Title: Family Tree
Text: Matthew 1
Bottom Line: God takes us in our brokenness to show the world how good and powerful He really is.
Intro
Good morning Real Life, Not sure about you but I’m ready for Spring! I walked out the door this morning and was greeted by some brisk air and I thought just a few more weeks! But regardless it’s great to be here with you this morning…
We’ve been in this series called Tension… looking at what it means to be full of grace and truth. How we can live in the tension between. If you missed one of the past 2 weeks, or both, I would encourage you to go download our podcast or check out our website. This series is a great reminder for us because we aren’t naturally build to live full of Grace and Truth. We lean one way or the other. And this series is a good reminder and challenge for us to be full of both.
We’ve been using this RUBBER BAND We’ve been looking at our actions towards others and evaluating are we full of grace and truth? Throughout this series we’ve been looking at this idea that The best expression of love is found in the tension between grace and truth. So far most of what we have looked at has been our interactions with others and our interaction with God. And how we need to approach those relationships with Grace and Truth. And today we are going to look at what it means that God is full of Grace and Truth and how that impacts us today.
Now to get there we are going to have to do some set up work. So it might seem like we aren’t talking about tension. But bare with me and it will all tie together.
How many of you have looked up your genealogy? We are all interested finding that one famous, powerful, or rich person we are related too. But I think there’s a little apprehension too. Because what if we found out we are related to a terrible person. What if there’s a murder or dictator in our linage? What if we came from bad stock.
I’ve tried looking into my genealogy a few times. But it’s not as easy as you’d think. I know my family tree a couple generations back. I have a few native Americans genes and mostly European genes. And no famous people or really bad people in my family tree. All in all, a pretty normal looking family. Which I guess is not a bad thing…
But we all want to come from good stock. We all want that famous person in our lineage. And when talking about our genealogies we are going to highlight those people. This isn’t new to our culture today. In Ancient times they place a huge value on where you came from. Genealogies were a big deal. They were seen almost as your resume. Where you came from and the potential you had. You could leverage your families genealogy to gain credibility. Look at where I came from, check out my stock. And you wanted strong, powerful, rich, and famous people in your genealogy.
And in ancient times to ensure you had a good genealogy they would often follow these two practices. First they would hide the bad people in your family tree. They would just leave them out. That strange uncle. Gone. That great granddad that did horrible things. Don’t bring him up. They would just prefer no one knew about them. And the second thing they did was they would never record a women. This was a very patriarchal culture and women were not held in the same value as men, so they didn’t make into many genealogies.
In Matthew 1 we have Jesus’ genealogy. And his looks drastically different then the rest of the day. He didn’t go out of his way to hide messy people, in fact he included them. And even the good people in his genealogy had some series skeletons in the closet. His genealogy included lots of bad people and it included 5 women. An other interesting thing is 3 of those women weren’t even Jewish. Tamar, Rahab, and Ruth weren't even Jewish.
This is crazy, this is something you would not do. People in Jesus’ day must have thought why would you include THAT person? Do you not know what they’ve done?
When we look at our family tree we are trying to find a good person so that we look better. We might not go to the same extreme today, but we still do this. How many of you as a kid would argue with other kids about how’s dad was stronger, or who’s parents had a better job? We were trying to use our families to make us look better.
But Jesus doesn’t approach his genealogy the same way. He’s not trying to make himself look better based off our actions. He’s trying to show us how good, powerful, and loving he really is. He’s trying to show us that despite what we’ve done we can still be used.
Tension
Let’s take a look at the first part of Jesus’ genealogy and see what we can learn…
Turn over to Matthew 1… I’m not going to read all these verses, I’m going to highlight a few of these people and you can follow along yourself…
Abraham was the father of Isaac,
Isaac the father of Jacob,
Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, Matthew 1:2
Jesus genealogy starts off with some pretty powerful names, names the jews would have recognized and held in high regard.
The first name is Abraham… The Jews of these day viewed Abraham has the father of their faith. And he was a man of great faith. But that doesn’t mean he was perfect. Here’s one example of a mistake. Abraham took his family to Egypt one time and he realized his wife was really pretty and he got scared that they would kill him so that they could take her. So he tells everyone she is his sister… Guys not a good idea. Well surprise it backfires and the king under the understanding that she’s Abraham’s sister takes her to be in his harem. He sold out his own wife. If that wasn’t bad enough he does it again!
Isaac… Like father like son, Isaac does the same thing.
Jacob… Let’s talk about Jacob, his name literally means “Grabs heel”. In other words he trips up others to get what he wants. And he goes around his whole life lying and cheating his way through.
At first glance you when you see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob you think you are looking at the allstar team. And these guys were great pillars of faith for the jews. And God used them to accomplish a lot. But so often when we think of these guys we think oh they were perfect. But though the had great faith, but they were far from perfect. And yet we still find them in Jesus genealogy…
And then we get to verse 5: Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab, Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth, Obed the father of Jesse,
Listed in verse 5 is Rehab… Now not only is Rehab a woman, which was already out of the norm to be include. She was a prostitute. If you were creating your genealogy that is the person you would hide. But Jesus keeps her front and center.
?But things are about to get real messy.
And nows we come to David…
Check out this this next verse about David. David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah’s wife Matthew 1:6
Listen to this “David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah’s wife” that’s kinda curious. Why didn’t Matthew say it this way? Why didn’t he try to hide this. This isn’t the kind of story you would expect to see in a genealogy.
We often remember David as the man after God’s own heart. The guy who killed Goliath. The humble shepherd who waited for the throne and didn’t take it even when he had the opportunity too. The leader that fearlessly lead his men into battle. The beloved king that brought the ark back to Israel.
And those things are all true. Those are the memories that the Jews would have immediately thought of when they read his name in the genealogy… But there’s a dark side too. And instead of brushing past it, Jesus genealogy points directly too it.
While David was all those good things and more. He was also an adulator, a murderer, and a deceiver. He had an affair with his commanders, Uriah, wife Bathsheba. And when she got pregnant he tried to have it cover it up by having him killed. And Jesus genealogy not only includes David, but points directly to one of the most heinous things a person can do. Jesus genealogy is full of messy people.
Truth
You see these names and you think you are looking at the allstar team of the Bible, the best of the best. But they are not. It’s more like a list of sinners than saints. It’s a list full of messy people with messy stories.
Let me be real for a moment, I can relate to this list. More then a few times I’ve messed up. More then a few times I’ve worried that I’ve made one too many mistakes. And that God will say, Enough. you’ve messed up one too many times, your done. Sometimes I worry that I’m not good enough, I don’t measure up, I’m just a failure faking my way through life. And one day the facade will fall and I’ll be found out.
Maybe you can relate. Maybe you feel like no matter what you do you just can’t fix that relationship. No matter how hard you try to still blow up at your spouse. Maybe you’ve been hiding that sin and you are terrified that you will be found out.
Maybe you relate to some of the others on this list that God promised big things and then seemingly forget about then. David was anointed king an then lived in exile, Abraham and Sarah waited 30 years for a baby, Ruth basically lost her whole family.
Maybe you are waiting for God to bring healing in your life. Maybe you are wondering if God even cares about you anymore. Maybe you feel like God is ashamed of you and doesn’t even want to be associated with you. Maybe you can relate to the people in this list too.
Here’s our hope. Because it’s from this list that Jesus comes. It’s from these broken lives, shattered families, and hopeless situations Jesus arrives. From this dead stump comes life.
In Isaiah 11:1 it says it this way… A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse; from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.
In other words out of this mess, the savior will come. It’s in this mess, this despair, the the king of kings entered the world. You can look at this family tree of Jesus and you just see the brokenness. There’s broken lives and broken relationships everywhere you look. Probably looks like many of our family trees. Yet it was through this brokenness family that God decided to bring redemption through Jesus.
You see after Isaiah penned this verse and before Jesus’ genealogy was recorded in Matthew 1 came this time that has famously been called the 400yrs of silence. 400 years of no word for God, no prophecy, no books of the Bible being written, nothing, just silence. And people felt that God had forgotten them, moved passed them, and giving up on them. He was done, they were finished.
And to make matters worse Rome moved into the promised land and took over. Takes the land God had given them makes them pay rent and charged them upwards of 80% taxes. And if you dared to rebel against Rome they would hang you on a cross. They would line the roads with these dead bodies hanging on crosses as a daily reminder of who was in control.
And the nation of Israel felt lost, felt hopeless, felt like there was no deliverance, they felt like God had given up on them.
So let’s put ourselves in that silent time, come one, for some of us that’s not a stretch. That’s our story, you feel God has over looked you, He’s silent, he’s moved past you, he’s forgotten about you. What are you longing for right now? What are you praying for? What are you hoping for? What are you looking at in your life right now that’s dead, it’s done, it’s like an old tree stump. What do you want God to take away that you feel like you’ve been wrestling with for a long time?
You see before Jesus entered the picture Israel looked a whole lot like a dead tree stump. But God has this strange habit of using broken people in hopeless situations to bring about his plan. And that’s good news for us today. Because if God can use those people and all their mistakes he can use you. If God can bring something good from those messes, he can bring something good to your life.
And if we are honest our lives look a whole lot like a dead tree stump. Sure we might dress it up and play it off like it’s not a big deal. But all of us, without exception have parts of our lives that are dead. This silent season that Israel went through is all too real to us.
For some of us in the room is seems like their are outside forces oppressing you everywhere you turn. Every day is a struggle just to get through. You’ve been asking God for years to bring you that longing in your life. You just feel weighed down. And you don’t know where to turn. And it feels like God has forgotten about you.
Other in this room don’t relate to that, but when you look at the genealogy of Jesus you can relate a whole lot to David. You look at your life and it’s just a mess, and it’s your fault. It feels like everything is lost and it’s a waste. It’s done and finished, you’ve destroyed the most important relationships you have. And you there’s no way God can bring life back into this mess that you’ve created.
Whatever it is in your life right now, whatever dead part of your life you have that is weighing you down, here’s what you need to know. God can bring life into even the deadest part of your life.
Here’s the good news, the best news. God’s love for you has never changed, never wavered. He loves you more than you realize. And the news gets better. God can take the bad things you’ve done and the bad things done to you and use them for good.
That’s the promise of Isaiah. That from the stump, in other words from the mess of the Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, and all the others, comes life. Life in the form of a baby. Jesus. From the hopeless situation came hope. And that promise is still true for us today.
Application
Jesus entered this world full of Grace and Truth. He showed us the reality of the condition of our lives. Here’s the truth… We are broken. The Bible tells us that the wages of sin is death. And I think if we are honest we would admit that we see that all around us. We see it in our lives, in our relationships, in the lives of those around us. Sin has brought death.. We’ve been there, many of us are there.
When we think about this tension between grace and truth. The truth of the Gospel we first need to recognize that state that we are in. The truth of the Gospel says that you and I are lost and broken. All of us, without exception. We are weighed down and overwhelmed by the sins we’ve committed and the sins committed against us. We have no hope of saving ourselves. The wages of these actions we have committed is death. That’s the truth…
But Jesus didn’t just come full of truth, He came with grace AND truth. While it’s true that the wages of sin is death. It’s also true that God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. John 3:16-17
The tension is clear. We were lost. That’s the truth. But because God loved us SO much he sent his son to pay the price to get us back to him. That’s grace.
Paul says it this way. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God. Eph 2:4-8 (ESV)
What great words… But God… The truth is we are broken and weigh down by our sin. But God… The truth is we are broken and cannot put other selves back together. But God… The truth is our sins have condemned us and it’s our fault. But God. The truth is we are all on our way to death. But God. The truth is many of us are facing impossible situations, but God. The truth is many of us have been hurt in unspeakable ways, but God.
You can see the tension here. The truth of our actions condemn us. But God’s love and grace saves us. We are sinful, but we are loved. We are broken, but we have hope. We been hurt, but we are rescued. We were lost, but now we are found.
It’s a beautiful tension really. No matter how far you and I go, no matter how many times we’ve screwed up, no matter how broken our lives are. God still loves us and his promises are still true.
Tim Keller says it this way. You are more sinful than you could ever dare imagine and you are more loved and accepted than you could ever dare hope.
Have you ever felt that? In some of the worst moments of my life I have realized this is true. 7th grade was the first time I felt convicted of my sin. I was at a summer camp with my youth group and during a worship service I felt the weight of my sin. I saw the consequences of my actions. But soon after I felt the weight I knew undeniably that God loved me still.
In some of the most difficult times of my life I inexplicably feel God’s love in those moments. When sin and death seem all to real and appear to have won, I feel God in those moments saying it’s not over yet. When loved ones die, when I screw up for the 100th time, when tragedy strikes someone close to me, I can see in those moments the weight of sin. But in those moments I cannot deny the love of God. We are more loved then we ever dare hope.
Here’s what this genealogy teaches us. Though we are broken, even though we’ve messed up our families, even though life didn’t pane out the way we thought. God can bring life out of death. God can bring life out of our dead stump.
That’s the message of the Gospel.
The Gospel isn’t a promise that when you follow Jesus everything will work out, the gospel is not a promise that every broken relationship will be restored. It’s not a promise that that person you sinned against deeply will forgive you. It’s not a promise that you will be rich one day. It’s not a promise that the cancer will go away. It’s not a promise that your family will always be safe.
?The Gospel IS a promise that death is not the final word. It is a promise that God is not finished with you. It is a promise that God has not forgotten you. It is a promise that you have not sinned too big. It is a promise that grace is big enough. And maybe more then anything else, this is a promise that God is with you.
A lot of us are pretending we are okay, even though we are not okay. The reason Jesus came is because none of us are actually okay. Jesus’ genealogy tells us that it is okay to not be okay. And we don’t need to pretend to be okay when it’s not okay.
Jesus came from this mess of a family tree and brought life. Jesus entered this world in a manager. Because no one could make room for him. He came in a forgotten time, to a forgotten people, in a forgotten town. Why, because God was reminding us that he had not forgotten his people. And that life can come from the dead in our lives.
Here’s what you need to know today. That dead area in your life, doesn’t have to stay that way. Whatever it is, Jesus came to bring life to the stump that is our lives.
So what do we do, how do we respond to the truth that our lives are riddled with sin? How do we accept God’s grace that covers our sins?
Response for Christians
Many of us in this room have been following Jesus for awhile. But we’ve let sin creep back in our lives. Jesus brought us life, but we choose to go back to death instead. What do we do, how do we get back to God?
Let’s look at the life of David. Maybe your sin looks like his, maybe it’s something different. But David’s response when he had sin in his life is how our response should look.
We get a glimpse of his personal journal in the book of Psalms, check out what he did. Here’s what David wrote when the weight of his sins came crashing down upon him.
Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight. Psalm 51:1-4
Like Adam and Eve often when we are caught in sin we run away from God. We hide in shame. But David did the opposite, he ran toward God. He presented his sin and begged for grace. And God restored him, he brought life from Davids mistakes. For us today in this category we’ve got to run to God. Whether it’s something small or whether we’ve really messed up our life, bring it to God. Let him heal you.
For those of you that are following Jesus but you have let sin back into your life, follow Davids example.
Bring Your Sins To God
Ask for Forgiveness
Let God use your past Sin for Good
Here’s the crazy thing… When we approach Jesus and give him our sins, when we repent. He not only forgives us, he takes the bad in our lives and brings life out of it. God can take your mistakes and use them for good.
Listen this isn’t a one time thing. I don’t know about you but I got sin in my life. And my temptation is to just bury it. Pretend it didn’t happen and promise myself I won’t do it again. But there is no healing when I hide my sins. Healing comes, life comes, when I bring my sin to God. When I confess to him what I’ve done he is faithful to restore me, heal me, and bring life back to me.
The good news for you today is that your sin does not define you, it doesn’t keep God from loving you, and it doesn’t disqualify you. God can restore you and use that once dead spot for good.
Response for those not following Jesus
There are also some of you in this room have not yet decided to follow Jesus. Or maybe you’ve been coming to church for awhile, maybe even years, but you aren’t fully committed. If you are sitting there and you recognize the dead parts in your life. You see the sin and the death that it brings. And you want to grab ahold of God’s grace for the first time, here’s what you do.
You repent; which is just a fancy word that we have way over complicated. Repent means that you rethink the direction your life is going and shifting the focus from your desires to Gods. Repent means to turn from your ways to Gods ways. It’s saying I’ve been doing life on my own for awhile but it’s not working out too well for me. God I’m going to trust you and follow your direction for my life. Second you be baptized.
Over and over again in the Bible when people are convicted of their sins and decided to follow Jesus they are told to repent and be baptized. Baptism symbolizes Jesus’ bringing new life out of the old. Baptism symbolizes being buried with Christ and rose again. When you are baptized you are washed clean of your past and your isn. This is a powerful moment in the walk of a Christian. And listen if God is prompting this in your life don’t put it off. Don’t wait another day.
We have towels, we have shorts, we have tshirts, and we have a room for you to change in. We got warm water and people to help you. Don’t go an other day living in death. Let Jesus wash of your sins and the sins done to you. Let Jesus bring life out of the dead in your life.
In just a few minutes the band will start playing and if this is you, if this is you want Jesus to bring life to your life go right over here to your left and someone will direct you.
If God is convicting you to take this step, do it, don’t put it off until another day. I get it, it’s scary, it’s intimidating, there’s a million excuses running through your head. But until you turn your life over to God there will be no healing in those dead parts of your life. Take a risk and follow Jesus.
Conclusion
Church. The Gospel is the greatest news in history. That though we are fallen and sinful people with no hope Jesus entered the world full of grace and truth and is offering a better way of life. That’s a beautiful tension. Jesus is offering to pay the price for our sins. That’s reason to celebrate. That’s reason to go tell everyone that will listen. That’s a reason to run to God this morning and ask him to bring life to the dead parts of your life.
God has a habit of taking the dead parts of our life and bring life from them. God takes us in our brokenness to show the world how good and powerful He really is. This morning if there is something nudging you to take that next step. Maybe to repent of that sin, or recommit to following Jesus, or maybe to decide to follow Jesus for first and you can be baptized right here this morning. I would encourage you to take that step. Let God bring healing and life back into your life.
Let’s pray…
After Song….
This good news is something that we cannot afford to keep to ourselves… Let’s go from here and be full of grace and truth to everyone we encounter. Amen?
5in15…
