From Generation to Generation

This past weekend, I had the good pleasure of returning to Indiana to visit with friends and family. It was a blur of a weekend - taking me from home to home and city to city. I even had the opportunity to drive down to Kentucky and visit with members of First Presbyterian Church of Owensboro.

But the highlight of the weekend came at the end when I was preparing for my departure. My father gave me a kind letter that included two pictures. The pictures were of my grandfather, Richard Kendall, and myself, which you can see above. The picture of my grandfather was taken in some Indiana forest in the mid-60's, while the one of myself was taken this past fall in the woods of upper Michigan. The similarities should be apparent, and when I showed the picture of my grandfather to Anna she quickly commented, "I've seen you stand in that exact manner before."

I'm drawn in by these pictures as they beg more questions from me than they answer about my ancestors. Perhaps its the realization that I shall soon see my son's face for the first time, yet know that I will recognize features and expressions that I've seen somewhere else before. Perhaps its the power in knowing that my life was begun long before me and will continue beyond anything I will ever see.

Seeds bear fruit in multiples and spread out in unforeseeable ways.

I cannot deny the power of history and family ties. I cannot deny the intricacies of intimacy. Indeed, it has begun to have profound influence upon my theology. I have begun to appreciate and understand why Paul can so naturally reduce all of humanity's ills and hopes down to two men - the first and second Adam. I have begun to rethink and rediscover why baptism is more than a simple story of personal conversion.

And to think all of this came from two simple pictures. But what is a picture after all if not a brief slice of history - captured and suspended as if it were not a living thing. The truth, though, is that all of history is living; it has been created, saturated and accepted by the greatest living source of all: God. So, when I see in my grandfather hints of myself, I also see a grand narrative whose beginning I've heard faint rumors of and whose ending I can only hope to experience. It is, after all, the story of a god who was willing to be known from generation to generation.

Wes