What is Your Heritage?

Families are interesting! Mine is no exception. There is a wide variety of people. In my extended family, I have rich, poor and everything in between. There are athletics and coaches, teachers and drop outs, blue collar workers and businessmen. I have family on wall-street, and in the back hills of Arkansas. I have famous people and no names. I have those that have been married for many years and those that have been married many times. I have those that stayed pure until marriage and those that were free prostitutes. I have homosexuals and heterosexuals. I have Christians and non Christians. I have those that get along with everyone and those that get along with nobody. I have those that have been victims of crime and those that have committed the crime. I have felons and murderers. I have those who have Cancer, Alzheimer’s, Aids, Heart Disease, Diabetes, Emphysema, and MS. The oldest is 88, the youngest is still in the womb. My blood is part Cherokee Indian, Dutch, and German. What is interesting is that I do not know anything about any ancestor older than my great grandparents. I know very little about them. I know many stories on my grandparents and their siblings and I know a lot about my parents and everything about my immediate family (Well, probably not everything but all I want to know). However, if you ask me my heritage, not my nationality, but my heritage, it would be hard for me to know how to answer. I know which people proclaimed to be Christian but I do not know one person’s spiritual journey through life. I do not know their core beliefs, their life passions, and their purpose. That is real heritage and that is what we are missing in our families today. I am hoping that these devotions will provide a way for my children to learn about their spiritual heritage. I want them to know the God of their parents, so they can pass it on to their children along with their stories of faith, and so on and so on.
I think it is interesting that Matthew begins his version of the Christmas story by sharing the genealogy of Jesus. His lineage wasn’t much different than my family. He has Kings and servants; He has great men and great women. He has prostitutes and great mothers. He had the rich and the poor. The one thing which was in Jesus' family was heritage. So many stories of great, faithful, God followers fill the generations of Jesus. Some of my favorites are: David (A man after God’s own heart), Abraham (The Father of Nations), Boaz (The great Kinsman Redeemer), Solomon (The king who built the temple), Joseph (Who saved God’s remnant), Rehab (Who hid God’s spies), Ruth (The widower who was faithful to her mother-in-law but was redeemed by Boaz), etc. His lineage doesn’t just go back four generation, it goes back over 42 generations. Every generation in the lineage of the Messiah is accounted for from Adam to Jesus. That in itself is amazing. His lineage shows us that though He had an overwhelming spiritual heritage, He truly is the Savior of all people and a wide variety of people had a place of honor in the lineage of Jesus!
Do you know your family’s spiritual heritage? If you have those who have walked with God for many years in your family, find out their stories. Pass them on to your children. If your family doesn’t have any spiritual heritage or you do not know it, then start building it now. Talk about the works of God to your family. Share the story of your salvation. Tell them what Jesus has done for you. Share how the baby in the manger whose birthday we celebrate is the Savior of all humanity, no matter where they fall in society or in our families. In the end, it doesn't matter what earthly family we belong to as long as we belong to His heavenly family.

Record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ

Luke 1