Harmony Christian Church
Harmony Christian Church
Week 3 - The Gift Foreseen (Section 3)
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FACEBOOK COPY:  The gift God gave in Jesus is foreseen in a pretty amazing way in the genealogies of Jesus – today Kent unpacks some pretty incredible hidden treasures you may have never heard.  Visit section 3 today @ https://www.harmonychurch.cc/timeline-of-jesus/birth-preparation/. IT’S EASY TO GIVE, text any amount to (859) 459-0316  to get started (or give online @ my.harmonychurch.cc/give ).

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OPENING ILLUSTRATION:

Growing up there was always this constant thing that would happen as my parents got to know other adults.  it would start like this.  Someone would start talking about how they were related to someone famous, Bloody Mary, or Herbert Hoover, whoever it was didn’t matter, because what followed next was always the same.  My mom would chime in and start talking about her maiden name was Crockett and we were actually related to Davy Crockett – I think His dad was my ancestors’ dad too…  All I know is every male in my family has to kill a bear by the age of 3…  Ha, remember the song…  

Anyway, my mom would start to regain these fine folks and show them up on their history and how we were related to one of America’s finest folk legends.  And that’s when it would happen, my dad would chime in and he’d say something to the effect of, “yup, Janice is related to Davy Crockett, the Wagners, come from a long line of horse thieves…”  Ha.  I’m about 95% sure that wasn’t true…  But every time it’s what my dad said…

As American Genealogies are kind of a mixed bag.  With the invention of ancestory.com and other websites like it, some of you have figured out that you are related to the duke of wellington.  

But for others of us, like my dad – you could care less..

Generally speaking, Americans are about the future, not the past.  

“Where I come from isn’t as important as where I’m going”

But that’s not the case for a huge part of the rest of the world…

ILLUSTRATION:

Jenni’s uncle by marriage is Muslim.  He and I were talking one day and he told me that he has a document that takes his family lineage back to Abraham through Ishmael.  That’s crazy, right?  

His genealogy anchored him in the history of a larger story

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Today, we are going to look at what some might consider the most boring part of the gospels, but if you are willing to do a little literary archaeology – you will see it’s a treasure trove that anchors Jesus’ story in the history of a much larger story…

So, first things first – before we put on our Indiana Jones hats and go archaeology-ing, I need to clear something up…

Both Matthew & Luke give us the genealogy of Jesus.  The problem is, they are different…

Matthew 1:15b-16

Matthan the father of Jacob,

16 and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, and Mary was the mother of Jesus who is called the Messiah.

Luke 3:23

23 Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph,

the son of Heli,

Matthew says Joseph’s Father was Jacob and Luke claims it was Heli (or some translations Eli)

b

What do you do with that?

Some of you are like, “finally, I knew this was a bunch of hooey…”

Before you get rid of the New Testament as contradictory, let me give you 3 good explanations for why there might be a difference of lineage between David & Jesus in the two gospels. 

[WATCH: 3 Minute Theology with Kent – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FspZ9MsVA3E ]

Ok, phew – boom, hopefully, that was under 3 minutes.  Because that’s not what I want to show you today…

All month we’ve been talking about the Giving God, and I want to show you how the genealogies foretold the gift…

So, put on your Indiana Jones Hats, we are going to go for a ride…

1st The 14’s in Matthew

Matthew ends his genealogy with this statement:

17 Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Messiah.

I’m not going to read them all to you, but what you need to know is Matthew is doing something that is common in biblical genealogies.  He has skipped some people to get three 14’s – but why?  Let me show you…

Got your indy hats on?

In Hebrew every letter has a number associated with it – numbers are huge in Judaism.

b

David’s name happens to be the following letters in Hebrew:

ד ו ד 

ד(dalet) + ו (vav) + ד (dalet)

with me so far?

ד(dalet) = 4

ו (vav) = 6

That means David’s name is 4 + 6 + 4 = 14

remember Matthew’s profession was “Tax collector”  the guy is a math genius…

But here’s something else you might not know

The number Three is the number of completion in the Hebrew bible.

So, Matthew is saying Jesus is 14, 14, 14 – He is David, David, David – but why?

Because the Jewish people knew that the Messiah would be the son of David.

Jesus is the completion of the Davidic Messiah that was to come into the world.

b

Or what about the women in Matthew’s Genealogy?

…Judah the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar,

…Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab,

…Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth,

…David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah’s wife

-Tamar was a Canaanite woman who had to essentially prostitute herself to get her father-in-law to give her a child (her father-in-law was supposed to give his youngest son in a levirate marriage to her because two of his older sons had already died married to her – Judah doesn’t and she ends up having to trick him into getting her pregnant)

-Rahab was a prostitute and a foreigner who helped the spies in Israel when they came to spy out on Jericho…

-Ruth was a Moabite-es – would have likely been despised by a lot of the people of the time because the Moabites had treated the Israelites terribly

-And Bathsheba – Matthew references her to her previous husband to just show the extent of how terrible what happened to her was.  She was raped by David and her husband was murdered.  

Why reference these women in a genealogy of the Messiah – all with sordid pasts and most with sexually sordid pasts?

b

Because Matthew is pointing out how God can use anyone and helping everyone to see that Mary really is as much of a hero as the women who came before her.

Or what about Luke’s Genealogy

He ends his 76 generations like this…

Lamech,

37 the son of Methuselah, the son of Enoch,

the son of Jared, the son of Mahalalel,

the son of Kenan, 38 the son of Enosh,

the son of Seth, the son of Adam,

the son of God.

Why does Luke take his genealogy all the way back to Adam and then to God?

b

Luke is making the point that Jesus is the essential man who is the Son of God

b

He came to set right what Adam got wrong…

CLOSING ILLUSTRATION:

When I was a kid, I was playing basketball with some buddies – the ball flew into the yard and I jumped on it.  All my friends jumped on top of me to try and wrestle the ball out of my hands.  I immediately started screaming – they all jumped off and when I rolled over, my pants leg was full of blood.  My knee had been gashed open to within a 1/4 of an inch of paralyzing me.  The next 30 minutes were a blur of blood and rushing to an er.  I can remember them coming in and giving me shots inside the wound to numb it so they could clean it.  Then the doc came in to sew it up.  Stitches on the inside and the outside.  I can remember feeling the needle and the pressure as they pulled through the skin and flesh.  I was squeezing my dad’s hand so hard he said his fingers were turning white.  At one point, my dad said, “I wish it was me instead of you…”  he would always chuckle when he’d tell this story because he said I replied, “Me too…”  Ha.  

I know the genealogies are boring.  I get it…  But what they tell me is that the story of Jesus is really anchored in real history.  And it tells me that the story of God coming to take our place was not just some nice story you tell your kids to make them obey.  It’s the real story of the Adam who came to set everything right that went wrong.

What will it take for you to give your life over to Him?  He literally came and took your place on the cross, taking all your sin on Him so that you could be free.  he didn’t just wish it was him instead of us, He did it…