Matthew 1:1-17
The Genealogy of Jesus (Part 2)

  1. The Three Parts to the Genealogy
    1. The Rise of the Davidic Kingdom
      1. It is most important to Matthew that Jesus is the Son of David.
        1. We discussed this somewhat last week.
        2. The son of David was supposed to sit on David's throne and reign forever
        3. Solomon, through disobedience, failed to be that son
        4. But Jesus, Matthew tells us, is that Son
        5. Jesus is called "Son of David" 10 times in Matthew, much more than in any other gospel
        6. The Son of David has arrived.
        7. The man of peace is here
        8. The builder of God's temple is ready
        9. The everlasting reign throne is about to be established.
        10. He is the one bringing in God's righteous kingdom
          1. From beginning to end, that's what this book is about.
          2. From the first verse speaking of Jesus the Messiah the son of David…
          3. To the last 3 verses in which Jesus declares his kingdom to be even more glorious than the disciples had imagined - All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me….
          4. The gospel of the Davidic Kingdom having come in Christ consumes Matthew's interest.
      2. On the other hand, Jesus is never referred to as the Son of Abraham in the book
        1. As important as being descended from Abraham is, being the Son of David is more important
        2. So the first part of this genealogy establishes how one gets from Abraham to David, the central Old Testament figure under Matthew's consideration.
      3. To Abraham, God made the promise that he would become a mighty nation, that kings would come from his body.
      4. In David, God fulfilled that promise, at least in a shadowy form
      5. Hence the triumphant conclusion of this section of the genealogy is that Jesse begot David THE KING.
      6. One might be tempted to say that all of God's promises have now been fulfilled in David and his kingdom
      7. But somehow the kingdom slips away
    2. The Fall of the Davidic Kingdom
      1. David begets Solomon by a sinful means that we'll look at in a moment.
      2. And Solomon begets Rehoboam, under whom the kingdom was divided
      3. 1 Kings 12:6ff. --
        Then King Rehoboam took counsel with the older men who had attended his father Solomon while he was still alive, saying, "How do you advise me to answer this people?" 7 They answered him, "If you will be a servant to this people today and serve them, and speak good words to them when you answer them, then they will be your servants forever." 8 But he disregarded the advice that the older men gave him, and consulted with the young men who had grown up with him and now attended him. 9 He said to them, "What do you advise that we answer this people who have said to me, 'Lighten the yoke that your father put on us'?" 10 The young men who had grown up with him said to him, "Thus you should say to this people who spoke to you, 'Your father made our yoke heavy, but you must lighten it for us'; thus you should say to them, 'My little finger is thicker than my father's loins. 11 Now, whereas my father laid on you a heavy yoke, I will add to your yoke. My father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions.' " 12 So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam the third day, as the king had said, "Come to me again the third day." 13 The king answered the people harshly. He disregarded the advice that the older men had given him 14 and spoke to them according to the advice of the young men, "My father made your yoke heavy, but I will add to your yoke; my father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions." 15 So the king did not listen to the people, because it was a turn of affairs brought about by the LORD that he might fulfill his word, which the LORD had spoken by Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam son of Nebat. 16 When all Israel saw that the king would not listen to them, the people answered the king, "What share do we have in David? We have no inheritance in the son of Jesse. To your tents, O Israel! Look now to your own house, O David." So Israel went away to their tents. 17 But Rehoboam reigned over the Israelites who were living in the towns of Judah. 18 When King Rehoboam sent Adoram, who was taskmaster over the forced labor, all Israel stoned him to death. King Rehoboam then hurriedly mounted his chariot to flee to Jerusalem. 19 So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day.
      4. And in that day the bulk of David's righteous kingdom slipped away into rebellion. His kingdom was never again a tenth of what it had been.
      5. But at least David still had a kingdom
      6. Things got worse from there
        1. There were evil kings as well as good, and Matthew mentions some of each, though more of the good.
        2. He omits 5 evil kings and only one good one from this list
        3. Why he picks and chooses rather than give a full list we'll talk about later.
      7. Eventually the Davidic kingdom got so corrupt that God allowed it to be overthrown by Babylon and they were taken captive
      8. What then of all the promises of God to Abraham and to David?
      9. We need a second Davidic kingdom or God is a liar
    3. The Disappearance of the Davidic Kingdom
      1. What we get instead is a bunch of nobodies
      2. Jeconiah the king begets Shealtiel who was … king? Nope. Just a guy who returned from the exile.
      3. Shealtiel begets Zerubbabel and he became king, right? Nope, he ruled as a governor of Judah under the authority of Darius the Mede.
      4. Zerubbabel begets Abiud, and we all know who he was…
        1. NOBODY knows who he was
        2. You look him up in a Bible dictionary and it says, "Son of Zerubbabel and father of Eliakim according to Matthew's genealogy."
        3. How far the kingdom has fallen from glory!
      5. Eliakim?
        1. There are several famous Eliakim's in the OT. This isn't one of them.
        2. Another nobody
      6. They're all nobodies, even the ones that sound famous
        1. Zadok? There was a famous Zadok who was a priest in the time of David. This Zadok? No one knows.
        2. Eleazar? Abraham had a servant named Eleazar, and the New Bible Dictionary talks about him for a while. Then it says: "An Eleazar is also mentioned in the list of Joseph's ancestors in Matt. 1:15."
        3. Jacob? Not the famous one. But he also begot a Joseph and Joseph became the legal father of the Christ.
      7. How far the kingdom has fallen into obscurity!
      8. How much it needs a son of David to redeem it and take for himself the name that is above every name!
  2. The Standouts in This Genealogy
    1. The Women -- Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba
      1. Tamar - Daughter-in-law to Judah, the son of Jacob
        1. Not a pretty story
        2. Tamar's husband, Er, Judah's son died, leaving no offspring.
        3. So Judah told Er's brother Onan to raise up offspring to his brother by lying with Tamar.
        4. Onan declined in a rather messy and embarrassing way that we can hardly speak of without blushing and covering the ears of our children.
        5. Tamar, desparate for offspring, disguises herself as a prostitute, hangs out by the side of the road and seduces Judah.
        6. She conceives a child by this method and that child is in the line of Christ!
      2. Rahab
        1. What's her full name? Rahab the harlot.
        2. A woman of faith, surely, but what a beginning!
      3. Ruth -- The Moabitess who marries Boaz and thus becomes part of the line of Christ.
      4. Bathseba
        1. Her who had been the wife of Uriah
        2. David's sin is exposed
          1. He commits adultery with Bathsheba
          2. He murders Uriah to cover up
      5. Matthew seems to be going out of his way to expose the dirty laundry in the family
    2. The Gentiles
      1. Tamar married into the family of Israel
      2. Rahab by faith came into the family, though she was a native of Canaan
      3. Ruth as well, a native of Moab, comes into the heavenly family by faith
      4. And Bathsheba, the wife of a Gentile and probably a Gentile herself, brought into the godly line.
      5. We see here a hint of the glorious mystery that will be shown forth in Christ - Membership in this kingdom will not be limited to physical, fleshly descent but will be extended to all the nations through faith in Christ
    3. The Suspect
      1. Tamar - what a wretched little story. Yet through this sin and deception comes the Christ.
      2. Rahab - Nothing wrong with her, and yet always she will have the stigma of her former life attached to her.
      3. Ruth - Again, a pure woman. Yet she contrives to marry Boaz under suspicious circumstances which we don't have time to go into here. At least in the eyes of the community, the circumstances might have been suspicious.
      4. Bathsheba - Again, suspicious circumstances put her in the line of Christ. She is an adulteress with David; the sin is hers as well.
      5. Thus Matthew establishes the providence of God who can bring about all things according to the counsel of his will, even using the sins of his people for good.
      6. But more important, Matthew is demonstrating how God often uses suspicious circumstances to bring the chosen offspring into the world. This sets us up for Mary's inclusion in the genealogy.
    4. Mary and Joseph
      1. Mary the Suspect
        1. Mary is the fifth woman mentioned and she fits right in.
        2. Her circumstances are suspicious as well, aren't they?
        3. Ultimately, she is pure like Ruth and Rahab rather than tainted like Tamar and Bathsheba
        4. But Matthew is showing how God has brought about the birth of Christ in the midst of circumstances the world might be uncomfortable with.
        5. And he himself will be a man with whom the world is uncomfortable.
        6. But God is sovereign and he delights to accomplish his will in unusual ways that all the glory may go to him.
      2. Joseph the Legal Father
        1. Joseph is mentioned even though Jesus is not physically descended from him.
        2. Yet it is Joseph's genealogy that is important
        3. Joseph is Jesus' legal father, so the descent is traced through him.
        4. We've been set up for this by the inclusion of the Gentile women in the line of Christ.
        5. Here again Matthew hints that it is not physical, fleshly connection that is important, but faith in Christ.
  3. The Number of Generations
    1. Fourteen, Fourteen, Fourteen
      1. Matthew works hard to make the list come out this way
      2. We've noted already that this genealogy is not complete.
      3. There are more generations listed in the books of 1 and 2 Kings than get mentioned by Matthew.
      4. Matthew is not ignorant of this; he's doing it on purpose.
      5. He wants a genealogy that comes out 14,14,14
      6. He even repeats the name of Jeconiah
        1. Once in the second genealogy at the end (v. 11)
        2. Once in the third genealogy at the beginning (v. 12)
      7. All so he can get this 14, 14, 14
      8. WHY?
    2. Christ, the Completer of the List
      1. Break down the fourteens further and you get 6 sets of 7
      2. And what does the number 7 remind us of? God resting on the seventh day, his worked finished.
      3. Now with 6 sets of 7, what comes next?
      4. The seventh seven! Christ! The perfection of perfections, the perfectly finished work of God.
      5. Christ is the end and the perfection of this list, this genealogy
        1. He is the one that this list points to, yearns for, and culminates in
        2. With him, the list is COMPLETE in a way that nothing has been completed before since the foundation of the world.
      6. In Christ, the true Israel has come, the completion of all the genealogies has arrived in him.
      7. In Christ, the Sabbath of Sabbaths, the seventh seven has come
        1. come unto him all you who labor and are heavy laden and he will give you rest.
        2. There is nothing more that God can do, nothing more he needs to do, the fulfilment of all things has come in Christ.
      8. This is how Matthew begins his gospel so you will know up front what it's all about.
      9. This is how Matthew will end his gospel, sending forth the disciples of Christ into the era of completion and fulfilment, bearing tidings of a new creation and a perfected kingdom.

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