Matthew 1:4 Ram fathered Amminadab and Amminadab fathered Nahshon
Wouldn’t it be great to be Billy Graham’s brother? I’m not so sure. How would you be introduced at parties? Whose exploits would your children talk about around the dinner table? In public, whose reputation would you be most concerned to protect? CNN, Time, NBC would all contact you… with only questions about Billy. Imagine your whole life and personhood defined by someone else.
Amminadab knew that feeling. His name appears nine times before the gospel of Matthew, in four separate books of the Bible, and we know nothing about him. But we know about his son Nahshon. Even in the middle of a genealogical listing, the registrar pauses to trumpet Nahshon: “Ram was the father of Amminadab, Amminadab was the father of Nahshon, the leader of the people of Judah.” The only reason Amminadab’s name crops up at all is to note his relationship to Nahshon… except for his first appearance, when he is footnoted as the father-in-law of Aaron, the high priest of Israel.
We all live in someone else’s shadow that is cast by the spotlight on their better performance in cooking or speaking, patience or punctuality. As I do life with others, it is naturally hard to feel good about myself, hard to avoid competing with Jennifer’s achievements, hard to resist comparing Jason’s friendliness to my own. But when our culture also constantly rates us against our fellow, noting how we fall short, it becomes nearly impossible. I can either sign up for this game where I must be a winner (in everything) to feel adequate, or I can opt out and be labeled a loser. That is, I can constantly chase after the adequacy that is just beyond my grasp or I can give up in despair and accept my own worthlessness… or I can stumble into grace.
When you consider Amminadab, Nahshon, Aaron and Moses in the light of their descendant at the culmination of Matthew’s genealogy, they all rank shoulder to shoulder. We all stand equally shadowed by Jesus’ glory. But here the simile breaks down, for Jesus does not diminish us by his greatness, but transforms us by it. We stand not in his shadow, but in his glory, and this comes not as the borrowed, vicarious glory of a famous relative, but in his fulfilling in us all he designed us to be. Jesus being all he is makes me all I am and can be. May we be such life-givers to one another.
Janathan Grace Reflections 
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