WHO'S WHO: DOES ANYONE CARE?

While visiting, Nany, Arlena’s Mom, last week, I noticed a book on her desk through Readers Digest. It is titled Who’s Who in the Bible. It is an alphabetical list of every person mentioned in both the Old and New Testaments. It begins with Aaron (the brother of Moses) and ends with Zophar (a friend of Job – although calling Zophar a “friend” is a stretch given that what Zophar does is call Job a liar and a sinner because Job won’t admit that his/Job’s sins are the reason why he/Job is suffering so much. But I digress.)

There looks to be at least a thousand names listed in the almost-450-page book. I simply leafed through it, sort of proud of myself that I recognized most of the names even if I could not remember exactly who they were or in what context I would find them. I left the book on the desk even as it was calling out to me to ask      Nanny if I could borrow it so that I could spend some serious time with it.

The men and women whose lives are recorded in that book are my spiritual ancestors or certainly had an influence on that inheritance. Just as it is fun, interesting and even important to learn about one’s physical ancestors, so, too, I think, it is important to learn about those who are the background of our spiritual life even if at a distance of several thousand years.

Yet, my leaving the book on the desk certainly makes it seem as if I really don’t care all that much about all those people, especially given the fact that I am retired and certainly can find the time to spend some time reading and re-learning about them. The even sadder part is that I am not alone in this “I could care less” boat. My suspicion is that most of us, while we think learning about all these spiritual ancestors would be interesting, we have better things to do.

The truth is that we learn as much, if not more, from the past than we do from the present, if – and that is a big “if” – we are willing to make and take the time to do so. Life is a learning process from the day we are born to the day we die. If we can learn from someone else’s successes and failures, we can save ourselves not only a lot of heartache but also a lot of effort that could be of better use to us and to those we love.

As people of faith we should care about those who have gone before, who have much to teach us about how to live and how not to live, about how to be faithful and about what can happen to us when we are not. Yet, as history so often teaches us, we, as a people, seem to be intent on learning not from history, not from the past, but learning the hard way by making our own mistakes. What fools we are!

The next time we visit Nanny I think I will ask to borrow the book. She’ll probably wonder why I would need to read the book, why I would care to read it, as I suspect she assumes I know what’s in it given my vocation. If she only knew!