Roots: What's your heritage in Christ?

When I was living in the Caribbean, one chap once deridingly called me “Kunta Kinte”. This name is taken from a book called Roots, also made into a TV series in which Kunta was a slave taken from his home among the Mandinka Tribe of Gambia in West Africa to America. The book tells of the generations from the daughter of Kunta Kinte, Kizzy and that of its author, Alex Haley, a 7th generation descendant of Kunta Kinte.

The question we ask ourselves, why was the author so concerned about finding his roots from his ancestor Kunta Kinte?

When we read the bible, in books like Luke, we are presented with detailed genealogies, which many of us skip over. For example, the one of Jesus.

Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph,

the son of Heli, the son of Matthat,

the son of Levi, the son of Melki

….. the son of David, the son of Jesse,

…..the son of Judah, the son of Jacob,

the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham

….the son of Seth, the son of Adam,

the son of God.[i]

The question we ask ourselves, why was the author so concerned about showing us Jesus’ roots right up to Adam and God?

Kunta Kinte rejected the new name his slave owners gave him because He and his descendants knew that knowing who you are and your heritage are critical for your success and those who come after you. Likewise, in order to blossom, you have to know who you are:

I am an orange tree of the family Rutacea. I am primarily of the Citrus Sinesis type, also called Sweet Orange as distinguished from Citrus aurantium, referred to as bitter orange. I originated from the region of South China, North East India and Myanmar and it can take between 5 and 7 years for me to bear fruit. [ii]

Roots are your identity system, how you anchor yourself. Who are you in Christ? What is the origin of your seed?

Read the full article here.

[i] Paraphrased and extract from Luke 3: 23-34 (NIV) [ii] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_(fruit)