Matthew
is emphasizing that Jesus belongs to the “House of David”.
Hebrew letters and numbers use the same symbols and the three consonants
of the name David add up to 14.
Therefore Matthew selectively chooses ancestors in three groups of 14,
making each grouping add up to “David”.
He also includes four women who were married to gentiles.
The point? Jesus
has come as King (as promised from the lineage of David), but not only of the
Jews but also of the world.
Luke
begins with Jesus and ends with Adam (Matthew had begun with Abraham) followed
by “the Son of God”.
Having placed his genealogy between Jesus’ baptism and temptation, Luke
is emphasizing Jesus’ deity as Son of God (Luke 3:22, 38, 4:3).
Luke’s list is more complete and includes many people we’ve never
heard of.
This plus his taking the ancestry all the way back to Adam gives Jesus’
genealogy a universal thrust, emphasizing that Jesus came for all of humankind.
These
genealogies are not simply a list of names assembled by a family historian.
They are generations of lives lived, some well, some poorly, all
imperfectly.
Yet out of it all, Jews, gentiles, sinners, royalty, women, immorality,
heroism, and all the messiness of humanity comes the raw material for God’s
arrival on earth.
God
requires neither dignity nor purity in order for Him to come to any of
us.
He just comes and says, “I’m here, I’m with you, I Iove you.
Now trust me. Let me forgive your sin.
Let me give you a fresh start.
The meaning of trust is obedience.
Obey me and live the Good Life that I’ve come to offer you”.
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