Do you know your family tree? How far back can you go? The number of people who have traced their family ancestry indicates there’s something compelling about knowing one’s family tree. Genealogy reveals something about the lives of past otherwise unknown family members simply by knowing the country or region in which they lived. Sometimes this search for a family tree is referred to as seeking “roots,” and this is bound up in the quest for identity.
Genealogies were vitally important and so it’s no wonder that we find them in our Bible. The very first book is dedicated to recording humanity’s earliest family tree. It opens with God’s creative activity and then introduces our first parents. Bible keeners will find no end of curiosities in those lists but the average reader of scripture will likely skip over the names and search for a story with a plot and perhaps a lesson to be learned.
The December 2022 issue of Canada Lutheran takes a look at the many genealogies present in the various Gospel stories of Jesus and his family tree as it relates to the Christmas story.
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