Gospels Series: Genealogy of Christ

Gospels Series: Genealogy of Christ

All right, well, last week we began into this series on the Gospels, the Synoptic Gospels. We talked about how they are to be viewed together, although they are from different perspectives. We talked about some of the background of those individual Gospel writers. We are going to bring in John when appropriate, but we did mention that there are longer discourses in John. He includes a lot of the sayings of our Lord that there's not as much of an event-by-event recording like there is with the other Gospel writers that give one event after another event in the life of our Lord, so we won't mention him as often. But I handed out, I guess everybody got one of these tonight. As we're reading through these genealogies this evening, y'all don't get too excited now, we're going to be like… I knew Sister Donna would be smiling back there. But we're going to be looking at these genealogies and some of the significance of them this evening. These genealogies are found in Matthew 1-17 and Luke 3-23-28. I printed off this, I found this… This is a side-by-side comparison.

Now, these words, as we're reading through it, you'll notice some of them are different from the King James. It's just they were transliterated a little differently into a… They probably came from a different version, but you'll get the idea anyway, of where these genealogies align with each other and where they diverge. And so, without saying any more about that, let's turn our Bibles this evening to Matthew 1. I want to begin reading. I do want to take the time to read these tonight. I think it will be beneficial. Maybe keep that chart there beside you as we're looking through it. I want you to see if you notice anything, notice some things before I say them, after we read through them. I want you to pay attention to those lists over there on that piece of paper as we're reading through. All right, Matthew chapter 1.

The book of the generation of Jesus Christ. The son of David. The son of Abraham. Abraham begat Isaac. And Isaac begat Jacob. And Jacob begat Judas and his brethren. And Judas begat Perez and Zerah of Tamar. And Perez begat Ezra. And Ezra begat Aram. And Aram begat Amminadab. And Amminadab begat Nason. And Nason begat Salmon. And Salmon begat Booz of Rechab. And Booz begat Obed of Ruth. And Obed begat Jesse. And Jesse begat David the king. And David the king begat Solomon of her that had been the wife of Uriah. And Solomon begat Reboam. And Reboam begat Abiah. And Abiah begat Asa. And Asa begat Josaphat. And Josaphat begat Joram. And Joram begat… And Josaphat begat Ozias. And Ozias begat Jotham. And Jotham begat Achaz. And Achaz begat Ezekias. And Ezekias begat Manassas. Or begat Manassas. And Manassas begat Ammon. Or Ammon. And Ammon begat Josias. And Josias begat Jeconias and his brethren. About the time they were carried away to Babylon.

And after they were brought to Babylon, Jeconias begat Salathiel. And Salathiel begat… And Zerubbabel. And Zerubbabel begat Abiud. And Abiud begat Eliakim. And Eliakim begat Azor. And Azor begat Sadoc. And Sadoc begat Achim. And Achim begat Eliud. And Eliud begat Eleazar. And Eleazar begat Mathen. And Mathen begat Jacob. And Jacob begat Joseph, the husband of Mary. Of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ.

So all… All the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations. And from David until the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations. And from the carrying away into Babylon unto Christ are fourteen generations.

And then if you'll look over in Luke 3 with me. Luke 3, verse 23. Luke chapter 3, verse 23. And Jesus… Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being, as was supposed, the son of Joseph, the son of Heli, which was the son of Methant, which was the son of Levi, which was the son of Melchi, which was the son of Janna, which was the son of Joseph, which was the son of Mattathias, which was the son of Amos, which was the son of Naum, which was the son of Esli, which was the son of Nagi, which was the son of Maath, which was the son of Mattathias, which was the son of Seme, which was the son of Joseph, which was the son of Judah, which was the son of Joanna, which was the son of Risa, which was the son of Zerubbabel, which was the son of Salathiel, which was the son of Neri, which was the son of Melchi, which was the son of Adi, which was the son of Kosem, which was the son of Elmadam, which was the son of Ur, which was the son of Josie, which was the son of Eliezer, which was the son of Jorim, which was the son of Mephant, which was the son of Levi, which was the son of Simeon, which was the son of Judah, which was the son of Joseph, which was the son of Jonan, which was the son of Eliakim, which was the son of Meleah, which was the son of Menan, which was the son of Nathan, which was the son of David, which was the son of Jesse, which was the son of Obed, which was the son of Booz,

we know that's Boaz, which was the son of Salmon, which was the son of Nason, which was the son of Amminadab, which was the son of Aram, which was the son of Esram, which was the son of Perez, which was the son of Judah, which was the son of Jacob, which was the son of Isaac, which was the son of Abraham,

which was the son of Terah, which was the son of Nacor, which was the son of Seruc, which was the son of Ragal, which was the son of Philech, which was the son of Heber, which was the son of Selah, which was the son of Canaan, which was the son of Arphaxad, which was the son of Sim, which was the son of Noah, which was the son of Lamech, which was the son of Methuselah, which was the son of Enoch, which was the son of Jared, which was the son of Malaliel, which was the son of Canaan, which was the son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God.

Well, we have read through both genealogies. Everybody's still awake. So maybe you've had some thoughts come to your mind as we read through those. First of all, I'll say Matthew obviously traces it back to Abraham, but Luke traces it back further than that. He goes all the way to Adam, the son of God. So we see there's a difference right there, right? Matthew, we mentioned last week. Last week is writing, because of a number of things we pointed out last week, it's very obvious that he's writing with the Jewish mind in mind. He's writing to the Jewish reader primarily, not that it's just for the Jew, but it's with that in mind. Luke is tracing the genealogy from Jesus all the way back to Adam. We notice that Matthew uses the expression begat, whereas Luke, what does he use? He uses the expression son of, right? He begat, and a lot of that has simply to do with the order in which it's read, right? What do we notice about Matthew? Matthew began with Abraham and went up to Jesus in time. He came back towards where he was in time. Abraham, starting back at Abraham, but Luke does the exact opposite. He begins with Jesus and works his way back to Adam. So that in itself explains the difference between begat and son of, you know, the different order, the different direction that we're moving with this.

Similarities that we see are, you know, that if you look on your piece of paper here, from Abraham to David, they're mirror images, aren't they? They're exactly the same. The genealogies don't differ at all from Abraham up through David. That's something to notice. Beginning with David, Matthew traces, as is pointed out here, the paternal line of descent through Solomon. And Luke is tracing. Luke is tracing. Luke is tracing. Luke is tracing. He's tracing the maternal line through Solomon's brother, David's son, Nathan.

We see that Matthew gives Joseph's father. Now, there certainly can quickly become some confusion here. And there's a lot of different theories. There's several different theories, but there's one that most have settled upon as to the discrepancy in these accounts. Matthew gives Joseph. Joseph's father as being Jacob. Look at Matthew 1.16. It says here in what Matthew 1.16, and Jacob begat Joseph, the husband of Mary. Luke says, what does Luke say? Let's read it in Luke 3.23. Let's look back over there. I don't want to say what it says. I want to read what it says in Luke 3, verse 23. What does it say there? It says, and it says, the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli. So we have Joseph's father being called Jacob in Matthew 1.16, and then we see Heli in Luke 3.23. I think you can see how it's been worked out in this little chart that you have over here. The common understanding is that it would have been, Joseph would have been the son-in-law to Heli, but he is mentioned here.

Well, obviously, Joseph is not the biological father of Jesus, is he? He's the adoptive father of Jesus, and yet he is recognized as the father of Jesus. Yes. Certainly, there was an issue. That he had to address with, you know, how can this be, seeing she knows not a man? Well, everybody assumed that it was by Joseph, but it was, from a legal perspective, Joseph was the father, but from an actual biological perspective, the blood, the humanity came through Mary. The humanity came through Mary, and Luke is going to emphasize more of Mary's side of it, whereas, Matthew is going to emphasize him being the son of David, but through Solomon. He's going, not through Nathan, and not through Mary's line.

Now, something else that you'll notice is there's a number more, there are more names that are mentioned, especially once we get past David, there's more names that are mentioned, on Luke's account. There, Matthew seems to have given us this 14, 14, 14. I don't profess to know exactly why he did the 14, and the 14, and the 14, but it's interesting, when we look at son of someone in the scriptures, that meant, we can give tons of examples of how, when it says the son of someone, it's not automatically talking about the direct son. It could be their grandson. It could be someone down, or someone on the line. There are certain individuals in scripture that are just picked up because of their significance, not that there weren't other children. Look at Jesus.

We don't have a full record of all of his half-brothers and sisters, do we? There are certain people that just aren't mentioned because it's simply, it's not because they were unimportant, or they were less human than the other ones were. It's just that they weren't important for the record of what was being communicated in the scriptures, right? And it's very clear what Matthew's trying to communicate here. He is emphasizing, even before he gets into the genealogy, he says, even before he says son of Abraham, he says son of David, son of Abraham, son of David. He is writing to a Jewish audience. He is writing to a Jewish reader, with that Jewish reader in mind. He is the son of David. He is the son of Abraham. That's really what's important in Matthew's genealogy of Jesus.

Now, we see that these, these two lines intersect briefly when we come to Shealtiel and Zerubbabel, the first governor of Judah, once they come back from the captivity, right? And then we notice, well, there are, it ends up, obviously, with Mary, or it says Joseph, who was the husband of Mary, here. And there, interestingly enough, along the way are, are several people that we wouldn't suspect to be in this genealogy, like Tamar, who played the harlot with Judah, and Rahab, who was a woman of ill repute there in Jericho, right? That housed the spies, who is also mentioned, isn't she mentioned in Hebrews 11 as well, in the hall of faith? We have Ruth, the Moabitess, who should not have been, you know, just, normally speaking, she should not have been included in this, but we see in this that God is showing us that he can, this is not only for the Jew, he brings in others as well that can be brought into the covenant.

We have Bathsheba, this woman was married to a, seems to be a godly Hittite man, Uriah, who was an honorable man, but he, but he was murdered indirectly by David, and so he comes into the line because, or she comes into the line, I should say, because she gives birth to David's son. We notice that Joseph came to David's son, came to David's son, came from the royal line through Solomon, whereas Jesus came from David through Nathan on Mary's side.

But think about with me for a moment, think about Matthew. Matthew was a former tax collector, wasn't he? A publican. What kind of, we might ask the question, why would the Lord have chosen these two to write these genealogies? These were no uneducated men. I would say that Luke was the more highly educated of the two, but both of them were well-versed in mathematics and in writing, in reading, in language. They had to be because of the professions they were in, a tax collector and a doctor. These men were well-equipped to have written these, I think, about Matthew. He was a tax collector, but I looked it back up, and I was looking at some details about publicans. They had to know Greek. They often knew Latin. Not always, but often they knew Latin. They knew the local language, Aramaic or Hebrew. It's very obvious that Matthew knew Aramaic because he didn't bother to translate terms like raka in Matthew 5, verse 22, which is Aramaic. He just put it in there. Matthew obviously had no arithmetic, math, because of his profession. He had to be literate. He had to be orderly and organized in his thinking. Aside from the tendency of publicans like Zacchaeus to cheat or to swindle or to do things like that, they had to know. They had to know how to handle money and know how to keep an orderly account of things. And so Matthew was such a man.

But Luke was also qualified as a doctor. Luke would have been the more highly educated. He's referred to in Colossians 4.14 by Paul as the beloved physician. The beloved physician. In fact, look back with me in Luke 1, verse 3. Luke 1 and verse number 3. It says there in verse 3, Luke 1, verse number 3. It seemed good to me also, he says, having had perfect understanding. What does that mean? It's interesting when you, there's two words here, but the idea of perfect is literally accurate, exact understanding. Having had accurate, exact, understanding of all things from the very first. Even those things which he was not necessarily witness to every first hand, not being one of the twelve, we see that he was very much acquainted with the twelve and the witness of those men. And he was a very thorough researcher evidently because it says he said he had a perfect understanding, understanding of all the things from the very first to write unto thee in order, most excellent Theophilus.

It's very likely that he interviewed extensively the eyewitnesses. You know, and we say it's good to document things while it's fresh, right? You know, write it down right now before you forget it. And Luke wasn't hearing something that somebody said about what somebody said. No, he had personal conscience. He was in contact with these eyewitnesses and he's telling Theophilus, I have written an orderly account step by step of what happened and I have vetted this and I have an accurate understanding of it and I'm writing it to you. Well, these things were recorded by Matthew and Luke would have been a good one to have systematically put down this information in a very detailed way. It is well known that the Jews were meticulous with how they recorded these genealogies and things. If, you know, they're well, very, very detailed in this.

But Matthew, Matthew, if you think back with me to the Davidic covenant in 2 Samuel chapter 7, it said over there that when thy days be fulfilled and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, it will, I will say, set up thy seat after thee which shall proceed out of thy bowels, the Lord told him, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. Well, that is a promise. He's going to establish the kingdom, the throne of David forever. But look what we've had. Since the Babylonian captivity, there has not been a king in Israel. There's been no king on the throne. And Matthew is writing with this in mind. He is emphasizing David, David, David. This is the son of David. This, Jesus, is the offspring of the one to whom it was promised that he would establish his throne. And there was a man, a Jew, by the name of Marvin Rosenthal I was reading about. Marvin Rosenthal, I don't know a whole lot about him other than that he converted to Christianity. I didn't take the time to research. I know he's got some sort of ministry, it sounds like. But the point is that he made the statement that the genealogy in Matthew was the, quote, first crack in the wall that made him reconsider everything he thought he knew about.

The first crack in the wall of his unbelief was this genealogy of Jesus. Why? Because the Messiah must be a descendant of Abraham. Abraham is the father of the Jewish race. But he also certainly, most certainly, must be the son of David, right? He must, even the scribes knew, well, when the wise men showed up, they said, where is he, this king of the Jews? We've come out of the east to worship him. We've seen this star. We've come to worship him. They said, well, he's supposed to be born in Bethlehem, Judea, Bethlehem, Ephrata, right? But they didn't bother themselves enough to even go down and investigate six miles to their south. And yet, we see that indeed, as was prophesied in Micah 5, 2, he was born. He was born of the house and the lineage of David. He was born in Bethlehem, Ephrata. Though it was little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of these shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler of Israel. He was born. And David and Matthew is pointing out that he is indeed of the lineage of David. And Marvin Rosenthal said that this was one of the things, that began to get his wheels turning, was the crack in the wall, so to speak. Interesting. He did actually point out the part about Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba being in the line as well, the inclusion of these unlikely figures.

In John 5, 39, let's look there briefly. In John chapter 5 and verse number 39, what does it say here? Jesus says, Search the scriptures, for in them, ye think ye have eternal life. And they are they which testify of me. The scriptures. Well, the scriptures that we just mentioned, Micah 5, 2, of course. But there are many scriptures that pointed to this. Matthew 1 gives the proof of Jesus being a direct descendant of Abraham and David through, his legal father, Joseph. But we notice that Luke is going to speak of the bloodline through Mary, and it brings in Joseph, the husband of Mary, but it's obviously different than the account given over in Matthew. It's interesting that this Jesus, the son of Mary, the son of, Joseph, but by legal adoption, he was in both lines, the son of David. In both lines, he can be traced back to David.

Luke presents, we might say, what is that passage in Galatians 4? Let's look in Luke, Galatians 4, if you will, in verse number 4. It's interesting what we read here. In Galatians 4, verse number 4, it says, Paul says, but when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his son. If you send your son forth, that means your son is already in existence, right? God sent forth his son, made of a woman, made under the law. I want you to stop and think about those two phrases right there tonight. Those two phrases, made of a woman, made under the law. I think what Matthew and Luke, because I was just meditating on this, those phrases just popped out at me. Even today, I was just thinking of how made of a woman, Luke is taking us all the way back to the first man, Adam, right? The son of God. Human. God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. He became a living soul. He became a human being, a creature that God made. Flesh, vessel of clay, breath in his lungs. And from him, through God, but from that man, descended the God-man, Jesus Christ. He was born and made of a woman. He took on flesh, made of a woman. So he's 100% humanity. Right?

But he's also the king that through the line of David, yes, he's the emphasis upon the king that will establish his throne. Now, obviously, there are many people throughout Jesus' earthly ministry, and I think in this program we did last year, the drama, we pointed out that it was some of the common people that would say, son of David, son of David, they recognize, this is the son of David, come to save us. But many wanted him to be the ruling king that would liberate them, of course, from Rome, but not the Savior that would be saving them from their sins. Right? We see that he's the son of God, made of, well, he's the son of God, he's made under the law to fulfill all the obligations of that law. Only God, come in flesh, could perfectly keep, the law, right? Only God, come in flesh, could fulfill the obligations of the law. He had to be a Jew.

He had to be, he was made under the law, but he was also made of a woman, as Luke emphasizes. I think it would be appropriate for Luke to present that view as the doctor. Jesus is the son of God, the king of the Jews. But he's fully human and fully divine at the same time. There's a lot of things, you know, I probably spent more time on this looking through the different arguments and thoughts and things about this, but at the end of the day, there's some things that we may not have all the answers to about why the genealogies were recorded exactly, but there's a lot of things that we may not have all the answers to about why the genealogies were recorded exactly, but there's a lot of things that we may not have all the answers to about why the genealogies were recorded exactly, but there's a lot of things that we may not have all the answers to about why the genealogies were recorded exactly, the same way they are.

It may seem like there's, maybe some generations were left out on Matthew's recording of it, perhaps, or there's some seeming discrepancies, but we must justify God in all of his sayings. There is this understanding that obviously we're not talking about, let's just put it this way, there would have been a huge issue with this for, for many centuries if, if, if, as meticulous as the Jews were at keeping genealogies, if there was, it's, it's, it's humanly impossible for Luke and Matthew to have just, whoops, we messed up on the last two-thirds of the genealogy. These are clearly talking about two different lines. Yes, it mentions Joseph because he is the legal father, but it's actually referring to, obviously, it seems here, the line of Mary, the maternal line that Jesus came through and because the emphasis is that he is the son ultimately going back to Adam, right? He's made flesh. Not that Joseph wasn't flesh, but Joseph wasn't his flesh father. He was his legal father, right? Joseph was the legal father. He wasn't the biological father because Jesus didn't have one. He received that flesh through, through Mary, through the line, through the line of Mary, of who, who, and Joseph was the son-in-law of Healy. He was the father of the son, legally speaking, but he was Mary's husband, the son, it seems, son-in-law to Healy.

So let's remember that Jesus was this fully man, but fully God. He fulfilled all the Old Testament requirements to be the Savior. We have testimony of Jews who have said, it was the genealogies of Jesus that got me really to thinking about this must be something to be considered here and that Jesus satisfied God's wrath on our behalf being the sinless son of God come in the flesh. He's fully human, yes, but he must be God, the God-man, to take our sins on him. No man can take away from us our sins. No mere man. God sent forth his son made under the law that we might be receive the adoption of sons. Heavenly Father, bless us now as we we think on these things, Lord, as we enter this Christmas season. Help us to stand in awe at the Christ who if we could fully put it into words what what how how can it be? How can it be seeing I know not a man and yet you entered into our dimension of time. You entered into this world of sin and where meek souls will receive him still the dear Christ enters in. We pray, Lord, that we would this Christmas there would be room in our hearts for the Savior if we've already received Christ may we be glad and ready to share him with others and if there's anyone that doesn't know Jesus as their personal Savior that they would would put their trust in him even this Christmas season we pray and ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.