What If......

How does it make you feel when someone you have only meant once remembers your name?  Sometimes it surprises me, sometimes I wonder why they remember, but in almost every situation it makes me feel good.   I like it when someone knows my name.

In listening through the old testament over the past few months I have been surprised at the number of chapters that have simply been a list of the names of people.  So and so was the father of so and so who was the father of so and so.... the begats of the King James Version.  I get weary of them and I think, "Who cares?  Can't this part be over with?  Why is it even in the Bible?"

But yesterday it occurred to me.   What if God had that all included because He wanted us to know that he cared about EACH of those people.  That all of those names that are hard to pronounce in Scripture represented a life .... a person .... a contribution ... and that God knew each name, each person, and that each life had value.

If that is true of Azariah, Pashhur, Amariah, Malkijah, Hattush, Shebaniah, Malluk, Harim, Meremoth, Ginnethon, Baruch, Meshullam, Abijah, Mijamin, Maaziah and Bilgai (some of the many men in Nehemiah who signed an oath agreeing to follow God) then it is true of me.  Of you.  Of each of us.

God knows your name.  He SEES you as a person, as a meaningful life, as a person who can and will make a difference.