October 13

1 Chronicles 1:1-54, 2:1-41, 4:1-23, 3:10-24

So what are we to do with this genealogical listing?  

I'm sure scholars have a field day with it.  But I mean people like me -- just regular folks.  I think the Bible was written for the common man.  Nothing against scholars, but just look how Jesus felt about the religious establishment.  They tend to do the Pharisee thing -- build a law around the law and hang on the importance of prepositions.  I think the message is plainer than that.   That God makes Himself known and that there's a role for the Holy Spirit in all of it.  Again, nothing against scholarship.  You have that "study to show yourself approved" thing.  But look at the history of scholars and priests and the religious establishment in the Bible.  And in our culture and our tradition, I think we tend to put more importance on heart than head and form than substance.  

I come to the Bible for God to speak to me.  Now and in this time.  Not as a research assignment or a literary text that needs its allusions analyzed.  This is the Living God, using His written word to speak to me right now.  Because the word is a person and not a text.  John 5:39-40

Anyway...sorry that scripture tends to get me up on a soapbox and off on an issue.  

Meanwhile, back at the text.  

What are we to make of this?  The importance of family and race?  Or the unimportance of it?  Pharaoh's daughter makes an appearance in the text.  Imagine having your name in the Bible?  Just a mentioned...obviously not for something bad.  "Er, Judah's firstborn, was wicked in the Lord's sight; so the Lord put him to death."  Want to avoid that.  But a mention.  Just the idea that God knows your name and remembers it and has penned the letters of it.

And maybe that's it.  That's why the genealogy is here.  God knows our names.  He knows mine.  He knows yours.  And I wonder what two lines my story would be abbreviate my life into?

Would it be:

Er, Judah's firstborn was wicked in the Lord's sight; so the Lord put him to death.

1 Chronicles 2:3

Or, this story that comes out of the blue in the genealogy:

Jabez was more honorable than his brothers.  His mother had named him Jabez, saying, "I gave birth to him in pain."  Jabez cried out to the God of Israel, "Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory!  Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain."  And God granted his request. 

1 Chronicles 4:9-10

What's my story as God tells it?  He knows my name and what is the two-line phrase He'd introduce me to others with?