Glad Tidings Magazine

It has become a popular pastime to track down your ancestors: to find out exactly where the family came from and how far back in time you can go, before the records run out or the family identity is untraceable. People used to trek half way around the world to look at gravestones and study parish registers, and many still do. But now online census data and other electronic records have made searching much easier and this has made the pastime much more popular.

For some people it really matters where they have come from and who they are. Perhaps they never knew their real parents or grandparents and finding out about them is the next best thing to knowing them. Other people struggle with their sense of identity and don’t seem to fit in, so they track back in their past looking for answers to who they really are. And sometimes it is important to be able to find out how long your ancestors lived and whether they suffered from illnesses that might have passed down the family line.

It mattered in Bible times whether or not you could establish your family credentials. The nation of Israel was divided into twelve tribes and you lived within that tribal structure. Each family’s inheritance was to be kept within the tribe, so you could not amalgamate your farm with another in some other tribe, for to do so would blur tribal boundaries. And the family mattered because you were identified by the people to whom you belonged. There were many people who shared the same name but they were distinguished by the names of their forbears. Take Zechariah, which was a name given to 27 different people in the Old Testament alone.

Those individuals are distinguished as follows:

Zechariah the son of Meshelemiah was keeper of the door of the tabernacle of meeting (1 Chronicles 9:21).
Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon Jahaziel the son of Zechariah, the son of Benaiah, the son of Jeiel, the son of Mattaniah, a Levite of the sons of Asaph, in the midst of the assembly (2 Chronicles 20:14).
Then the Spirit of God came upon Zechariah the son of Jehoiada the priest, who stood above the people (2 Chronicles 24:20).
Then the prophet Haggai and Zechariah the son of Iddo, prophets, prophesied to the Jews who were in Judah and Jerusalem, in the name of the God of Israel, who was over them (Ezra 5:1).

Notice that the four different people mentioned here are described in two ways. They performed different functions – a doorkeeper, a Levite, a priest and a prophet – but they are also identified by their family credentials, the key phrase being “the son of”.

Family Credentials

It was possible to change your tribal identity, for example by marrying someone of another tribe. But the tribe of Levi – which provided the Levites and the Priests – was especially careful to maintain tribal integrity, for a man could not become a priest unless he was born of Aaron’s line. That is why King Hezekiah had a census made when he was reorganising temple worship:

"Besides those males from three years old and up who were written in the genealogy, they distributed to everyone who entered the house of the Lord his daily portion for the work of his service, by his division, and to the priests who were written in the genealogy according to their father’s house, and to the Levites from twenty years old and up according to their work, by their divisions, and to all who were written in the genealogy" (2 Chronicles 31:16–18)

When the nation of Israel had been deported to Babylon for seventy years, because of unfaithfulness, upon their return the apportionment of the land they had once owned had to be done by reference to their family credentials. Nehemiah the appointed governor reports as follows:

"Now the city was large and spacious, but the people in it were few, and the houses were not rebuilt. Then my God put it into my heart to gather the nobles, the rulers, and the people, that they might be registered by genealogy. And I found a register of the genealogy of those who had come up in the first return, and found written in it" (Nehemiah 7:4–5).

The Family of God

If we could each trace our family history back far enough we would discover that all of us come from a common ancestor, for Adam was the first man that God created and we are all descended from him and share his characteristics. He is the author of much of our misfortune, as the New Testament explains:

"Through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned" (Romans 5:12).

We have each inherited a nature with an inbuilt tendency to sin and we have to work with God if we want to develop a new nature which is inclined in a different direction. And that can be done, for the New Testament begins with the great news of the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. His genealogy features in the first eighteen verses of the New Testament, in the gospel of Matthew, to show that his earthly family was descended from the kingly line of the tribe of Judah. But then his Father’s identity is revealed:

"Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." (Matthew 1:20–21).

By becoming related to the Lord Jesus Christ – through faith and baptism – we too can become children of God, patterning our lives after the example of Jesus and following his directions. This is how the apostle Paul advised us to live, as members of God’s family:

"As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving" (Colossians 2:6–7).

Finding your roots

In this month's issue