I recently finished Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. At an intimidating 800 pages, it took a little over a year of stolen moments and early mornings, thanks in large parts to the short chapters. Otherwise, Tolstoy tends to include so many names and places that it is easy to lose track of the basic story.
Reading the genealogies in Scripture, such as the long one found in the first 8 chapters of 1 Chronicles, can feel like an exercise in triviality. Rarely do we feel that the writer is spending less energy trying to reel us in. After all, how exciting and relevant can a list of dozens of names be?
But then what else did God promise Abraham but people...and lots of them? "Now the Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing." (Gen. 12:1-2) So Abram will become a nation. The one will become many. As this nation grew, they experienced many ups and downs. Disoriented, they would lose the trajectory of what God was doing. Remembering God's words to Abram, they could remember all the people, the great nation God had promised. They count their blessings.
Imagine the author of 1 Chronicles actually knew a story about everyone who gets listed here. Each name is a story in itself. So the list of names is not as trivial as it seems. The little stories tell the big story of the God who made the promise to Abram. Obviously, not all the people lived as though they were part of this big story. Though they are still included in the list, some of these folks were villains. One suspects they would have found genealogies especially useless. What use is a family if I live only for myself?
But for those of us who love family, family vacations, being part of a tradition, a heritage, being built up by God's promises, there is a lot here in the first eight chapters of 1 Chronicles to at least appreciate if not enjoy. Through Jesus' blood, we are part of God's family. We shouldn't lose the narrative on account of all these names because ultimately these names are the narrative. We are the narrative. Our lives, our choices, our relationships with God and others are the story. "I will make of you a great nation."
My prayer list is not terribly exciting. It is a list of names. If I showed you my list, chances are you might know one or two people, but you probably wouldn't know everybody. Sometimes, I don't even know everybody on my list. People who pray at some point become more or less comfortable lifting up names they don't know and praying for people they've never met before. United by the one who created us all, we learn to live this way, in this family.
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