apart from Jesus Christ. But I think we understand this idea of the power of independent names. If I carried the name of my ancestors, and that was how I was defined, then I am sure that it would impact me deeply. I’m sure my trade would be different, my socio-economic class woudl be different, my life would look different. I am benefitting from the system.
However, because of this independent perspective, because of this freedom to pursue our own name, there is a limited value placed on personal heritage (due also in part to the “melting-pot” culture of the United States), and much of what the Israelites seemed to value in their cultural heritage has seemingly been lost here.
This brings me back to a concept that I seem to constantly revisit: the power of story. The call to pass stories down to the next generation is found throughout the Bible. Everywhere the Israelites encountered something, God would direct them to set up a monument so that they could tell their children and grandchildren what had happened. In all of the commandments were the instructions to teach to their children and grandchildren. There is something about a heritage, a story that you are a part of. I wonder if because of the negative power of a bad story, we avoid passing on stories at all. That is our loss.
I wish I knew stories of how God had moved in the lives of my grandparents and great-grandparents. I want my grandchildren, and great-great-grandchildren to know the stories of how God has moved in my life. I want them to know that they are a part of the same story of God redeeming our family. I want them to know the story of their family – and I want it to be a story of pursuit of God. However, even if it is not always a story of constant pursuit of God, I still want them to know it. It is when we know the stories that we can change them.
I’m pretty sure it was when the Israelites stopped telling their stories, when the stopped telling their children what had happened when their ancestors walked away from God, and what happened when they came back that their nation began to fall apart (again and again).
Let me constantly be remember and telling others the story of how God has rescued me!
God, thank you for what you have done.
Help me to constantly pursue you, and tell of your stories to those around me.
Amen.