Azarel Son of Azarel of Old

​The desert wind carries the scent of ancient dust, and I, Azarel the son of Azarel of old, feel it on my face. My family has lived in these hills since before the memory of the elders, and we have passed down the stories, one generation to the next. I was just a boy when my grandfather told me about the death of Moses. "He saw the promised land from a mountaintop," my grandfather said, his voice a low rumble, "but he never set foot there. Joshua, his student, had to lead the people across the Jordan River and into Canaan."

​We have Joshua's stories, of course, of battles fought and cities taken. But it was a difficult land to hold, and once Joshua passed, things grew chaotic. My ancestors lived in the time of the Judges, a period of great ups and downs. My grandfather's stories tell of a woman named Deborah who led us to victory against our oppressors. He also spoke of Samson, a man of immense strength whose weakness was his undoing. It was a time when God would raise up a leader to save us, and once we were safe, we would forget our God again.

​We wanted to be like the nations around us, with a king to rule over us. So we got Saul, a handsome but flawed man. Then came David, a shepherd who defeated a giant and captured the hearts of the people. He was a man of passion and faith, and he brought all of us together in one kingdom. We built a beautiful capital in Jerusalem, and his son Solomon built the magnificent Temple. The Temple was the center of our world, a place where God's presence was felt. It was a time of great wealth, but also a time of great forgetting. Solomon, in his old age, turned his heart away from God, and the kingdom split in two after his death.

​Our people fell into a long, slow decline. The stories of the prophets—Elijah, Isaiah, Jeremiah—are full of warnings, but we didn't listen. And so, the world came crashing down. The northern kingdom was scattered by the Assyrians, and the southern kingdom, my people, fell to the Babylonians. The Temple was destroyed. My family was taken away in chains to a foreign land. We wept by the rivers of Babylon, remembering Zion. It was a time of great sorrow, but also of great hope, for the prophets spoke of a new day, of a promised king who would one day set everything right.

​After seventy years, we were allowed to return and rebuild our home, but it was never the same. We were a people under the thumb of foreign rulers—first the Persians, then the Greeks, and finally the Romans. We held to the stories of our ancestors and the prophecies of the Messiah, the Anointed One who would deliver us. For hundreds of years, the prophetic voice was silent, and we waited.

​And then, just recently, the stories began again. My uncle, a shepherd, told me about a baby born in a manger in Bethlehem, a child of a virgin. My own eyes have seen this man, Jesus. He is a carpenter from Galilee, but the stories say he is a direct descendant of King David. He doesn't look like a warrior-king, but he speaks with an authority I've never heard before. He heals the sick and teaches with parables. He says a new kingdom is at hand, a kingdom not of this world. I don't know what it all means, but I feel the weight of history and the hope of my people on this man. The story that began with Moses' death is now in his hands.