Shady Ladies

Sometimes it's the taking of photographs which reveal more than the photos themselves. The difference between the two sides of my family – my Mum's side and my Dad's – is seen at its most extreme when we take family photographs. Let me state right off the bat though, that I have a great affection for both sides of the family. They have all shown a great deal of care and interest in me and I care for them all. And yet, at times the divergent heritage of each family sticks its head out, and no more so then when we take family photographs.

You see, on one side – the one without the Christian heritage – there is constant joking about not standing on the edge of the family photo if you've married into the family. "Get in the middle [insert name], if you want to be in this photo forever". The reason, in case you're wondering is that if you stand on the edge of the photo, once you're divorced, the scissors are bound to be produced and you'll be quite literally cut off from the family. Being in the middle of the photograph ensures your future in the family! And we all know there are few more sacred truths in this day and age than, 'If there's no photographic evidence, it never happened.' Divorce is a sad, often repeated, and all too present reality for this side of my family. And that little bit of truth that lies behind every joke, in this case is not too far below the surface.

And then there is the other side of my family. The story goes, so far as I understand it, that my grandfather was one of 11 Christian brothers. Ten of these brothers made their way to Australia from England in the early 1900's, and thus began a strong Christian heritage which has been passed down to me. We had a family reunion about 5 years ago where we all had name-tags showing which brother we belonged to. I had "Izaac - Bill's family". Quite strangely though I imagine for family reunions is, ours included a family church service.

At another point in the weekend we all stood in the church hall (where the reunion was held) and we were asked to stand amongst our generations. Of the 11 brothers, at that stage there were just three widows left – a generation virtually gone. My Nana and one other wife present, were seated on one side of the room. To their right stood their children's generation where my parents stood. The next wall around stood my cousins and I, and the final side of the room held the dozen or so great-grandchildren that were present. The question put to us by one of my Dad's cousins (a man of the cloth), was, "We received a spiritual legacy from our fathers, and they are almost wiped out completely. The weakness of death has already been seen in our generation: What of the gospel are we passing on to our children? Have we spurned the spiritual legacy that was handed down to us?"

It was a stirring moment.

And I can think of nothing but thankfulness to God, that I should be born into such a family, even though as they say, 'he had no say in it, no say in it at all'.

Yet it is not that this side of the family is also without its skeletons. We had a big family tree printed off which ran 40 something A4 pages long along a wall. And there were a few sealed sections. Or at the very least, my cousins and I joked, they should have had post-it notes over them. There was the two brothers who married two sisters. Okay, so the brothers weren't related to the sisters, so it sounds worse than it is, but it sounds suspect. Then there was the one couple who divorced, and then the wife re-married one of her ex-husbands cousins. Not surprisingly those two lines from the 11 brothers don't communicate much and one side was virtually absent from the weekend.

The truth is, we all have our own story. Or, if you're a contestant on a reality show, your own journey. And we all have skeletons in the past that we would like kept in the closet. There's a reason we store skeletons in the closet and not in the lounge room.

Jesus had some skeletons in his closet. Have you ever read his genealogy in Matthew 1*? It reads like a script of The Bold and the Beautiful (or a script of Passions for those with better taste). There is a bit of a tension in what is actually on display here. Because the intention is put right out there in v1

The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

The genealogy is to show the positive side of Jesus' family history. He is the true son of Abraham, the true son of David. Jesus is the one who had been promised, who would come to be servant of all, despised and afflicted, the one on whom the punishment of humanity would be placed in order to bring life.

And yet, though this is a regal family tree, the details reveal there are a lot of skeletons in Jesus' family closet. Notice the 'shady ladies' mentioned throughout. Prostitutes, illegitimate relationships, foreigners, murder – Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, the wife of Uriah (of which the union is considered so tragic, Bathsheba is not even specifically named). And it is with these reminders that even the long vaunted calibre of the men listed is immediately transferred to their failures. In that sense, Jesus' genealogy reads much like those in Genesis which are haunted by that refrain, "And he died, and he died, and he died". A reminder of the judgment that has befallen humankind.

Jesus' genealogy is a reminder of the past, not just his past but the past of humanity. A history littered with sin and failure yet clothed with grace. And it is also about the future, for the Christ has now come.

*I've blogged on this passage previously.