Text: Matthew 1:1–17
Preacher: Pastor Brian Sauvé
A Genealogical Christology
Go ahead and make your way to Matthew 1, if you would, and we’re going to have some fun with lists this morning. Solomon tells us in Proverbs 25:2,
“It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.”
-Proverbs 25:2
One of the places where the Lord God has concealed glories is in the mundanities of the Bible—those places that test our mettle; that test our wisdom; places like the book of Numbers, Genesis 5, Genesis 10.
There are places in Scripture that, if we’re honest, we can sometimes think: Why is this here? Now, we know from many passages of Scripture, especially passages like 2 Timothy 3:16–17, that all Scripture, that every word of Scripture, is breathed out by God and therefore profitable and authoritative and good and helpful.
And we know that God has not just spoken, but he has spoken carefully and sufficiently—that there are no wasted words in the text. We know this about all of the various parts of the Bible, and so we know that it includes the lists of the Bible as well.
God loves lists. Did you know that? God loves lists. He includes them over and over, from beginning to end, in the Scriptures. Go all the way back to the first section of the first book of the Bible, and what do you find? A list, Genesis 5. Another list, Genesis 10—and we could keep going, right? Sprinkled throughout Genesis and Exodus, we find lists. And then we get to a book entitled “Numbers,” and boy do we find some more lists.
Go all the way to the other end of the Bible, and what do you find? More lists. The book of Revelation, chapter 7, with a large portion of the chapter devoted to another list.
It is the glory of God to conceal things—lists seem to be one of God’s favorite places to do so. For example, in Genesis 10, the kings can win their glory in searching out God’s hidden wisdom as they notice that all of the Gentile nations that come from Noah’s sons tally up to around 70 names. And then, lo and behold, the number 70 seems to serve as a symbolic reference to the Gentiles for the rest of the Bible.
In the same genealogy, we get hints of what to expect later in the story as Israel interacts with the Gentile nations. We find that Sidon is the firstborn of Canaan, and later that Jezebel is a Sidonian princess—there’s a little foreshadowing in there about what kind of women this Jezebel is going to be.
Those are some small little hidden gems. But there are much, much bigger glories concealed in the lists of the Bible. I’m convinced our great-great-great-great-great-great grandchildren will still be uncovering new hidden glories as they grow in the wisdom of kings.
So this morning, we get to search out some of those glories in one of the lists of the Scriptures, Matthew 1:1–17, the genealogy of Jesus, as traced through his adoptive father Joseph’s line. Look there with me, if you would. This is the Word of the Living 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.”
-Matthew 1:1–17
Thus ends the reading of God’s Word. May he write in on our hearts by faith.
Now, I know that some of you are quite interested in and well read in the study of the biblical canon, textual issues, etc. And so you know that there are often objections brought against the Bible for so-called issues and contradictions between the genealogy of Luke and that of Matthew.
And you guys in that position have probably read whole books on the subject, and so know that it would be a fool’s errand for me to try to make this a seminar on textual criticism. So I’m not going to do that.
Let me simply say up front that the whole controversy is stupid, and it’s stupid because it’s exactly the kind of manufactured controversy you’d expect to arise when 21st-Century disciples of scientism and secular humanism and modern notions of history start trying to put the Scriptures in a beaker in a laboratory and make it obey our made up rules of textual criticism and historiography and on and on. I’ll just bottom line it like this:
First, this genealogy differs from Luke’s because it is supposed to. Matthew and Luke weren’t dumb. They were trying to accomplish different things with their writing. Both are accurate, reliable historians who tell real history and don’t lie. But Luke is probably giving us Mary’s genealogy, while Matthew is, in his own words, giving us Joseph’s.
Further, Matthew knows that he is leaving out certain steps in the genealogy here. He sometimes skips a father and jumps to a grandson or other descendant. Again, he’s not dumb. He’s rather highlighting something theological about the genealogy of Christ.
For example, he skips some generations in David’s line, particularly in verses 8 and 9. Why? He didn’t just mix them up, he rather intentionally excluded all of David’s descendants who had dealings with the wicked house of Ahab, those descended from Athaliah and Joram—following the example of the writer of 1 and 2 Kings, who cut out all mention of Athaliah, the wicked queen of Judah.
So we’re simply going to take the text as what it is—the inspired, inerrant Word of God, wherein the Lord in his glory has concealed many gems for those pursuing the wisdom of kings to uncover, to their glory. Lord willing, we’ll see three such glories together: The first two related to how Matthew uses numbers in the genealogy.
Funny Numbers, Crayon-Box Theology, & Hidden Glory
Now, let me be the first to note something before I start walking you through what we might call “theological fun with numbers.” That is, I want to say that what we’re going to do this morning is not to go jump into the ditch where the crazy numerology Bible-code people from the History Channel like to live.
You know what I’m talking about? The guys who hire out billboards across the nation, because they’ve cracked the Bible code that shows the exact date of Christ’s return, which just so happens to be a month from today. There are some funny numbers that get thrown around sometime.
But on the other hand, if we’re going to deal honestly with the Bible, we need to be prepared to think like ancient Hebrews, who were very much concerned with things like symbolism in numbers. The number 12, for example, is obviously of great importance: 12 tribes of Israel, 12 disciples of Jesus, 12 foundations in the heavenly Jerusalem with 12 gates.
You’ll also find various points in the Bible where the numerical value of different words and names are intended to have symbolic meaning—for example, with the number 666, referring to Nero, in the book of Revelation. We’ll see some things like that in the text, starting with the relationship between the number 7 and how Matthew structures Jesus’ genealogy.
A Better Jubilee
The first hidden glory to see is how Matthew deploys sets of sevens in this genealogy to present Jesus’ coming as the beginning of the seventh “week,” or seventh set of seven, in the genealogies. That is, he presents Jesus’ coming as a Jubilee.
The Jubilee law is a law from Leviticus 25, where Israel was required to count off seven series of seven “weeks” of years, or what the text calls seven Sabbaths of years, which is 49 years.
And on the tenth day of the seventh month—which is the Day of Atonement—a trumpet was blown, the fiftieth year began, and they were to return all property that had been sold amongst the Jewish peoples, so families could return to the land they were given by God in the conquest, debts would be forgiven, slaves were freed, and the people would take a year off of work.
I’m sure you see the glorious shape of that command! The people celebrate atonement for their sins, blowing a trumpet of Jubilee on the tenth day of the seventh month of the seventh series of seven years. Captives are set free in this Jubilee. Debts are forgiven in this Jubilee. And all starting on the Day of Atonement.
Let me explain how we see a reference to Jesus’ coming as a Jubilee in the numbers Matthew deploys. The genealogy of Matthew 1 is broken into three sets of 14. More on the significance of that number 14, in a moment.
But three sets of fourteen is the equivalent of six sets of seven, the number 42, which has lots of significance in Daniel’s prophecies, as well as the book of Revelation’s prophecies, concerning the arrival of Christ to make an end of sin and of Old Covenant Israel. There is a whole section of this sermon I removed for the sake of time concerning Daniel’s Seventy Weeks prophecy—which is a Super-Jubilee prophecy, concerning the number 49 multiplied by 10—so ask me about that one later.
But for now, just know that the number 42 is a significant number, and it is a period of six sevens. That is a number that leaves you hanging, that makes you long for the seventh seven, the Jubilee. And Matthew’s genealogy ends after the sixth seven. Or does it?
No! Actually, after those six sevens, who shows up in the seventh slot, the Sabbath slot, the Jubilee slot? Jesus! Here’s the point, and theologian Peter Leithart sums it up better than I could:
“Jesus comes in the ‘seventh’ position, the sabbatical position, in this creation-genealogy. After the ups and downs of Israel’s history, Sabbath—a super-Sabbath, a 7 x 7 Sabbath, a Jubilee Sabbath—has arrived in Jesus. Jesus brings Sabbath as the new Moses, delivering us from the bondage of Egypt. He brings Sabbath as the new Joshua, subduing the land to peace and delivering an inheritance. He is David, putting down our enemies on every side. Jesus comes to deliver Israel from the burdens imposed by hypocritical Pharisees. And He comes to release our burdens of anxiety and fear. He comes to announce the year of Jubilee, which took place in the year after the seventh sabbatical year, the year when slaves are released, when all Israelites returned to their ancestral lands, the year that saw Israel reordered and put right. Jubilee means the end of exile, and Jesus comes as Lord of Jubilee.”
-Peter J. Leithart (Jesus As Israel: Volume I, 54)
David’s Kingdom, Expanded
The second hidden glory to see is how Matthew presents Jesus as the ultimate and better son of David. This one is very quick to see.
Again, the genealogy is divided into three segments of 14. If you count, you will notice that David is the 14th name on the list. And lo and behold, the numerical value of David’s name is 14.
Let me explain how that works: Using a literary device that was very common among the Jews, where they would assign numerical values to each letter of the alphabet and then add those up to arrive at a number for a name. As I said earlier, that is what John is doing in Revelation with the number 666—which is a reference to the numerical value of Nero’s name.
I know that sounds weird to us, but this practice is anything but weird to both ancient Greeks, Romans, and Hebrews. It was fairly commonplace. And so this genealogy is intentionally divided into sets of 14, centers in the middle on the 14th name on the list, David, whose name adds up to 14. Not an accident.
What’s the point? Well, the structure is meant to highlight what’s at the middle: David. This makes total sense, since David’s reign is the center, the high point, of Israel’s history. Israel grows to its zenith from Abraham to David over 14 generations. Then it declines and becomes diseased from David to the exile in another 14 generations, finally succumbing to foreign rule completely when the Southern Kingdom falls.
But wait! 14 generations later, who arrives? Jesus! The one who will restore David’s throne—who will actually fulfill it by sitting on it forever and ever. This is why we will see Jesus preach so often and so emphatically and so centrally about the arrival of the Kingdom of God with his own arrival. It was because he came to make of David’s throne what it was always meant to be.
This is good news for us, right here where we sit today. It means that, ruling over the world, ruling over the Kingdom to which we belong, is a King who is establishing—and will fully and perfectly in the fullness of time establish—perfect peace, justice, joy, and order.
He is taking up the list of our debts owed to the crown and writing them off in his blood. He is making his enemies a footstool for his feet. He is winning a royal bride for himself. In Christ, we find the restoration of David’s throne.
And in all of this, he doesn’t just restore David’s Kingdom; he expands David’s Kingdom, not just over the land of Canaan, but the entire world. This brings us to the third hidden glory to see, which has everything to do with four women with questionable bloodlines nestled into this genealogy.
Four Women
Matthew includes four women in his genealogy, in addition to Mary, the mother of Jesus:
Tamar, from Genesis 38, who maybe you remember was the daughter-in-law of Judah—yes, the Judah from whom we get the tribe of Judah, the tribe from which Christ comes. But this is an unpleasant story. Tamar, Judah’s daughter-in-law, dresses up as a prostitute to seduce Judah, getting pregnant with twin boys, Perez and Zerah, and subsequently trapping him in his lies. She is then vindicated as Judah pronounces her more righteous than himself, and she comes under his household protection.
Then, Matthew ties Christ to Rahab, from Joshua 2, who was the prostitute who hid the Israelite spies as they spied out the city of Jericho, and become an adopted member of Israel for her faith.
Next is Ruth, the Moabite woman who married into Israel, but became a widow and subsequently married Boaz, a kinsman redeemer who brought her under his wing.
And finally, we have Bathsheba, who had been married to Uriah the Hittite, a might warrior of David’s, but who then committed adultery with David, who murdered her husband, married her, and eventually gave birth to Solomon, who would become king, with her.
So here’s the obvious question for Matthew: Why these four women? Why not some less problematic women, such as Sarah, Rachel, or Abigail? You begin to see why when you see some of the threads that tie these four women together:
First, of the four, all but Ruth are at least partly connected to some moral travesty, and even Ruth’s initial connection to Boaz (if you read the story) has shades of scandal.
All four of these women get pregnant and give birth in what most onlookers would consider shady circumstances—just like the woman who actually could be considered the fifth woman in the genealogy, Mary, who was considered a loose woman due to her miraculous conception of Jesus—which we’ll see next week. Mary is initially seen as a sinful woman—just like these four women—but is vindicated, just like these women are all vindicated in their stories. Matthew may intend through these women to rebuke those who slandered Mary.
But there is another reason that Matthew included these four women, and one that unfolds one of the glories of Jesus’ coming and ministry: All four are either Gentiles or, in the case of Bathsheba, married in a Gentile household, Uriah, who is explicitly named in the genealogy.
Tamar is a Canaanite.
Rahab is a Canaanite.
Ruth is a Moabite.
Bathsheba is married into a Hittite household.
What’s the point? Even in Jesus’ very family tree—and you see this both in his adoptive father’s genealogy here in Matthew and Mary’s genealogy in Luke’s gospel—God has incorporated the whole world, Jew and Gentile.
The blood of Gentiles is running in the veins of Christ. He is no mere savior of Jews: He is the Savior of the world. Through this Son of Abraham, the promise to Abraham will see its fulfillment as all the nations of the earth are blessed. The Seed of Abraham is built with Gentile blood—Canaanites and Moabites and Hittites—and he will bring into his one body the blood of every tribe and family of earth.
Sinners, Scoundrels, Sons of Abraham
So I hope you see that Solomon was right:
“It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.”
-Proverbs 25:2
There are glories hidden in some of the corners of the Scriptures that seem at first glance to be the most mundane. Even here in this little corner of Matthew, there is explosively good news hidden:
Our Lord has come to set the captives free; his coming is the eternal Jubilee.
Our Lord has come to sit on David’s throne, but as the one in whom the blood of nations runs, the one who will fulfill the global promise to Abraham. He is making a new humanity after his own image.
And so this first chapter of Matthew’s gospel eagerly looks forward to the final words of the last chapter—wherein the Lord commissions and sends his disciples-turned-apostles to bring the Kingdom to the nations.
Let me leave you with one final glory hiding in this text, one which is hard to miss: This genealogy preaches to us that there is no depth of sin that our God cannot overcome, nowhere too low for his reach. The Lord Jesus comes from a long line of sinners and scoundrels to identify with us, sinners and scoundrels all—men and women made of the same stuff as Jesus’ family tree.
He came to redeem hypocrites and sexual miscreants and sinners like Judah and Tamar and Rahab. Is that you? Are you the guy with the filthy search history and the secret lusts? The Lord Jesus came from Judah’s line to save men like Judah. Repent of your sin and turn to him now for cleansing.
And He is all of this relentlessly and unstoppably: He is a relentless Savior and an utterly sovereign God. In ages past, he was at work, bending all of history towards the singularity that is the advent of Christ. Not one movement of one atom left the rails of his control for one millisecond of history in order to bring about the coming of the Lord.
So hear this: Do you belong to the Lord? Are you his? Has he called you, cleansed you, resurrected you, forgiven you, renewed you, adopted you? Sleep in peace tonight: The God who bent all of human history to his purposes is keeping you. What do you have to fear? Nothing. Not a thing.
Not one thing, whether in life or death, sickness or health, poverty or abounding, because you belong, body and soul, now and forever, to God the Father and our Lord Jesus.
He is not ashamed to be called our God, because he is a God who makes the unworthy worthy. He is a God who forgives. He is a God slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, keeping covenant to the thousandth generation of those who love him and keep his commands.
He accomplishes in his people what he requires in his people. So as we come to his table this morning together to commune with God and each other around his body which was given and his blood which was shed—repent with alacrity. Sing with confidence. Come with boldness. Don’t dare not to come.