Who's Who? But Who Cares?

November 27, 2016    1^st Sunday of Advent               Matthew 1:1-17

The genealogy of Jesus may seem like just a long list of hard to pronounce names, and who really cares?  But when we look at it more closely we find a lot of important lessons for our lives.  As we read through Matthew’s gospel we’re going to discover a lot of things about him.  Among them is that he’s a very tidy writer and likes to put things in good order.  He wants us to know Jesus ancestry and so it puts it at a very logical place, the beginning!  Matthew’s gospel isn’t the only place in the Bible that gives a genealogy of Jesus. Luke’s gospel does too, but Luke starts elsewhere and puts the genealogy at chapter 3.

In coming weeks I’ll give you a handout about the structure of Matthew.  We’ll discover that Matthew likes structure and he’s written his gospel around a very sophisticated pattern.  We get a hint of that with the genealogy.  He wants us to recognize patterns with Jesus ancestors: fourteen generations from Abraham to David, fourteen generations from David to the conquest of Jerusalem by the Babylonians, and fourteen generations between then and Jesus.

Much as Matthew might love structure, he apparently didn’t do well in math.  If you count out the generations you realize he doesn’t actually list fourteen generations in each segment.  The third segment contains only thirteen generations.  Nevertheless fourteen was a very important number for Matthew.  Fourteen is the numerical value of King David’s name in Hebrew.  It is also twice times the ideal number of seven.

Whatever the case, if we critically look at Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus we do discover other problems.  It doesn’t match up with Luke’s genealogy at all.  There’s no reconciling the two.  Plus not only is Matthew’s math off, the divisions of 14 generations aren’t equal.  The first covers 750 years, the second covers 400 years and the third covers 600 years.  He also skips four kings and one queen.

What does this mean?  Does this mean that Matthew’s genealogy is bogus and Matthew isn’t a reliable source for information?  No.  Let’s use this as a lesson to understand more about Matthew.

Matthew’s gospel was most assuredly written for a Jewish  audience who had accepted Jesus as the Son of God and converted.  As we go through the gospel we’ll discover how they are being persecuted for their conversion; persecuted primarily by other Jews who reject Jesus.  And we’re going to find just how fear-filled their lives are.  They’ve come to be believers.  It’s hard to say they’ve converted to Christianity because Christianity is in its infancy at this point and there’s no real structure.  But Jesus said he’d return.  They thought it would be soon, but his return is delayed, which heightens their fears all the more.

Most biblical scholars believe Matthew was written around the year 80.  Prior to the year 70 Jews who had converted to Christianity appear to have remained welcome among Jewish communities.  There’s evidence that Jewish Christians would still worship with Jews in the synagogues on the Sabbath – which was Saturday.  Then on Sunday the Christians would have a second worship.

But if you remember your history well you’ll remember that in the year 64 Rome burned.  Emperor Nero, who was probably insane, was looking for a scapegoat.  Christians got blamed and persecution of them began.  Still, this didn’t affect outlying areas like Judea a whole lot.  But then in the year 70 the Romans burnt the temple and totally destroyed Jerusalem as punishment for Jewish revolts.  It was a tumultuous time for Jews.  They cast Christians out of their synagogues and the two religions went their separate ways.

Well discover that as Jesus predicted, families were torn apart.  Friendships were destroyed.  A lot of people were being hurt.  This is the life of the people Matthew is writing to.  There are a few fundamental things he wants these people to know.  The way he’s structured the genealogy speaks to that.

He wants his readers to know that what is happening is not really chaotic.  It is orderly.  It is part of God’s orderly and structured plan. 

Very importantly, he does not want his readers to feel like Jesus has abandoned them just because he hasn’t returned as quickly as they had hoped.  Remember always, Matthew likes patterns and he writes with structure.  He wants his readers to know that God didn’t just pop into the world for a short time and then just pop back out after the resurrection.  No, the genealogy shows how God has deeply rooted himself into history – into our history.  Even though the genealogy goes to Joseph, and thus shows no actual DNA connection to Jesus, for Matthew this is an important connection.  Our human story and God’s story are one in the same.

And though the genealogy itself doesn’t point it out, Matthew wants us to know that God is still very much with us and that our story is still God’s story.  Matthew begins the gospel with a genealogy and do you remember the final words of the gospel?  Jesus says, “And remember, I AM with you always to the end of the age.  Matthew’s fearful community is not lost or forgotten.  They are not unimportant to God.  And the same goes for us too.

Now let’s take a little time to look at the actual people in the genealogy.  Some of them you may recognize.  Matthew starts with Abraham.  We know him.  He’s the one God made the covenant with that his ancestors would become God’s people.  We also know Isaac and Jacob.

We recognize some of the kings: David and Solomon.  Josiah may stand out.  He is arguably the most righteous king in all of Jewish history.  There are a number of people that we do not know, but you’ll find their names in Old Testament stories.  And then there are a lot of people recorded nowhere else.  We have no way of verifying them at all.

Some of the people in the genealogy are very virtuous – like King Josiah and Boaz.  And some not so much – like King Solomon.  Many of the kings listed were just plain bad.  Some people are manipulative scoundrels like Jacob.  Some, like Abraham, are filled with faith.  Some are killers like King David.

All in all, we ask ourselves, is Jesus’ genealogy one of picture perfect virtuous people?  Is God willing to claim only the righteous?  No.  Rich/poor, good/bad, known/unknown, all are included.  God wants us to know he is rooted in the same messy reality we live in, not something perfect.  God will come into this world as a human connected to all the imperfections of the past.  God embraces and claims as his own both our good and our bad.

There’s one more thing I want to point out about the genealogy.  It’s almost all men as you’d expect a genealogy from that time.  But strangely, four women appear, and a fifth is eluded to.  If you know these women well you’ll know there is a common thread among them.  And believe me, if you are a woman you do not want to be among them!

There’s Rahab, the prostitute in Jericho who turns traitor against her own people to help the Israelites conquer the city.  Bathsheba isn’t mentioned, but she’s eluded to in verse 6 where she’s called the wife of Uriah.  You probably know the less than virtuous stuff that went on between her and King David.  Still, if you’re creating a movie you can depict it and still get a PG-13 rating.

Then there’s Tamar.  We find out about her in Genesis 38.  I won’t give details because we like to keep sermons family friendly.  You’ll have to read about her yourself, but again, if you’re making a movie, you can depict her and still pull off a PG-13 rating but you’re flirting with R territory.

And then there’s Ruth.  I simply can’t talk about what goes on when she meets Boaz.  We read about her in Ruth chapters 2 to 4.  While the author there uses euphemisms to refer what she and Boaz got up to in the dark, if you’re a movie maker and you want to do the scene justice, let’s just say you may go beyond an R rating. 

So what company does that put the fifth woman, Mary, among?  The notes in my study Bible say that the women all have “irregular sexual unions” but are considered important for God’s plan.  Who knew there was so much spice in Jesus’ ancestry!?!

With Jesus firmly rooted into our reality Matthew has prepared us for him to be born, which we’ll look at next week.