Cush's sons are Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabteka — the last two of whom have sons of their own: Sheba and Dedan. These names correspond to peoples of the Arabian Peninsula and East Africa. Sheba is especially significant: the Queen of Sheba who visited Solomon in 1 Kings 10:1–13 is the most famous descendant of this line, coming from the ends of the earth to hear Solomon's wisdom. Jesus references her in Matthew 12:42 as evidence of the searching that human beings are capable of when they are seeking truth. The fact that her ancestor appears in this table as one name among many, yet she becomes a figure of wisdom-seeking in Jesus' teaching, illustrates how this genealogy plants seeds of significance that bloom much later in the story. Every name in the Table of Nations is a potential Sheba — a person, a people, a culture that might one day come to seek the wisdom of God.

COMMUNITY REFLECTIONS

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