Scripture Daily

Context No. 3683 of 4322 · 1 Chronicles

Context · Reflection

1 Chronicles 2:1-8: in context

1These are the sons of Israel: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun, 2Dan, Joseph, Benjamin, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher. 3The sons of Judah: Er, Onan, and Shelah, which three were born to him of Shua’s daughter the Canaanitess. Er, Judah’s firstborn, was wicked in the LORD’s sight; and he killed him. 4Tamar his daughter-in-law bore him Perez and Zerah. All the sons of Judah were five. 5The sons of Perez: Hezron and Hamul. 6The sons of Zerah: Zimri, Ethan, Heman, Calcol, and Dara—five of them in all. 7The son of Carmi: Achar, the troubler of Israel, who committed a trespass in the devoted thing. 8The son of Ethan: Azariah.

This genealogy of Judah's line records both the good and the shameful without flinching. It names Er, Judah's firstborn, who was wicked in the LORD's sight and died; it names Tamar, out of whose difficult story came Perez, an ancestor of David and of Christ; and it names Achar (Achan), called the troubler of Israel, who brought disaster by taking what was devoted to destruction.

Scripture does not scrub its genealogies clean of failure and sin. The line that leads to the Messiah runs through the wicked and the shamed, the outsider and the troubler, as well as the faithful. There is honesty here, and grace: God's purposes advance through a real family with real sins, not an idealized line of the pure. And there is a sober reminder too, in Achar, that one person's sin can trouble a whole community. Our own stories are woven into a larger one God is writing, and he can accomplish his purposes even through flawed and failing people.

Do I see that God works his purposes through real, flawed people and families, and am I sobered by how one person's sin can trouble many, while trusting God's grace through it all?

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