Well, this is now the second Sunday in Advent and we are beginning a short series today looking at the Christmas story, broadly speaking, from the point of view of Joseph. Mary is, understandably, the focus of a good deal of Christian reflection at Christmas time. Then there are the shepherds and the wisemen; they get a fair amount of attention. The choirs of angels singing in exaltation, as we were just singing ourselves, they get a lot of airplay, don’t they? But in the dramatis personae of the Christmas story, poor Joseph all too often gets treated like a bit of an extra. My wife showed me a short clip this past week, which you may well have seen, of a little boy, maybe 4 or 5 years old in England, sitting in the back seat of the family car, excitedly telling his mom that he had been chosen for a part in the school nativity play. “It is a classic role,” he said with a big smile. “A classic role? Wow. Is it a wise man?” mom asked. “No.” “Is it Joseph?” “No,” he said. And then with great enthusiasm he announced, “It’s doorkeeper number 3!” and you’d think this little boy had been asked to play the lead role in a major theatrical production. He was over the moon with his classic part. He was just a doorkeeper, doorkeeper number 3, and he could not be more delighted.
Actually, I think that’s one lesson that Joseph’s comparatively modest part in the Christmas story teaches us. Jesus is the focus of our attention; not Joseph, not us. And we find our joy this Christmas in the wonderful fact that we have a part, albeit a very small part, in His story. We can say with King David in Psalm 84, “I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord than dwell in tents of wickedness.” Or as that little boy put it with such exuberance, “I get to be doorkeeper number 3!” It’s only a bit part in a much bigger production, but our significance comes not in how central we are, but in the centrality of Jesus Christ who’s first coming we are celebrating.
And so, this morning I want to invite you to turn with me to Matthew’s gospel, chapter 1. You can find it on page 807 in the church Bibles. And as we consider the genealogy found in these opening seventeen verses, I want you to think about three themes with me. First of all, this list of names records a messy history. A messy family history. Secondly, this genealogical list proclaims a fulfilled plan, a fulfilled divine plan. And thirdly, Matthew’s genealogy announces a shocking beginning, an unexpected beginning that changes everything. A messy history. A fulfilled plan. And a shocking beginning. Before we get to all of that, let’s pray and then we’ll read the Scriptures together. Let us pray.
God our Father, we cry out to You now for the work of the Holy Spirit. Take Your Word and bring it to bear with power and life changing force for Your glory, for the praise of the name of Jesus upon our wicked hearts. For we ask it in His name, amen.
Matthew chapter 1 at verse 1. This is the Word of God:
“The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.
Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, and Judah the father of Perez and Zerah by Tamar, and Perez the father of Hezron, and Hezron the father of Ram, and Ram the father of Amminadab, and Amminadab the father of Nahshon, and Nahshon the father of Salmon, and Salmon the father of Boaz by Rahab, and Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, and Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David the king.
And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah, and Solomon the father of Rehoboam, and Rehoboam the father of Abijah, and Abijah the father of Asaph, and Asaph the father of Jehoshaphat, and Jehoshaphat the father of Joram, and Joram the father of Uzziah, and Uzziah the father of Jotham, and Jotham the father of Ahaz, and Ahaz the father of Hezekiah, and Hezekiah the father of Manasseh, and Manasseh the father of Amos, and Amos the father of Josiah, and Josiah the father of Jechoniah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon.
And after the deportation to Babylon: Jechoniah was the father of Shealtiel, and Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel, and Zerubbabel the father of Abiud, and Abiud the father of Eliakim, and Eliakim the father of Azor, and Azor the father of Zadok, and Zadok the father of Achim, and Achim the father of Eliud, and Eliud the father of Eleazar, and Eleazar the father of Matthan, and Matthan the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ.
So, all the generations from Abraham to David were fourteen generations, and from David to the deportation to Babylon fourteen generations, and from the deportation to Babylon to the Christ fourteen generations.”
The Messy History
Let’s think first about the messy history of Joseph’s family tree. All family histories are messy things, aren’t they? They are complicated, convoluted. They are full of surprises and not a few secrets that nobody talks about. We don’t mention “Auntie Flo.” There’s a reason you never knew you had a second cousin twice removed called Bubba, right? Family histories are messy things and that was certainly the case in Joseph’s genealogy. The story of Judah and Tamar in verse 3 is an awful account of deception and sexual sin. The story of Rahab, a prostitute who is enfolded into the people of God. Boaz and Ruth in verse 5 – the record of a pagan Moabitess coming to belong to the covenant community. Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah the Hittite, whose name isn’t even mentioned in verse 6, had an affair with David the king to produce Solomon. First Kings 11 said Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines. His family, in case that’s not clear to you, his family was a mess. Uzziah, mentioned down in verse 8, was the king whose pride made him usurp the role reserved only for the priest. He offers incense in the temple and God curses him with leprosy so that he lives the remainder of his days shut out from the people of God and the worship of God. Jechoniah, mentioned in verse 12, also under the curse and judgment of God, forfeited his claim to the Davidic throne.
Now I’m just cherry picking a few of the standout examples, but we could go on. This, clearly, is a messy family history. Isn’t it? Prostitutes and polygamists, abusers and victims of abuse, apostates and pagans. But each member of this sin-soaked family tree marks another step in a sequence that leads inexorably in the providence of God to the birth of Messiah, Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. The grime and the shame of sin, the multigenerational misery that our twisted choices can cause that are written all over this family, they were no hindrance to Jesus. These people are part of the family because Jesus came to seek and save people like these. That is to say, people like us – outsiders, Gentiles, folks whose faces and families don’t fit, broken victims whose damaged hearts lead them in turn to perpetuate the cycle of sin and misery inflicted on still others, lost people, guilty people, unclean people. Jesus came for them. He came for you. This is Joseph’s family. They can be your family too.
There was a delightful, elderly lady in the congregation I served in London named Henrietta McLeod. Henrietta hailed originally from the remote island of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides off the northwest coast of Scotland, which is where my wife’s family, on her mother’s side, all come from. And so when I first met Henrietta, I explained that Sheena’s mother also was a McLeod from the village of Tolsta Chaolais near Carloway on the island. Now Henrietta was far too fine a Christian lady to show it, but she was more than a little disappointed that her new minister, in what was still at that time a largely highland denomination, was a lowlander from Glasgow with no family ties to the Gaelic heartland. But her eyes lit up when I told her about Sheena’s people. And then Henrietta did something I will never forget. When people from her culture and her generation met each other, they would rhyme off their family trees in an effort to find some people in common. “Who are your people?” is a vital question because if you can find a common relative then you’re not a stranger anymore; you are family. And so, she held up both hands, and in Gaelic, counted off on her fingers ten generations. She was Henrietta, daughter of so-and-so, son of so-and-so, son of such-and-such, and so on and so forth. She covered about 250 years in five seconds. It was amazing! I was dumbfounded. As a little girl, she had been taught to recite all of these names by heart. She didn’t know most of them; she didn’t really know anything about any of them really beyond a name, not much of their history or story at least, but these were her people nonetheless and she was hoping that by rattling them off like that I might recognize a name and discover that her people were really my people too.
Matthew’s genealogy is a bit like that. It’s not just a cold piece of historical record keeping. It’s an invitation of sorts, calling us to establish a family connection. You remember that Jesus, when He came, was treated as if He were the worst name on the list of His already pretty deplorable family tree. He was abused and mocked and spat upon. He was condemned, tortured cruelly, stripped and crucified publically. Even God the Father turned His face from Him as he hung in dying agony on the cross. He had done nothing wrong, nothing, and yet He was treated like He was the worst sinner on the rolls of Joseph’s family tree. In 2 Corinthians 5:21, the apostle Paul actually says, “God made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us.” That’s a striking phrase, isn’t it? “To be sin for us.” “He who was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners,” Hebrews 7:26. He was treated by God as if He were the living embodiment of sin itself, in all its darkest, vilest horror. And as such, He was damned under the curse and wrath of God that sin really deserves at the cross.
And all of that happened, Paul says, so that we are the guilty ones, like all these other misfits in Joseph’s story. Our face really does belong in this list, doesn’t it? Our wicked hearts put us right here among this unlikely group in Jesus’ family story. We are the guilty ones. And Jesus endures all that He endures that unclean sinners like us, no different than all the folks in Joseph’s genealogy with their dumpster fire lives, that we might be welcomed into the family of God, accepted, adopted, counted righteous, brought near. “He who knew no sin,” Paul says, “became sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” That’s why Jesus was born. That’s why it really matters. That’s what was happening at the cross. “Guilty, vile and helpless we, spotless Lamb of God was He. Full atonement, can it be? Hallelujah! What a Savior!”
And because that’s why He came, there is a sense in which Matthew’s list of names, the names of Joseph’s family tree, that list continues on. If you trust in Jesus Christ, your name is on the list, along with countless others from every tribe and language and nation. And at the last time, God will read your name on the rolls of the book of life. But unlike the names here in Matthew chapter 1, there will be no longer any record of our misdeeds, no scandal over our presence in the family tree. No one will say of your name as we’ve just done for Tamar or Solomon or Uzziah, “Can you believe her name, can you believe his name is on the rolls of Jesus’ family? Can you believe it?” No, brothers and sisters in Christ, all record of our sin has forever been expunged, buried under the righteousness of Christ, so that on the great final day when your name is called from the long roll of the family tree, the Father will not say to us, He won’t say to you, “How did you get here?” No, He’ll say instead, “Welcome home, My beloved child. With you I am well pleased.” And so that’s the first thing to see here. This is a messy family history. And if you trust in Christ, it’s your family history and your name belongs on the roll.
A Fulfilled, Divine Plan
Then secondly, Matthew’s genealogy is meant to teach us about a fulfilled, divine plan. A fulfilled, divine plan. You’ll notice Matthew structures his list in three groups of 14 generations. That stylized structure tells us he’s not trying to make an accurate list of every single name. This isn’t ancestry.com, you know, where a complete accounting of every one of your ancestors is given. This is a theological genealogy, and in keeping with ordinary Jewish practice, Matthew, using the known and accepted convention, happily skips generations. He aligns his list, in order to make clear to his readers, important connections between people. That’s especially clear, isn’t it, in verse 1. “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David.” Now David was not His immediate father, but Matthew is making connections. “The son of David, the son of Abraham.” Matthew’s agenda, you see, is to highlight Jesus’ connection to David and back further to Abraham. That’s the big point he wants us to be sure we don’t miss.
So first, verses 2 through 6, Matthew traces Jesus’ descent from father Abraham. And his point in doing that, in making this connection, is to show us that Joseph’s son is the heir of the great covenant promise made to the father of the Jewish people, that his children would be as numerous as the stars and that in his seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed. It was by believing those promises that Abraham was counted righteous in God’s sight. And the apostle Paul assures us likewise, in Galatians 3:7, it is those who, like Abraham, believe the Gospel promise concerning Abraham’s seed, the Lord Jesus Christ, it is by believing that promise that the ancient covenant blessings promised to Abraham and to his family become blessings given to us. We are the seed of Abraham through faith in Abraham’s son, the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s how you become part of the family. That’s how you’re welcomed in – by trusting Abraham’s son.
A similar point is made in the second section of 14 generations, beginning with King David. You see it in verses 6 through 11. And here again, we remember that God made a covenant, this time with David in 2 Samuel 7, that his seed, his heir, would sit upon his throne forever. One of his sons would at last be God’s great King. The one that Isaiah 9, the one that we’ve been memorizing together, the one that Isaiah 9 promises would come. Matthew’s genealogy wants us to see this one has now arrived, at last, in Jesus Christ. The one “of the increase of whose government and of peace there will be no end,” who will sit on the throne of David over his kingdom “to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from this time forth and forevermore,” this one, He is finally here. That’s the point. He’s here.
Yet another point along the same lines is made in the third section – the third group of 14 generations, which leads this time from the exile of Judah into Babylon right up to Jesus’ birth, verses 12 through 16. Now the return of the exiles back to the land was promised in the prophets to be a glorious restoration, one that would bring such blessing for God’s people that their new condition after the exile would far exceed anything they had ever known in their previous history. But if you read Nehemiah and Ezra, the account of the return of the exiles, you’ll see when they arrive back in Jerusalem the city is utterly ruined, its gates burned by fire. Ezra 3:12 says, “When at last the people managed to rebuild the temple, the old men who had been little children when the exile began, they burst into tears. They wept because it was clear to them, as impressive as this new temple was, it was not yet the glory promised. In fact, they remembered the old temple and this new one did not compare even to that; it didn’t measure up to what they had lost, never mind to what was promised. Though they had returned to the land, the returning exiles still had no king from David’s line. The righteousness of Messiah’s reign seemed impossibly far off. Instead, they lived as a petty vassal state, under the dominion first of Babylon and then Persia, then Greek and then Roman oppression.
Now, Matthew is saying, now Jesus has been born. David’s heir, Abraham’s seed has come at last and He is here to lead a new restoration, a true and final renewal of the covenant people of God. He will tear down the temple as He puts it in John 2:21, referring not to the building of bricks and mortar but to His own body. He will tear it down in His death upon the cross. Then He said He would rebuild it again on the third day in His glorious resurrection from the dead. And the result would be that those who trust in Jesus will themselves, like living stones – 1 Peter 2:5 – be built together. Our lives will be knit together, built together living stones in the fellowship of the local church to be a true temple where God shall dwell by His Spirit.
So the glory promised long ago in the prophets that had not come immediately after the exile, the longing for a better temple that the poor substitute in Jerusalem that the exiles built that was causing the old men to burst into tears of grief, that glory has now been realized at last. It has come in the living union and communion of the people of God with the Lord Jesus Christ. The church, the community of the redeemed, united to Christ – that’s the real temple where God now dwells by His Spirit. Matthew’s genealogy, do you see, is really all about God’s perfect plan, hence the carefully crafted scheme of three sets of 14. It’s a perfect, divine plan come to its long, promised fulfillment. God was keeping His word, fulfilling His promise. That covenant promise – salvation for the ends of the earth, a true king to reign on David’s throne, a perfect restoration, a new and final temple where God and sinners like us can have communion and fellowship forever, all of it, God has done in the arrival of His Son. A messy family history and a fulfilled, divine plan.
A Shocking New Beginning
Finally, Matthew’s genealogy is about a shocking new beginning. A shocking new beginning. You know in the film industry, up until the 1970s, the credits for the cast and crew typically came at the beginning of movies, didn’t they? They were opening credits. Today, of course, audiences have no patience for that. We want immediate, attention-grabbing, opening scenes – a high speed car chase, a death defying rescue, a daring escape from a burning building. And so nowadays, credits all typically come at the end, right, scrolling up the screen while we walk out of the theater oblivious to the names of producers and makeup artists and boom operators. And so it might seem to us, when you come to Matthew’s gospel for the first time, it might seem to us a rather curious choice that he has the credits rolling at the beginning. It’s not exactly a thrilling, attention grabbing introduction to the gospel or to the New Testament as a whole for that matter.
But take another look. Notice the long, and you might think at times rather dreary list of names. It follows 14 verses of the same pattern – A was the father of B. B was the father of C. C was the father of D. And so on and on until you reach verse 16 which lands breaking the pattern like a thunderclap. “And Jacob was the father of Joseph, and Joseph was” – not the father of Jesus, but – “the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born.” Jesus was born of Mary’s substance, not the natural born son of Joseph; He was conceived of the Holy Spirit in her womb, a new man, a fresh start, a new beginning for the whole human race.
As I was reading it over, the repetitive character of Joseph’s genealogy reminded me of the repetitive phrase in the books of Kings and Chronicles which recount the stories of the monarchs of Judah and Israel. Over and over and over as you read through those books you will read of each king, both the good kings and the bad kings, “and he died. And he died. And he died.” No one can break the cycle. And here in Matthew’s genealogy we read a similar refrain, this time about the beginning of life, not its end. “Abraham was the father of Isaac, Isaac was the father of Jacob, David was the father of Solomon, Solomon the father of Rehoboam, Jechoniah the father of Shealtiel, Jacob the father of Joseph” – and then it all changes. “Jacob was the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ.” Joseph wasn’t Jesus’ natural father. Jesus was miraculously conceived. He breaks the cycle of birth and death, birth and death, birth and death. He who was supernaturally born triumphs over the grave bringing life and immortality to light.
I wonder if you’ve come to view the Advent season itself as about as dull and repetitive and uninspiring as Matthew’s genealogy. You’ve been there, done that, so many times. After all these years there’s really nothing new, nothing fresh, nothing left to thrill your heart. The cycle just repeats and repeats and repeats and so maybe you’re faking it for the sake of the children or the grandchildren, just going through the motions. Well if that’s you, let me invite you to take another look at the Advent story, would you, and see what’s really going on, what’s really going on. Under the veneer of apparent mundanity, the world, the world was being turned on its head. Death will be defeated. God’s ancient covenant promises were being kept. Deliverance from sin was being secured for anyone, for you, should you go to Jesus for it, all in the birth of the boy Joseph would call “son,” who was conceived of the Holy Ghost and born of the virgin Mary. The tinsel and the Christmas lights, they may not awaken much wonder in you anymore. That’s fine. But Matthew 1:16 really should. Jesus has come and nothing can be the same again.
Let’s pray together.
Our Father, we adore You that You have never, never yet broken Your promise, that in Jesus, all the promises of God are Yes and Amen. And here in the opening verses of the first book of the New Testament, that is proven to us, down long generations You have been faithful. In the gift of Jesus Christ, the son of Abraham, the son of David, salvation to the ends of the earth was made available for sinners, repenting and turning to Him. Help us now to do that anew or for the very first time – to come running as it were to Christ to peel back all the layers of tinsel and sentiment to the true wonder of the season that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. And rekindle in our hearts wonder, love and praise, for we ask it all in Jesus’ name, amen.