Mensa Otabil - Jesus' Genealogy (10/30/2025)
Today we’re going to look at the generation of Jesus Christ, his genealogy. One of the things I do as a pastor is study the Bible, and I must study every part of it. I study genealogies, I study the geography of the Bible, I study history in the Bible, and all of that. Most people just like inspirational parts of the Bible, but you have to study all parts of it. So, Matthew starts his account of the life of Jesus with his genealogy.
In Matthew 1, verses 5 and 6, we read, «Salmon begot Boaz by Rahab; Boaz begot Obed by Ruth; Obed begot Jesse, and Jesse begot David the King.» David the King begot Solomon by her who had been the wife of Uriah. In ancient times, this is how biographies were written; you had to trace the person’s history, and talk about who his father was, and who his grandfather was, and it goes back and back and back. This is what Matthew does when he’s tracing the bloodline, the history of Jesus Christ. He traces it back to King David and his son Solomon, showing that Jesus was the son of David. That was an important fact for the Jews at that time; for us Gentiles, it may not mean much, but it was important for the Jews.
In the list of ancestors, he includes women, which was not very normal to do, because society at that time was very patriarchal and based mostly on men. But Matthew includes women, and all the women he includes had some trouble with their backgrounds. There was Tamar, who was caught in prostitution; there is Rahab, who was unfortunately a prostitute; and then there is Ruth, who was a Moabite. The Moabites were a race that Israel was not supposed to deal with. Then there was Uriah’s wife, that is Bathsheba, who committed adultery with David. So, if you look at it, these are not the kind of women you would typically include in your bloodline. But one of the reasons why I like the Bible so much is that it doesn’t whitewash history. The Bible tells it as it is; it tells the stories as they occurred, and so these are included in the genealogy of Jesus.
So, why did the Gospel writer include this? Why did the Holy Spirit inspire this inclusion? It’s very important for us when we trace our own genealogies because sometimes we look at our lives and the people who have been in our lives, and there are all kinds of questionable characters in our history-maybe your parents or your grandparents or great-grandparents. You may hear stories that someone in your family was a murderer, or someone was a thief, or was something else. Sometimes, you feel like your bloodline has been tainted. But this Gospel account tells us that God is a redeemer, that he’s able to take us out of a negative bloodline and do something wonderful with us, and that’s what Jesus’s bloodline tells us.
So, if you give your life to Jesus Christ, what he does is take your past -the good, the bad, and the ugly- and do something miraculous and wonderful with it. Don’t ever be ashamed of your past, your background, and your ancestry. Don’t ever feel that because of a certain ancestry you have, you are cursed, or that the devil has control over your ancestry. No, that is not what Christianity teaches. Christianity teaches us that God redeems all of us; he redeems our tribes, he redeems us from our histories, he redeems us from all kinds of prejudices that people have against us, and he makes us his peculiar people. That is the story of Jesus Christ.
So today, as you think about Christmas and your past, remember that Jesus Christ takes your past, as bad as it may seem, and does something good with it. Also, remember the curses of your ancestry cannot pursue you into your future if you are in Christ. Christ the Redeemer makes us whole, even though we came from a very jagged and rugged background. Let’s pray. Say with me, «Heavenly Father, you own my past, present, and future. Use my history to work out your purposes in my life. In Jesus' name, amen and amen.»