“Remember the days of old; consider the generations long past. Ask your father and he will tell you, your elders, and they will explain to you.” (Deuteronomy 32:7)

I was driving west on I-40, arguably one of the most boring interstate stretches known to mankind–well, at least known to me. Thankfully, though, I had my daddy by my side, just the two of us–a very rare treat that I was ready to indulge. To kill the time, I asked him to tell me stories of his childhood and mine.

I had my eyes on the road, but was driving on autopilot while intently listening; as he spoke, his voice carried me to another place and time.

I could smell the salty, warm breeze of 1941 blowing in through the window of my dad’s Key West childhood home. I could hear the African-American band playing “Happy Days Are Here Again,” as the mourners followed behind the horse-drawn hearse passing by my dad’s house on their way to the cemetery. From South Florida, he took me further north to my great aunt’s farm, where I could feel the warm milk splashing as if unto my own hands, sweat running down my back, even at five in the morning. When he fast-forwarded to tales of Chile, where I was born and raised, I could feel the rhythmic rumble of the trains pulling out of the smoke-filled Estación Central of Santiago, and I was reminded of familiar stories of how God provided for my family during the thick political tension of 1971. I have long forgotten the stench of wet wool drying over an open fire pit or the sound of the chickens clucking in our backyard. But I do remember the rush of horror that would turn my blood cold at the sudden roar of a tremor, and holding my breath as I waited in fear of whether a full-blown earthquake would follow. I also recall the taste of warm Coca-Cola, the smell of fresh-baked marraqueta bread, and the sound of creaking hardwood floors.

I love story. I love my story, I love others’ stories, but I especially love to hear stories about those who came before me whose blood runs through my veins, whose sins and blessings I shoulder. After our long drive, all of the images from my dad’s stories swam in my mind for days, and I wished I knew more.

Once home, overcome with nostalgia and a hunger to uncover more from my past, I opened my armoire–the ignored keeper of old memories. It is filled with boxes of photographs, home videos, and an unfinished scrapbook or two. After flipping through a short stack of the oldest photos, I reached into the back corner of the middle shelf and dusted off a forgotten brown binder titled The Inlanders. On its cover page, under my father’s hand-painted family crest is written, in an old-timey font, my paternal family name: Geiger.

This genealogy, compiled by my father as a gift to my siblings and me, goes all the way back to to my sixth great-grandfather, Abraham Geiger (1690-1766). Much of the early information in this book was gathered by my half-granduncle, Amos Cheshire Geiger (1889-1958), a WWI veteran, “who felt that his kin were worthy of being remembered.” Although complicated and at times hard (and boring) to read, the genealogy fascinated me with its thin slices of my history.

This forty-one page genealogy is filled with dozens of names, locations of homes, land grants, and farms extending from South Georgia to South Carolina to North and South Florida. I was thrilled by the view of such a distant past, however small it was. I found out a variety of interesting facts. My fifth great-grandfather died in 1777 “of wounds received while fighting,”  but it isn’t clear if he died in “Indian forays or the revolution.” My distant uncle James got scalped by Native Americans sometime in the mid 1800s during the Florida Indian Wars. My second great-grandfather was wounded in the Civil War battle of Olustee, dying shortly after from his wounds, and my second grand-uncle was married to a Cherokee woman.

Although filled with war and tragedy, I noticed a conspicuous lack of sordid accounts, such as stories of hatred, betrayal and habitual sins. Families are typically not inclined to airing out such dirty laundry. But I need only to look into my own heart to see that sin was, and certainly still is, woven through my past and in my own story.

There is a place in our souls that loves special memories and significant stories. We want to know, where do I fit into this story? God molded into us a strong desire for family ties and purpose; we want to know that our ancestors’ stories mattered and that ours will matter too once we pick up where their time ended.

But very soon after we lean into these stories, selfishness, betrayal, pain, strife, stupidity and all kinds of ugliness are uncovered.

Our families, our story, is terribly tainted by sin. Unlike my family genealogy, the Bible spares us no detail about the ugliness of sin and its consequences, nor of how God deals with sin and also redeems it.    

Beginning with Adam, and on through the centuries, sin reaches us, and we become aware of the fact that we are not who we are meant to be. We feel incompetent, unworthy, and like sin-infected frauds. Lost in that story, we become discouraged and easily lose hope.

But there is good news! Woven into the word of God, there is an ongoing story of hope. In this grandest of stories, we find the promised Messiah of the Old Testament, who in the New appeared and became flesh to dwell among us. He is Christ, the One who takes the stories we so heavily carry and redeems each one of them.

Reach, for a moment, into our long-forgotten armoires, bookshelves, or bedside tables, and grab His word and contemplate Jesus’ earthly lineage with me.

The first genealogy of the Bible is found in Genesis 5, and it begins with Adam–the one whose sin we inherited. The last genealogy listed in the Bible ends with Jesus–the One who paid for and redeemed us from that sin. Matthew’s genealogy begins with Abraham, the one with whom God made his covenant promise, and ends with Jesus–the One who fulfilled that promise. The genealogy listed in Luke moves backwards from Joseph all the way back to “Adam, the son of God.” In between Genesis and the New Testament, there are dozens of other genealogies. When I read them, my eyes glaze over no matter how hard I try to concentrate. But to the nation of Israel, genealogies were both a symbol of status and a reminder of a promised covenant. A genealogy not only gave legitimacy, but also purpose and hope.

In the New Testament, when Paul writes to the Christians in Rome, a church group that includes both Jews and Gentiles, he says, “For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope” (Romans 15:4).

The beautiful thing about His word is that we can read about those who came before us and learn that they too were a bunch of incompetent, unqualified sinful men and women.

Abraham was a liar, Jacob was a deceiver, Rahab was a prostitute, and David was a philanderer and a murderer. Those are the better-known characters. But there are plenty of other very questionable individuals casted. And yet, there they all are, listed in the earthly lineage of Jesus, deemed worthy of remembering. God made and loved and used each one of them with all their flaws and sin to be an encouragement to us as part of His story of faith, grace, and hope.

If you look a little further back in Romans 8:16-17a, Paul reassures us: “The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ.”

And again he says in Galatians 3:29, “If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”

You and me, dear ones, are in that same lineage, recipients of the same promise.

We are, in Christ, the children of God!

Next time the scenery in your life gets boring, lonely, scary, interrupted by sin, or if you are simply feeling like a counterfeit Christian, invite your Heavenly Father to sit by your side. Ask Him to woo you into His story and to lead you to where you have been called. He has a place for you.

Even if you are journeying in seemingly mundane, insignificant autopilot-mode, listen intensely to His voice. Smell the flowers of the Garden of Eden, cross the parted waters of the Red Sea in awe; smell the incense in His holy temple; taste of His sweet manna; and quench your thirst with the living water. Tremble at the enraged sea of Galilee, drink some wine and dance at the wedding at Canna. Behold the Lamb of God, and touch the scars on His hands.

Sink into the story of your spiritual genealogy.

As you hear of the generations clumsily marching through the centuries, you won’t be able to help but notice how Jesus is where He has always been, and where He always will be: right in between you and God.

Susan, the daughter of James William Geiger Jr., the son of James William Geiger Sr., the son of James Marion Geiger . . .  Jesus, the son of Joseph, the husband of Mary . . . David, the son of Jessie, the son of Obed, the son of Boaz . . . Jacob, the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham, the son of Terah . . . Seth, the son of Adam, the son of God.

***

The top image is a photo from my mom’s side of the family. There is a possibility that the twin on the right is my mom’s great grandfather. If I’m right, this photo could have been taken in the mid 1800s.

In the second photo, my grandfather is on the far right, the rest of the gentlemen are his brothers.