Beyond the Names: Unpacking the Gritty, Grace-Filled Genealogy of Jesus

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
Thank you for watching!

[00:01:49] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
In excelsis Deo
[00:02:22] Shepherds, why this jubilee?
[00:02:27] Why your joyous strains prolong?
[00:02:34] What the gladsome tidings be Which inspire your heavenly songs

[00:02:49] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]:
In excelsis Deo In excelsis Deo

[00:03:14] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
Glory to God, Glory to God, Glory to God in the highest forever All He has done is unfailing love Glory to God in the highest forever
[00:03:31] Come to Bethlehem and see Him whose birth the angels sing Come adore on bended knee Christ the Lord the new born King Sing with us
[00:04:00] In excelsis Deo In excelsis Deo
[00:04:19] Glory to God Glory to God Glory to God in the highest forever All He has done is upend Him up Glory to God in the highest forever Glory to God
[00:04:37] Glory to God, glory to God in the highest forever Holiest God, His unfailing love Glory to God in the highest forever
[00:04:54] Glory, glory, glory to God in the highest Glory, glory, glory to God in the highest

[00:05:14] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]:
Good morning, good morning Watermark Church.
[00:05:16] My name is Courtney and it is so great to see all of you here this morning.
[00:05:20] Let me share a couple things coming up around here at Watermark.
[00:05:23] Kicking off tonight, we're having Jingle and Mingle.
[00:05:25] Please come back 5 to 7 this evening for fun, food, and fellowship.
[00:05:30] We're going to sing and we're going to eat a lot, so come hungry.
[00:05:34] Bring a friend, bring the family.
[00:05:35] We look forward to seeing you there.
[00:05:37] Up next, Calling All Teens, you guys are going to have your Christmas party next Sunday from 5 to 7.30.
[00:05:43] Please wear all red or all green because you guys are going to be playing a game related to that.
[00:05:49] And then we also ask that you bring a side or dessert to share, and Watermark is going to provide the main course.
[00:05:55] And then, rounding out December, we're going to have two Christmas Eve services, one at 3 and one at 4.30, so please join us for that.
[00:06:03] With that, I'm going to kick it over to Sam and Hannah for the Advent reading.

[00:06:07] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_03]:
Today marks the second Sunday in the Advent season leading up to the celebration of Jesus' birth.
[00:06:19] It is a joyful season of preparation and anticipation.
[00:06:22] Through the prophets Isaiah and Micah, the Lord promised, therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign.
[00:06:27] The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son and will call him Emmanuel.
[00:06:32] Isaiah 7.14 But you, Bethlehem, through you, our small nation among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler of Israel, whose origins are from old and from ancient times.
[00:06:44] Micah 5.2

[00:06:47] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]:
Jesus is the Messiah that had been promised for generations.
[00:06:51] The Apostle John makes clear that Jesus Christ is the one a dark world desperately needs.
[00:06:57] In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
[00:07:02] He was with God in the beginning.
[00:07:04] Through Him all things were made.
[00:07:06] Without Him nothing was made that has been made.
[00:07:10] In Him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.
[00:07:14] The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
[00:07:18] John 1, 1-5 Today, along with the candle representing light, we ignite the candle representing God's glorious promise of a Savior who is Jesus Christ.

[00:07:31] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
In Jesus' name we pray.
[00:07:46] Amen.

[00:08:06] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
Behold the King has come Divinity incarnate Creator of the world
[00:08:25] Behold what light has come And the dark cannot contain it The Savior of the world is finally here
[00:08:46] O come, let us adore Him O come, let us adore Him For He alone is worthy Christ the Lord
[00:09:15] Father's love beyond all comprehension He gave His only Son to die in our place Go and see that empty tomb
[00:09:37] He's not there for He is risen Every heart prepared in room
[00:09:46] Jesus Christ the King of Heaven O come let us adore Him O come let us adore Him For He alone is worthy Christ the Lord
[00:10:23] We give you all the glory Christ the Lord We give you all the glory We give you all the glory We give you all the glory
[00:10:51] We praise your name forever.
[00:11:03] We praise your name forever.
[00:11:09] Sing with us!
[00:11:13] O come, let us adore Him O come, let us adore Him For He alone is worthy Christ the Lord
[00:11:32] Oh come let us adore Him Oh come let us adore Him For He alone is worthy Christ the Lord Christ the Lord He is Christ the Lord

[00:12:04] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_06]:
Hallelujah, Hallelujah, for the Lord God Almighty reigns.
[00:12:41] Alleluia Alleluia For the Lord God Almighty reigns Alleluia Holy
[00:13:14] Are you Lord God Almighty?
[00:13:21] What is the name?
[00:13:25] What is the name?
[00:13:27] You are holy
[00:13:35] Are you Lord God Almighty Worthiest of them Worthiest of them Amen

[00:14:00] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
In the darkness we were waiting Without hope, without light Till from heaven you came running There was mercy in your eyes To fulfill the law and prophets To a virgin came the Word From a throne of endless glory To a cradle in the blood
[00:14:35] Praise the Father, praise the Son, praise the Spirit, three in one.
[00:14:51] God of glory, majesty, praise forever to the King of kings.
[00:15:07] To reveal the kingdom coming and to reconcile the lost Now You've redeemed the whole creation Oh You did not despise the cross For even in Your suffering You saw to the other side Knowing this was our salvation Oh Jesus for our sake You died
[00:15:41] Praise the Father!
[00:15:49] Praise the Son!
[00:15:53] Praise the Spirit!

[00:15:59] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
Three in one!

[00:15:59] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]:
God of Glory!
[00:16:04] Praise forever to Thee!

[00:16:14] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
And the morning that you rose All of heaven held its breath Till that stone was moved for good For the Lamb had conquered death And the dead rose from their tombs And the angels stood in awe For the souls of all who come To the Father are restored
[00:16:42] And the church of Christ was born Then the Spirit lit the flame Now this gospel truth of hope Shall not kneel, shall not faint By His blood and in His name And in His freedom I am free For the love of Jesus Christ Who has resurrected me
[00:17:16] Praise the Father!
[00:17:21] Praise the Son!
[00:17:24] Praise the Spirit!
[00:17:34] In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
[00:17:56] Amen.
[00:17:59] God of glory, majesty Praise forever to the King of Kings Praise forever to the King of Kings Praise forever to the King of Kings

[00:18:28] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_07]:
We praise you, Jesus, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, Prince of Peace, Wonderful Counselor, Son of God,
[00:18:57] Father God, we thank you so much for your sacrifice to do something that we can never do, to give us your Son, your one and only Son, part of the three in one, who covers us so that we can have relationship and covenant with you through his blood that was shed for our sin.
[00:19:24] We thank you God that when we approach you like this, when we have a relationship with Jesus, that you see Jesus first.
[00:19:36] We are so thankful that He is on the right hand of the throne of God.
[00:19:44] And it is such a joy to get to worship like this.
[00:19:50] God, we pray that we would remember your Son, Jesus, every day, not just because of the season.
[00:19:55] The seasons change, but our Savior is the same.
[00:19:59] And we give you all the glory, to Christ the Lord, and it's in your name we pray.

[00:20:05] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
Amen.
[00:20:23] Thank you for watching!

[00:20:37] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
Well, good morning.
[00:20:39] Hey, it's great to see y'all today.
[00:20:40] So glad you're here.
[00:20:42] You know, I'm excited.
[00:20:43] We're in a second week of our Advent season, kind of, you know, preparing for and anticipating the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
[00:20:53] You know, I think about Christmas, you know, what it meant to me and what it means to me, and in particular growing up.
[00:20:59] Do you have any for you?
[00:21:01] Any great Christmas memories?
[00:21:03] Anything come to mind from your Christmas past?
[00:21:06] You know, I have a lot of those, and I could share a bunch with, again, when I was growing up, but I have one in particular that stands out to me.
[00:21:13] 38 years ago, on Christmas Eve, you know what I did that night?
[00:21:18] I asked Lori to marry me.
[00:21:21] yeah and she said yeah she said I'll do it and 51 weeks later she kept her promise we got married on December 17th 1988 so we'll be celebrating I don't know 37 38 years this this December and uh you know I always look back with with you know a lot of excitement about that night and what it meant to me and
[00:21:44] the fact that she would say yes to me and then kept that promise and so again 51 weeks later we got married and you may say well that's interesting how'd you come up with that December 17th and the reason we did that is because we were in college at the time so we were juniors we had to do it on a break so it was Christmas break and not only that there might be a little better reason the better reason was because the church was already decorated for Christmas
[00:22:09] So we saved a fortune on decor and flowers, and flowers were a big thing in weddings in the 80s.
[00:22:16] I don't know if they are as much today, but they were then.
[00:22:18] So we saved a fortune, and we were thankful to be able to do that and celebrate that day.
[00:22:24] So we've got an anniversary coming up in 10 days, I guess, right?
[00:22:28] So maybe you have some great Christmas memories.
[00:22:31] One of the greatest memories for any of us who are believers is the promise that God kept for us.
[00:22:39] The promise that was fulfilled for us in the coming of a Savior who is Jesus Christ.
[00:22:44] So during this season, we're drawn to Luke's Gospel, right?
[00:22:48] We love to read the Gospel story in Luke chapter 2.
[00:22:52] We don't read as much in Matthew, particularly in Matthew chapter 1, about Jesus
[00:22:57] Genesis, Genesis, Genesis, Genesis
[00:23:13] Stable, Jesus being laid to rest in that manger surrounded by farm animals, by shepherds, and you know as history would have it, later wise men, right?
[00:23:25] So that's the one we love to read, Luke's account.
[00:23:29] But Matthew is different.
[00:23:31] Matthew chapter 1 in the New Testament starts with something a bit tedious, maybe uninteresting at first glance.
[00:23:38] Chances are that when you started reading the New Testament in Matthew that you may have skimmed over at best or maybe skipped over completely the genealogy of Jesus that's in Matthew chapter 1.
[00:23:53] But if all the Bible is God-breathed, as the Apostle Paul makes clear in 2 Timothy 3.16, then that means that these very first verses in the New Testament must matter.
[00:24:07] They must say something to us.
[00:24:09] So why did Matthew go to the trouble of outlining Jesus' ancestry at the beginning of his Gospel?
[00:24:17] What does that teach us?
[00:24:19] What do all those people teach us about who Jesus is and about what Jesus came to do?
[00:24:25] And why does any of that matter to you and me?
[00:24:28] You know, maybe it's something you haven't thought about before.
[00:24:31] Again, in this series we're calling Christmas Unwrapped.
[00:24:33] We're talking about the story, maybe behind the story, the story you didn't know about a very familiar story.
[00:24:41] So we're going to look at that this morning, answer some of those hard questions because here's the truth.
[00:24:47] Some of you may think that God doesn't have any interest in you.
[00:24:51] Maybe you feel like that you made a mess of your life to this point.
[00:24:55] You made far too many bad decisions.
[00:24:57] You've taken too many missteps in your life to this point.
[00:25:01] Some of you, maybe you think that God isn't paying attention to you.
[00:25:05] That He has far too much to do.
[00:25:08] Let us pray.
[00:25:15] Let us pray.
[00:25:27] Some of you, maybe you have friends, maybe you have family members who are far from God and you desperately want to find a way to help bridge that gap, to help them to find their way, to make their way to Jesus.
[00:25:40] Listen, here's the truth.
[00:25:41] No matter where you are in your faith journey,
[00:25:43] No matter where you are in life's journey, I don't think you're here today, I don't think you're watching today by accident.
[00:25:49] I think that God has brought you to this place on purpose and for a purpose.
[00:25:53] You see, He wants you to know, He wants you to see how He has fulfilled His promise to you and to a world that desperately needed Him to work in a way that only He could.
[00:26:06] But before we dig into His Word today, let's pray.
[00:26:11] Our Father, I'm so grateful for this chance to be in Your house with my friends today.
[00:26:16] And God, I'm so grateful for the songs that we've been able to lift to You, to praise You for who You are.
[00:26:21] You are holy.
[00:26:22] You are magnificent.
[00:26:23] You are wonderful in every way.
[00:26:26] And God, I pray that now as we open your word, God, that you would speak to our hearts, to our minds.
[00:26:31] God, that you would open our hearts to what you have to say to us today.
[00:26:36] God, if there's someone in this room or watching today who does not yet know Jesus as Savior and Lord, I pray that you would use this opportunity to convict them, to convince them of the truth.
[00:26:47] That He is the light of the world.
[00:26:50] He can change their lives.
[00:26:51] God, He can change every person's life in this room, no matter where we are in our faith journey or life journey.
[00:26:58] So move, God, in our lives today as we unpack Your Word to us.
[00:27:03] We pray it in Jesus' holy and precious name.
[00:27:06] Amen.
[00:27:07] So question.
[00:27:09] Have you ever dug any into your ancestry?
[00:27:13] Into your family history?
[00:27:15] Into your family tree?
[00:27:17] Anybody in here ever done that?
[00:27:19] Yeah, some of you have.
[00:27:20] Some of you have.
[00:27:20] Did you find out anything interesting about your past doing that?
[00:27:24] You know, some of you may have, I was talking to some folks on the way out this morning.
[00:27:28] Somebody came up to me and said, you know, I found out something interesting in my past.
[00:27:31] I'm related to a rather notorious judge.
[00:27:35] He was called the hanging judge.
[00:27:37] He hung about everybody that came in front of him.
[00:27:40] I said, that must be kind of tough to think about.
[00:27:42] She said, yeah.
[00:27:43] Another person who came by said, you know, I found out in my family that over the, at least the last century, that every marriage in my family was broken.
[00:27:54] Except for mine and my husband's and a cousin of mine.
[00:27:57] We're the first ones in generations who have had a marriage that has lasted a lifetime, which was pretty cool.
[00:28:04] You know, maybe if you looked into your past, you would discover that you're related to somebody famous in your life.
[00:28:09] Wouldn't that be kind of cool?
[00:28:11] You discover you're related to maybe a great war hero, or you're related to a great general, or even to a president.
[00:28:20] That'd be kind of cool, right?
[00:28:22] What if you had a royalty, you know, a person who was of royal descent in your past?
[00:28:27] That'd be kind of cool too, right?
[00:28:29] But what if you discovered you were related to someone not famous but infamous, right?
[00:28:35] Someone who was maybe a criminal or a gangster or maybe a murderer, right?
[00:28:40] Maybe this notorious judge like that person talked about leaving earlier.
[00:28:46] You know, the truth is, whether you're related to someone famous, whether you're related to someone infamous, or like most of us, neither, your family history, your family tree, your ancestry, your genealogy says something about who you are.
[00:29:03] It's who your family is.
[00:29:05] And the same was true with Jesus.
[00:29:08] So who was Jesus related to?
[00:29:10] And why does any of this matter?
[00:29:12] You know, Jesus' family history must be important or it wouldn't be listed in the very first chapter, the opening words of the New Testament.
[00:29:21] Now, I'm not going to read all of it to you today because it's a long, I think the whole chapter is his genealogy.
[00:29:28] But I'm going to point out some salient verses, a few people here that might be important for us to know about because of what they say to us about who Jesus is and about what he came to do.
[00:29:41] So I'm going to read a few of these looking at Matthew chapter 1.
[00:29:44] Here's the opening verse.
[00:29:46] This is the genealogy of Jesus.
[00:29:48] The Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham.
[00:29:51] Judah, the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar.
[00:29:55] Perez, the father of Hezron.
[00:29:57] Hezron, the father of Ram.
[00:29:59] Salmon, the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab.
[00:30:02] Boaz, the father of Obe, whose mother was Ruth.
[00:30:06] Obed the father of Jesse and Jesse the father of King David David was father Solomon whose mother had been Uriah's wife and Jacob the father Joseph the husband of Mary Mary was the mother of Jesus who's called the Messiah thus there were 14 generations in all from Abraham to David 14 from David to the exile to Babylon and 14 from the exile to the Messiah
[00:30:35] So, why does Matthew take the time to outline the genealogy of Jesus?
[00:30:41] Why is that important?
[00:30:43] I think there are a few reasons.
[00:30:44] I'll give you a few right off the bat, and then we'll dig a little deeper, right?
[00:30:48] To get behind the story you thought you knew.
[00:30:50] The first is this.
[00:30:52] I think the genealogy of Jesus helps to substantiate Jesus' life.
[00:30:58] You know, these people that are named here in Matthew chapter 1 let us know who he is and who's a part of his family tree.
[00:31:07] Now many of these folks that are mentioned in Matthew chapter 1 have significant stories that are detailed in the Bible.
[00:31:15] And the fact that these people are mentioned in this list
[00:31:18] shows the historical accuracy of really the life of Jesus, especially when you consider that some of these people named in this genealogy have a little bit of a scandalous past.
[00:31:33] I'll tell you more about that in just a minute listen when you dug into your family history those of you who did you may have discovered some of the people in your past were a bit scandalous again like that hanging judge that that person told me about you know it may be that you want to kind of erase some of those people out of your past but the truth is you can't because if you did it wouldn't be historically accurate
[00:31:56] Same is true with Jesus' genealogy.
[00:31:59] This is accurate because all of these people are named no matter their past.
[00:32:06] And we'll talk more about that in a minute.
[00:32:08] I think another reason this genealogy is important is that it authenticates the prophecies and the promises of the Old Testament.
[00:32:16] So the Messiah was prophesied to come from the line of
[00:32:21] David.
[00:32:22] That's in Isaiah 11.1.
[00:32:25] So by recording his lineage, God confirms that Jesus was indeed descended from David.
[00:32:32] Jesus' genealogy is really a testament to his fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies and the promises.
[00:32:40] I think there's a third reason this genealogy matters and really all that are in the Bible.
[00:32:46] The genealogy demonstrates the detail-oriented nature of God and His interest in individuals.
[00:32:56] This is important.
[00:32:57] And God didn't see Israel vaguely.
[00:33:00] He didn't see Israel as a nebulous group of people.
[00:33:04] He viewed them with specificity.
[00:33:06] He viewed them with precision and with detail.
[00:33:10] and there's nothing detached about these genealogies this one or any other that appears in God's Word you see they reveal that God is involved in intimate historical details these are real people with the real stories and real purposes the fact that a list like this appears as it does again throughout God's Word and here shows that God cares about each person and the details of his or her life
[00:33:39] Now why does that matter to you and me?
[00:33:42] You know why it matters?
[00:33:44] Because it means He cares about you too.
[00:33:46] That He cares about me too.
[00:33:49] That you, that I, am significant to Him.
[00:33:52] That you matter to Him.
[00:33:53] He knows you by name.
[00:33:54] In fact, Jesus would later say in Matthew 10.30 that the very hairs on your head are numbered.
[00:34:01] So whether you have thousands of hairs or just a few,
[00:34:06] God knows every one of them, right?
[00:34:08] He's numbered them.
[00:34:10] And this is important.
[00:34:12] He is a detail-oriented God who cares deeply about everything in your life.
[00:34:17] So understand, God inspired Matthew to list this genealogy in the way he did because Jesus' genealogy substantiates his life, his history.
[00:34:29] It authenticates the prophecies, the promises that are made throughout the Old Testament.
[00:34:33] And it demonstrates God's detail, his interest in people, including you and me.
[00:34:40] So here's another question.
[00:34:42] What does Jesus' genealogy teach us about Christmas and about Christianity?
[00:34:49] I love what the late pastor and author Timothy Keller writes about this in his book called Hidden Christmas.
[00:34:56] I referenced it last week and I'll do it again this week because that book really serves as an inspiration for me throughout this series, so credit to him for that.
[00:35:06] You know, I think it's vital to understand that Christmas is much more than the story of the birth of a baby.
[00:35:14] It's about a coming.
[00:35:15] An anticipation, a preparation for the one who would come.
[00:35:20] It's why we celebrate Advent.
[00:35:22] It's why we're kind of building up to what we will do on Christmas Eve when we light the Christ candle.
[00:35:27] We've lit two candles representing the light and now the promise.
[00:35:31] This is important.
[00:35:33] God had planned for the arrival of His Son even before the creation of this earth.
[00:35:39] And throughout His Word, God foreshadowed who Jesus would be
[00:35:43] Throughout the course of history.
[00:35:45] So the people named in this genealogy are worth a closer look because
[00:35:51] These people, they teach us a lot about who Jesus is and about what he came to do.
[00:35:57] So this genealogy helps us to understand, I think, three vital truths.
[00:36:04] And you may write these down.
[00:36:05] The first is this, that the gospel is not a fantasy story.
[00:36:10] It is a reality story.
[00:36:13] And it's important that you understand that because there are some people who want to argue that it's a fantasy story.
[00:36:20] It's not reality.
[00:36:21] But it is.
[00:36:22] You see, Jesus' story, including his birth, it's not a fairy tale.
[00:36:27] It's life-changing good news.
[00:36:29] It's why Matthew didn't start his gospel with this line, Once upon a time.
[00:36:36] Right?
[00:36:36] Maybe you've heard that.
[00:36:37] Maybe you read those stories to your kids.
[00:36:40] You know, when my kids were growing up, we loved to go to the movies from time to time, to watch fairy tale movies.
[00:36:46] I remember one in particular when...
[00:36:48] I took Logan to see The Lion King, right?
[00:36:51] So we went into a packed theater.
[00:36:53] There were so many people in there, there were hardly no seats available.
[00:36:57] But I did find two seats, but there was a lady sitting between them.
[00:37:02] So I asked her, I said, Hey, do you mind sliding over one so I can sit with my son here?
[00:37:07] She wouldn't do it.
[00:37:09] She wouldn't do it.
[00:37:10] So I had to sit down with my son.
[00:37:11] It was awkward, the whole movie, right?
[00:37:13] He sat on my lap the whole time.
[00:37:15] And listen, he's a big boy.
[00:37:17] Have you seen him lately?
[00:37:18] So after that movie, I had to sit there for a while to try to get my legs to wake up because they were asleep within 10 minutes of the start of that movie.
[00:37:27] But we loved watching The Lion King.
[00:37:29] Later, we would go to see other movies like Toy Story, right?
[00:37:33] In fact, I think I read this week that Toy Story 5 is coming out next summer.
[00:37:39] Did you know that?
[00:37:40] I don't think I even knew there was a 3 or 4, but there it is.
[00:37:44] But we enjoyed those movies when my kids were growing up.
[00:37:47] Fairy tale movies are fun to watch.
[00:37:49] Fairy tale stories are interesting to read.
[00:37:53] But understand something about Jesus' story.
[00:37:55] This genealogy, it makes clear that His story is just that.
[00:38:00] It's history, you see.
[00:38:02] It's not a fantasy.
[00:38:04] It's reality.
[00:38:05] It's not a fabrication.
[00:38:06] It's world-changing information.
[00:38:08] It is life-changing good news.
[00:38:12] Let me ask you another question.
[00:38:13] Do you know why we called the gospel
[00:38:16] Good News.
[00:38:17] Anybody know that?
[00:38:19] Because there's no greater message that's ever been told than the Gospel message.
[00:38:24] It's not just a compelling story.
[00:38:27] It's not an urban myth.
[00:38:28] It's not a motivational anecdote.
[00:38:31] You see, R.C.
[00:38:32] Sproul says the Gospel is called the Good News because it addresses the most serious problem that you and I have as human beings.
[00:38:39] Did you know that?
[00:38:41] And it's pretty simple.
[00:38:43] You see, God is holy, and we are not.
[00:38:47] God is good, and we are not.
[00:38:49] God is just, and we are not.
[00:38:52] And at the end of my life, just like you, I'm going to have to stand before a holy, a good, and a just God, and I'll be judged.
[00:39:00] And I'll be judged either on the basis of my own righteousness, or the lack thereof, or the righteousness of another.
[00:39:09] The good news of the Gospel is that Jesus lived a life of perfect righteousness, of perfect obedience to God.
[00:39:17] Not for His own well-being, but for all who would trust Him to save them.
[00:39:22] You see, He has done for me what I couldn't possibly do for myself.
[00:39:29] And not only that, He lived that life of perfect obedience.
[00:39:34] He offered Himself as a perfect sacrifice to satisfy the justice and the righteousness of God.
[00:39:43] And our good and gracious God sent His only Son humbly, born in a stable, to ultimately, humbly die on a cross.
[00:39:54] Now why would He do that?
[00:39:57] This is because of God's gracious love for you and for me.
[00:40:02] You see, that's not advice that I'm giving you.
[00:40:06] That's not just a feel-good story.
[00:40:08] The Lion King was.
[00:40:10] The Toy Story was.
[00:40:12] This is not a fairy tale.
[00:40:14] This is not a fantasy tale.
[00:40:16] It is life-changing, world-changing reality.
[00:40:21] It's good news.
[00:40:22] It's news you can use.
[00:40:24] Jesus' genealogy makes very clear that His story is history.
[00:40:30] You see?
[00:40:30] Real, life-changing, good news for you and me.
[00:40:34] But there's a second truth that I want you to understand about Jesus' genealogy.
[00:40:39] And that's this, that the gospel turns the world's values upside down.
[00:40:46] Let me ask you a question.
[00:40:48] If you were applying for a job, if you wanted to get a new job, let's say it's the end of the year and you're thinking, maybe I need to try something new.
[00:40:57] So you're going to submit for a job.
[00:40:59] What will you submit in order to try to get that job?
[00:41:02] What is it?
[00:41:04] A resume.
[00:41:05] So why would you submit a resume?
[00:41:06] What does that say about you?
[00:41:09] yeah it gives your your history right it it tells us a little bit about your education maybe your goals and you know your vocational life it will tell a little bit about your work work history you know where you've been who you work for give us some indication of your qualifications for this particular job so yeah you know all of us in this room probably at some point have compiled a resume and if you haven't you probably will
[00:41:34] At some point.
[00:41:35] So in the first century when Jesus came along, people didn't compile resumes.
[00:41:40] They didn't.
[00:41:41] They didn't do that to detail who they were.
[00:41:44] They compiled genealogies.
[00:41:47] In that time, people were less interested in your education or your qualifications than they were in your family relations.
[00:41:54] They wanted to know who you were related to.
[00:41:56] It was a communal, it was a family-oriented society.
[00:42:00] People wanted to know who you were related to because chances are they knew somebody in your family.
[00:42:06] Because most people in that time, they didn't move very far.
[00:42:09] People hung around where they were born, where they grew up.
[00:42:12] So your family history communicated a lot about who you were.
[00:42:17] Now, that could be a good thing, or it could be a bad thing, right?
[00:42:23] Depending on who's in your family history.
[00:42:26] But in that time, your family, your pedigree, your clan, it constituted your resume.
[00:42:31] So your genealogy was a way of saying to the world, this is who I am, right?
[00:42:37] Now here's a question.
[00:42:39] Do you think that people tinkered with their genealogies in the same way that we might tinker with our resumes today?
[00:42:46] You know, so if you were putting that resume together, there might be a thing or two that you might leave off, right?
[00:42:53] If you can, not to say that you're lying, but you might just leave it off, right?
[00:42:58] They can find out more, ask more questions.
[00:43:00] We do that to make ourselves look as good as we possibly can to get the job we want.
[00:43:07] Interesting, the same thing went on with these genealogies in ancient times.
[00:43:13] People would kind of scrub off those folks that they didn't want associated with them.
[00:43:18] In fact, Herod the Great was notorious for doing that.
[00:43:22] He purged some of the names from his own genealogy that he didn't want to be connected with.
[00:43:27] See, the purpose of a genealogical resume in ancient times was to impress people.
[00:43:35] You wanted people to look at your genealogy and say, wow, look at the quality of people who are on here.
[00:43:42] Look at the respectable people that are listed in this person's ancestry.
[00:43:47] You know, those that make up this family tree that would impress people.
[00:43:52] That's the hope, right?
[00:43:53] So, yeah.
[00:43:55] There was some scrubbing.
[00:43:56] There was some tinkering going on with these genealogies in the ancient times in the same way we would scrub our own resumes.
[00:44:05] But here's something really interesting.
[00:44:08] Are you ready for this?
[00:44:09] So, this doesn't seem to be what Matthew's doing at all when he lists Jesus' ancestry, his genealogy.
[00:44:17] In fact, he seems to be doing the exact opposite of that.
[00:44:22] He's not scrubbing it.
[00:44:23] He's not cleaning it up.
[00:44:25] He's not deleting anybody.
[00:44:26] It's oddly and shockingly unlike any other genealogy you might see in that time.
[00:44:33] So you may ask, how does Jesus' genealogy differ from others in ancient times?
[00:44:40] I'll give you a few shocking revelations.
[00:44:44] Are you ready for this?
[00:44:45] The first is this.
[00:44:48] There are five women who are listed in Jesus' genealogy.
[00:44:53] You may say, well, that's not a big deal.
[00:44:55] Why is that such a big deal?
[00:44:56] It wouldn't be in our society, in our culture, but it would be in that one because that was a patriarchal-driven culture.
[00:45:04] Women were almost never named in these kinds of lists.
[00:45:09] It would have been unheard of, much less five of them.
[00:45:14] Now note something else shocking here.
[00:45:17] Most of the five women were Gentiles.
[00:45:21] Gentiles!
[00:45:22] Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, two Canaanites, and a Moabite.
[00:45:29] Now that's unusual.
[00:45:30] Well, you say, well, why is that such a big deal?
[00:45:34] Because these women would have been considered unclean in ancient times among the ancient Jews because of their national heritage.
[00:45:43] They wouldn't have even been allowed to go into the temple or the tabernacle for worship.
[00:45:51] Yet here they are in Jesus' genealogy.
[00:45:55] It's a little shocking, right?
[00:45:57] But there's another shocking revelation here.
[00:45:59] I don't want you to miss.
[00:46:00] These women, they point to the sordid, immoral, and kind of nasty incidents in the Bible.
[00:46:09] Some of this plays out like an episode of Jerry Springer.
[00:46:13] You remember that guy, right?
[00:46:16] Or Sally Jessie Raphael or Donahue, those people.
[00:46:20] Is there any modern day, I know that's a dated reference, right?
[00:46:23] Some of you are like, who's that?
[00:46:24] Is there a modern day equivalent to that guy?
[00:46:26] I don't even know.
[00:46:27] Maybe he still has a show.
[00:46:29] I don't watch it.
[00:46:30] But it kind of feels like something he would have on his show, right?
[00:46:34] Some dysfunction that was popular on those kind of afternoon talk shows.
[00:46:39] So I'll give you an example.
[00:46:40] Matthew tells us that Judah was the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother is Tamar.
[00:46:46] Now what happened there?
[00:46:48] You know that story?
[00:46:49] I'll give you a quick synopsis.
[00:46:52] It's sorted.
[00:46:53] So Tamar tricked her father-in-law Judah into sleeping with her.
[00:46:58] Right?
[00:46:59] Which was an act of incest.
[00:47:01] It was against the law of God.
[00:47:03] And, you know, even though Jesus was descended from Perez, from Zerah, not from Zerah, Matthew includes both of them and Judah and Tamar in Jesus' genealogy.
[00:47:16] So we're reminded of that whole sordid story.
[00:47:21] So it was out of that dysfunction that the Messiah came.
[00:47:26] Does that make you feel better about your family?
[00:47:28] Right?
[00:47:30] But wait, there's more.
[00:47:32] So look at verse 5.
[00:47:33] There's one named here Rahab.
[00:47:35] You know anything about Rahab?
[00:47:38] Her story?
[00:47:39] She was a Canaanite by heritage and by vocation she was a what?
[00:47:43] A prostitute, yeah?
[00:47:46] Not exactly a stellar pedigree to be a part of the Messianic lineage, right?
[00:47:52] But let's talk about another.
[00:47:54] How about this one mentioned in verse 6?
[00:47:57] King David.
[00:47:59] Wow, now hold on a minute.
[00:48:01] Wouldn't it be kind of cool to have a king in your lineage, in your genealogy?
[00:48:07] That'd be awesome, right?
[00:48:08] I mean, most of us would be telling people about that.
[00:48:11] And here's the deal.
[00:48:12] It says in verse 6, Jesse, the father of King David, David was the father of Solomon, note this, whose mother had been Uriah's wife.
[00:48:23] Now that's an interesting way of writing that, because Uriah's wife had a name.
[00:48:28] What was her name?
[00:48:31] Bathsheba, right?
[00:48:32] So why did Matthew choose to leave Bathsheba's name out?
[00:48:37] Why did he actually write it that way, whose mother had been Uriah's wife?
[00:48:43] It's kind of interesting that he would write that way because it kind of calls attention to the sordid detail of that story.
[00:48:50] And maybe or maybe you don't know what that story is but it's one of the most notorious, it's one of the most tragic stories in the entire Bible.
[00:49:00] It's a difficult story in Israel's history.
[00:49:04] And if you don't know it, I'll give you the cliff notes.
[00:49:06] So before he was king, David was on the run from another king.
[00:49:11] It was King Saul.
[00:49:13] He wanted David dead.
[00:49:14] He wanted to kill him.
[00:49:16] So during that time, there were a group of men who came around David in the wilderness to protect him.
[00:49:23] One of those men was a fellow by the name of Uriah.
[00:49:27] He protected him in a time of great need and in many ways David owed his life to Uriah.
[00:49:34] It was sometime later when David became king that he was at home while his troops were away in battle including Uriah when David's eye caught this one named Bathsheba and he wanted her for himself.
[00:49:52] But there was a problem.
[00:49:54] Bathsheba was married to Uriah.
[00:49:57] So David took Uriah, he slept with her, and later he decided that he would have Uriah killed in battle.
[00:50:08] And then he would marry Bathsheba, have her for himself.
[00:50:12] And then later, of course, after the deed was done, David and Bathsheba were married.
[00:50:17] One of their children was Solomon, from whom Jesus descended.
[00:50:24] So why did Matthew leave Bathsheba's name out of Jesus lineage here?
[00:50:29] I think it wasn't really a slight to her, but really a slam against David in this moment to make it a powerful point.
[00:50:37] There's some family dysfunction here.
[00:50:39] This deeply flawed man, David, was from whom the Son of Man, the Messiah, came.
[00:50:47] You know, it may seem a little mind-blowing to consider that in Jesus' line there are people with some pretty dark and sinful pasts, right?
[00:50:55] I mean, even some of the prominent men here, like Judah, like David, had some serious baggage.
[00:51:01] They were moral failures, let's just call it like it is.
[00:51:05] You know, it's worth noting that the law of Moses would exclude these men from the presence of God, yet here they are again in the very lineage of Jesus.
[00:51:16] So why is this such a big deal?
[00:51:18] Why does it matter?
[00:51:19] What does it reveal that Jesus' ancestry includes some infamous people?
[00:51:26] This is worth writing down.
[00:51:27] There are some people in your life who need to know this and hear this.
[00:51:31] It matters because it reveals that no matter your past, you can be a part of the family of Jesus.
[00:51:39] You can.
[00:51:40] It doesn't matter your pedigree or your history.
[00:51:42] It doesn't matter your heavy baggage.
[00:51:44] It doesn't matter what you've done, the poor decisions that you've made, the sinful choices you've made.
[00:51:50] Here's the key.
[00:51:52] And that's a very important word, if.
[00:51:54] If you're willing to turn from that sin, to trust Jesus as your Savior, to follow Him as Lord, His grace is sufficient for you.
[00:52:05] That's great news.
[00:52:07] You know, it's through Jesus that your sins are forgiven, that your new life begins.
[00:52:12] I want you to understand something about ancient times here.
[00:52:15] There was a thing called ceremonial uncleanliness.
[00:52:19] If a person wanted to stay holy, they had to avoid anything that was not holy or considered unholy.
[00:52:27] But see, Jesus turns that notion upside down.
[00:52:30] Jesus' holiness isn't contaminated by contact with us.
[00:52:34] Instead, His holiness infects us.
[00:52:37] You see, around Watermark, we love to say, Jesus will meet you right where you are, but He will not leave you there.
[00:52:45] He wants to make you just like Him.
[00:52:48] That's great news.
[00:52:50] And when you repent, when you surrender your life to Him, He changes you.
[00:52:55] No matter your past.
[00:52:58] So looking again at these people in Jesus' ancestry, the women, they have these sketchy pasts, right?
[00:53:04] They were low on the societal totem pole.
[00:53:08] Yet look at King David.
[00:53:10] He was as high as you could get in the societal pecking order, right?
[00:53:14] He was royalty.
[00:53:16] Yet he too, just like these women, needed the grace of Jesus Christ.
[00:53:22] Prostitutes to Kings.
[00:53:24] These infamous people included in Jesus' genealogy prove that there is no one from the lowliest to the highest in society who can fail to receive the grace of Jesus Christ if they repent and place their faith in Him as Savior and Lord.
[00:53:43] And that includes you.
[00:53:45] That includes you.
[00:53:47] There's something else I want you to see before we leave this today.
[00:53:50] One more truth, a vital truth about His genealogy that matters.
[00:53:56] You see, God may take His time, but He always keeps His promises.
[00:54:01] Amen?
[00:54:02] Jesus' genealogy reminds us that the promise of the Messiah took generations to be fulfilled.
[00:54:08] But God kept his word.
[00:54:10] Jesus is linked to the father of our faith, to Abraham.
[00:54:13] In Matthew 1, this is the genealogy of Jesus, the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham.
[00:54:20] See, God made this promise to Abraham.
[00:54:23] In Genesis 12, verse 3, All peoples on earth will be blessed through you.
[00:54:30] By the way, long before that, God had promised that there would be one who would come who would crush the head of Satan, who would defeat evil.
[00:54:38] This is in Genesis chapter 3.
[00:54:40] Listen, this promise was a long time in coming.
[00:54:43] It really was.
[00:54:44] In fact, there were 400 years between the Old Testament and the New Testament, between these words that are spoken in Matthew that are recorded in our New Testament.
[00:54:53] It appeared that the Messiah was not coming, but then He came.
[00:54:58] You see, God doesn't always work on our timetable.
[00:55:01] He doesn't always work on our agenda.
[00:55:04] But when He does work, you be ready because He always exceeds our expectations.
[00:55:10] We see it in the Nativity.
[00:55:12] We see it throughout His Word.
[00:55:14] Consider Joseph, Jacob's son's story, he's mentioned here.
[00:55:19] Here's a guy who went through trial after trial after his brothers sold him into slavery.
[00:55:24] We spent weeks on a series in his life.
[00:55:27] For years it seemed like God wasn't paying attention to him, to his prayers, to his pleas, yet in the end we discovered that all of those things that had happened in his life had to happen.
[00:55:39] So that all those people could be saved.
[00:55:43] And Joseph ultimately understood that too when he was able to say to the very brothers who had betrayed him in Genesis 50-20, You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives.
[00:56:01] Rarely does God's grace operate on our timetable.
[00:56:06] Here's the truth.
[00:56:07] It may appear to us sometimes that God has forgotten His promises.
[00:56:11] But then He comes through in ways that we could have never imagined.
[00:56:16] Think again of that nativity.
[00:56:19] Could anyone have expected that?
[00:56:22] Could anyone have seen that coming?
[00:56:25] The Messiah, born not in a plush palace, but in a lowly manger.
[00:56:31] No one expected that, yet it makes all the sense in the world, doesn't it?
[00:56:36] It was only coming in such a humble way, and ultimately dying in such a humble way on that cross, that He could save us.
[00:56:45] God kept His promises.
[00:56:48] And you may say, well, that's great.
[00:56:52] God kept His promises.
[00:56:54] But I haven't exactly kept my promises to Him.
[00:56:57] I've made a mess of my life.
[00:56:59] I've done such stupid things and I can't take any of those things back.
[00:57:05] I want you to look again at Jesus' genealogy.
[00:57:07] I want you to see this name Jacob, Joseph's dad in verse 2.
[00:57:11] Abraham was the father of Isaac, Isaac the father of Jacob.
[00:57:15] Do you remember Jacob's story?
[00:57:17] Jacob had deceived his father Isaac to essentially steal the birthright of the firstborn, his firstborn brother Esau.
[00:57:27] And because of that deception, Jacob, he ended up causing this major rift in his family.
[00:57:32] He became a fugitive fleeing to a foreign land.
[00:57:34] He suffered consequences for his sin, including losing his family.
[00:57:39] And what Jacob did was wrong.
[00:57:41] There's no doubt about that.
[00:57:42] He suffered for it.
[00:57:43] But I want you to see this, that God is greater than our sin.
[00:57:47] He still used all man's sordidness, all man's selfishness to bring about His promises.
[00:57:56] God kept His promise despite man's foolishness.
[00:58:01] Jesus' genealogy makes that crystal clear.
[00:58:07] There's one overarching message of Christmas that I don't want you to miss here.
[00:58:13] That God is always working out His purposes and fulfilling His promises.
[00:58:21] It's who God is.
[00:58:24] Look, no matter your past, you can be a part of God's family.
[00:58:29] Some of you came into this room today or you started watching today and you were just curious.
[00:58:34] You weren't even sure why you were here or why you tuned in.
[00:58:38] But now you're starting to get it.
[00:58:41] You understand.
[00:58:42] Maybe you thought you weren't good enough for God, and I'll tell you, you're not.
[00:58:47] But thank God for Jesus Christ, because it's through Him, His perfect righteousness, His perfect obedience, that we, you and I, are made right with a perfect God, a just God, a good and gracious God.
[00:59:04] So maybe you're here today, watching today, and for the very first time, you would say yes to Jesus.
[00:59:10] Say, Jesus, I'm a sinner in need of a Savior.
[00:59:13] I want to invite you to save me.
[00:59:15] I know I've done far too many things in this life to hurt others and to hurt you, but I also know that Jesus died.
[00:59:26] In my place so that my sins could be forgiven and I could be right with you.
[00:59:32] If that's you today, you can pray a prayer in just a moment to invite Jesus into your heart.
[00:59:36] If you're here today, you've been a believer for a long time, you've heard this story, a story you thought you knew, but today you've heard it in a fresh and new way.
[00:59:44] And you're inspired again to go out to reach those in your sphere of influence who may not yet believe.
[00:59:51] And now you have something fresh and new to share with them.
[00:59:55] Life-changing good news.
[00:59:58] So do it and give the Holy Spirit a chance to work in their lives as only He can.
[01:00:03] I want to invite you to stand on your feet and I want to pray for you and with you.
[01:00:08] Our Father, we are so grateful for Your Word to us.
[01:00:12] God, it is powerful.
[01:00:14] It is life-changing.
[01:00:16] God, I want to thank You so much for the incredible gift of salvation that You offer us in Jesus.
[01:00:22] God, His genealogy
[01:00:25] It just shows us, just proves to us that He came to save imperfect people.
[01:00:32] Even Jesus' genealogy is filled with people just like us.
[01:00:37] Thank God You love them.
[01:00:40] And You met them right where they are.
[01:00:42] You'll meet us right where we are today.
[01:00:45] But God, You won't leave us there.
[01:00:47] You'll save us.
[01:00:49] God, if there's one in this place today who would say, Jesus, I'm a sinner in need of a Savior.
[01:00:54] I know that Savior is You.
[01:00:56] I want to surrender my life to You.
[01:00:58] I want to repent, to turn from my sin, to walk in Your way, to let You lead me as Lord.
[01:01:05] And so today, I make that commitment, that promise to You, because You kept Your promise to me.
[01:01:13] God, I thank you for your word to us.
[01:01:16] I pray that we'll leave this place inspired today to share, to testify to the wonderful name of Jesus Christ.
[01:01:26] It's in his name we pray.
[01:01:28] Amen.

[01:01:49] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]:
You were the Word at the beginning, One with God, the Lord Most High.
[01:02:04] Your hidden glory in creation, Now revealed in You, our Christ,
[01:02:15] What a beautiful name it is What a beautiful name it is The name of Jesus Christ my King What a beautiful name it is Nothing compares to this What a beautiful name it is The name of Jesus
[01:02:49] You didn't want heaven without us So Jesus, You brought heaven down My sin was great, Your love was greater
[01:03:09] and what could separate us now what a wonderful name it is what a wonderful name it is the name of Jesus Christ my King what a wonderful name it is
[01:03:33] Nothing compares to this What a wonderful name it is The name of Jesus What a wonderful name it is The name of Jesus
[01:04:19] How sweet your name, Lord, how good you are We love to sing in your name, Lord, we love to sing for you, Lord And death could not hold you, the veil tore before you You silenced the most of sin and grave
[01:04:47] The heavens are roaring The praise of your glory For you are raised to life again And you have no rival And you have no equal Now and forever God you reign
[01:05:15] and yours is the kingdom and yours is the glory yours is the name above all names what a powerful name it is what a powerful name it is the name of Jesus Christ my King
[01:05:43] What a powerful name it is Nothing can stand against What a powerful name it is The name of Jesus And you had no rival You had no equal Now and forever God you reign
[01:06:12] and yours is the kingdom and yours is the glory yours is the name above all names what a powerful name it is what a powerful name it is the name of Jesus Christ my King
[01:06:39] What a powerful name it is Nothing can stand against What a powerful name it is The name of Jesus What a powerful name it is The name of Jesus

[01:07:14] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]:
Amen.
[01:07:15] What a wonderful name it is.
[01:07:17] What a powerful name it is.
[01:07:20] What a life-changing name it is.
[01:07:23] The name of Jesus.
[01:07:24] It's the most wonderful name you'll ever hear.
[01:07:28] Emmanuel, God is with us.
[01:07:30] That's why Jesus is here.
[01:07:34] He's here to change your life, to bring your life light and hope to change you from the inside out.
[01:07:42] To walk in His way and His truth every day of your life.
[01:07:46] And I hope and pray that you'll leave this place today knowing Him as Savior and Lord of your life.
[01:07:51] And leaving here today with a mission to make Him known in the lives of others in your life who may yet be far from Him.
[01:08:01] You'll make an impression.
[01:08:03] You'll leave a mark for Jesus Christ's sake.
[01:08:05] So do that this week.
[01:08:06] There are people in your life right now who are dying to hear this truth, who need the light.
[01:08:12] So share it with them.
[01:08:14] Invite them back to this place during this Christmas season where they'll hear the gospel truth.
[01:08:19] I promise you that.
[01:08:21] I hope you'll be back with us tonight.
[01:08:23] We'll get together for some fun, for some fellowship, for some great food.
[01:08:27] So be here at 5 o'clock.
[01:08:29] We'll start off with a little jingle in here and then we'll move over to the bridge to mingle and to eat and plenty of eating.
[01:08:37] So come and be ready.
[01:08:38] Bring your appetite.
[01:08:39] It will be a lot of fun.
[01:08:40] So I hope you'll be here for that.
[01:08:42] Let me say a word of prayer.
[01:08:44] We'll be on our way.
[01:08:47] God, it's always wonderful to be in your house with your people.
[01:08:53] God, to be able to sing these praises together.
[01:08:56] to lift your name on high.
[01:08:57] Lord, you are worthy of our adoration.
[01:08:59] You're worthy of our praise.
[01:09:02] Jesus' name is wonderful.
[01:09:03] It's powerful in every way.
[01:09:05] And so, God, as we leave this place now, I pray that we would be empowered by Him, by your Holy Spirit at work in us, that we would make an impression, that we would leave a mark for Jesus Christ's sake.
[01:09:17] We pray it in His holy, His redemptive, and His glorious name.
[01:09:22] And all God's children said, Amen.
[01:09:25] Blessings.

[01:09:26] [SPEAKER UNKNOWN]:
God bless you.