Blue Tint Glasses

Genesis 10:8-9 – Cush was the father of Nimrod, who grew to be a mighty warrior on the earth.  He was a mighty hunter before the Lord; that is why it is said, “Like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord.”

Chapter 10 consists of the family tree of Noah’s sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth.  Not too exciting at a glance, but it can be if you really sit down to think about a family tree.  Ever think about your family tree?

In seventh grade we were assigned a family tree project for History class, but this family tree assignment was on steroids.  It didn’t just stop at grandparents or great grandparents…we had to go waaaay back.  It wasn’t too terribly difficult to trace the roots back on my dad’s side, he had a family member that was all over that stuff.  My mom’s side was a bit of a different story.

We struggled to get a lot of the family tree completed and we had to do a lot of digging to fill in each line.  It finally came to a point where my grandma said, “we’ve only got a couple spaces left, let’s create some names…what’s the difference anyway!”  So it was at that moment that great great aunt Edna Lava was born.  Ha, we still joke about making up Edna Lava’s name and sticking her in the family tree assignment and that was a dozen years ago.  We’d even created a personality for “Edna” and talked as if we knew her.

In the lines of the family tree, some people’s entry is a little more than just a name.  There’s an unmistakable quality or personality and stories that go along with it.  This is the case with Nimrod in verse 8 continuing through verse 12.  Within all the names of the family tree of the line of Ham, Nimrod has a paragraph depicting his life.  We learn that he is a great hunter, for instance and we read of his kingdoms.

What will be said about you on your line of the family tree?  There’s a slew of different qualities, attributes, personalities and ways of describing someone and how they lived their life.  What will people say about you?  I’m sure those that know me would have a lot of interesting stories and ways to describe me, but I would hope that people around me would also say, “He really loved Jesus.”  That’s how I want to  live.