What is your Inheritance?

What is my inheritance?

I have been thinking about that lately because Rosh Hashanah is in September. My simplified understanding of this custom is that we’re supposed to spend this week examining ourselves, looking at our behavior for the past year, acknowledging and admitting to God where we did not live up to what God expects of us, and repenting. The Hebrew for repent means to return, to leave a wrong path. To change my behavior and my attitude.

How much of my behavior and attitude can I blame on inheritance? We can inherit physical characteristics from our ancestors. We can inherit their belongings. I inherited some things from my mother, and I have made a will to ensure that my children will inherit everything I own when I die.

But we can inherit more than possessions. We can inherit the attitudes and beliefs of our parents. We can inherit their religious beliefs. We can do things the way they did because we think it’s right, or maybe we don’t think deeply about it at all. The status quo is easier than change.

In Ezekiel, I learned that the Israelites had been relying on their religious inheritance. God made a promise to their ancestors, and they believed that promise guaranteed their safety. The temple in Jerusalem was proof that God would always protect them, they thought. Never mind that they have been ignoring God, violating all of his commandments and now worship idols inside that very temple. Maybe one of their excuses was that they were just doing what their parents did. Following customs they had inherited.

In Ezekiel, God is giving the Israelites warning after warning. If I was one of those Israelites listening to these dire warnings, I would be thinking, “We’re doomed. God has decided to punish us, and there’s nothing we can do about it.”

But when I read carefully, I see that God’s warnings are to give them a chance to change their ways. A chance to return to fellowship with him. A chance that has nothing to do with inheritance. In Ezekiel 18 he makes this very clear. A son who chooses not to follow his father’s wicked ways will live, he says. “The one who sins is the one who will die,” God says. “The child will not share the guilt of the parent, nor will the parent share the guilt of the child.”

One of my uncles used to say, “Every hog takes its own hide to market.” We cannot rest on the laurels of our ancestors — nor do we have to continue in their sins. God will judge each of us on our own actions alone.

And he does not want any of us to have to die. In Ezekiel 18:23, God asks, “Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?”

Each of us must die some day, but the death God is talking about is not our physical death. It is eternal separation from him. No  more second chances. But if we are “in Christ,” we will wake to eternal life with our Lord.

Reading the Bible has taught me that God has spent all of history begging us to have fellowship with him. And my fate is not sealed — every second I am alive, I can change it by turning to him.

Peter wrote, “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” (2 Peter 3:9)

God’s final words in Ezekiel 18 are, “For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Sovereign Lord. Repent and live!”

I’m not Jewish, but I have friends who are, and I find these thoughts good to meditate on during this holiday. Rosh Hashanah is known as the “Jewish New Year” — perhaps I will end up making a new year’s resolution. Meanwhile, I wish all of you shana tova — a good year!