I just read Genesis 8-11, which gives us the historical record from Noah to Abram and Lot the son of Abram’s brother Haran. They moved with their father Terah to a city, Haran, near to the land of Canaan. Canaan was the son of Ham whom Noah cursed because Ham saw his father’s nakedness and did not cover him up.
Do you believe that Genesis is history and if not history what? The book of Genesis must be taken as history because it is a historical record but should be read understanding its purpose. The purpose of this historical record is to point to God as the author of life and to trace the historical record of a people Israel. However, the historical record will not end with the people Israel. The record will continue to the birth of the Son of God and the birth of the church of Jesus Christ. We are now living in the historical record between the inauguration of Christ as Lord and his returning to sit down on his glorious throne to judge the earth. I love history because the finger of God is all over it. You can see God in history and see where he is guiding mankind when you read history.
God commanded Noah and his sons and his daughter’s in-law to be fruit and multiply and fill the earth. However, they congregated in one place, in the area that is the country Iraq today. They were not spreading out on the earth as the Lord had commanded. They built a tower to heaven to show how great a people they were; therefore, God confused their language, so that they could not communicate and work together, causing man to spread out over the face of the earth. After this, the historical record traces Noah’s son Shem’s family line to Abram the son of Terah.
My family line came from one of the sons of Noah, probably Japheth given what the historical record indicates. Of Japheth’s descendants, Genesis 10:5, “From these the coastlands of the nations were separated into their lands, every one according to his language, according to their families, into their nations.”
I am not a descendant of Abraham, Isaac or Jacob but Jesus came to redeem a people for himself; people from every tribe, tongue and nation on the earth. We are the people of God in Jesus Christ.
