The Thrill of Hope (2) - A Promise Made is a Debt to Be Paid

Introduction

So even though I was 43 when I married my wife, I still was old fashion in the fact that I went to her dad to ask for her hand in marriage. He & his wife were excited and gave their blessing. But as I shook his hand, he said, “A promise made is a debt unpaid.” I knew that was a quote for an old book or something I had seen many years ago, but I just couldn't remember where it was from. So I course I went back & Googled it. It was by Robert Service, the author of The Cremation of Sam McGee. In that poem, he wrote, “A promise made is a debt unpaid.” The meaning is, when you make a promise to someone, it is as if you take a debt from them. The ‘debt’ you owe to the person is not paid until the promise is fulfilled.

Now today the second sermon in our Series the Thrill of Hope is, A Promise made is a debt to be paid. Sorta playing off the quote by Robert Service. Last week we began this series by looking at the first time God promised Hope. Adam & Eve sinned, ruining the world, & yet God in response promised redemption. A promise made is a debt to be paid. God has made certain promises to His people. One promise being He would cover their debt of sin. In the reality of a fallen world, God gave hope, though human sin had scarred his perfect creation. He promised hope. But as followers of Jesus, it’s easy to look around at our current world and wonder to ourselves, WHAT ON EARTH IS GOD DOING?! A War Raging in Ukraine A devestating hurricane in November A COVID-19 virus that just won’t go away! A cancer diagnosis! A sharply polarized and divided society. WHAT ON EARTH IS GOD DOING?! Where's the hope? Hope is found in many places of God's word including, believe it or not, in an eye glazing, ear numbing, unpronounceable, & weird genealogy.

A casual reading of the New Testament may cause a person to wonder why the first Gospel begins with something as seemingly dull as a family tree. One might conclude that there is little significance to be drawn from this catalog of names and, thus, skip over it to where the action begins. One sometimes wonders why such lists of names are in a book which is specifically known as a revelation of the will and love of God. Who cares to read a genealogical table? Most of the names are unknown, many of them are difficult to pronounce, and once read, who can remember a solitary verse of the whole catalog? Yet the names are here, and if here, there must be some purpose in the record. God is a severe economist of space as of everything else: he does not throw anything away, though there may be wastefulness here and there, according to our present incomplete notions of things.

This genealogy is dispensable. It lays the foundation for all that follows. Unless it can be shown that Jesus is a legal descendant of David through the royal line, it is impossible to prove that He is the Messiah – The King of Israel. Matthew begins his account where he must, with the documentary evidence that Jesus inherited the right to the throne of David through His stepfather, Joseph. This genealogy traces the legal descent of Jesus as King of Israel; the genealogy in Luke’s Gospel traces His lineal descent. Matthew’s genealogy follows the royal line from David; Luke’s genealogy follows the bloodline from David.

This isn't an ordinary genealogy like the one you may have. It's different. In our genealogy of grandpa, grandma, granny, & aunts & uncles we use bloodlines. Matthew's genealogy does trace Jesus to the throne of David legally, but this genealogy is really a story. It's the story of the promise of the Messiah. It's a story of hope. A story that says, “Remember what God promised so long ago that he would do? He's doing it. He's been doing it all along. God is going to redeem his people, and give them new life!” If you were asked, “Where does the story of Jesus start?” you'd probably begin by looking for a time—maybe 2:37 a.m., in Bethlehem of Judea, in the year one A.D.  Not so with Matthew. He starts at the beginning of a great saga. He starts with Abraham, the first recipient of the promise to be a "light to the nations," and he follows the travels of that promise through Abraham's descendants, through ups and downs, through thousands of years, stopping finally at a manger in Bethlehem. In an age where the past, even hundreds of years in the past, can get you cancelled, Jesus’ genealogy wouldn’t go over very well in modern society. It really didn’t go over well 2000 years ago either. The names Matthew offers us are not necessarily related to one another by the direct blood ties that characterize a “family tree” in our minds. Rather, they are bound to one another by God's purpose of bringing into our broken and fragmented world a new hope. Matthew’s genealogy has some strange yet wonderful ironies and twists. There's no boredom here. The genealogy of Matthew tells us whom God can use to share the promise He made to ‘bless all the nations of the earth.’ Bible Passage Matthew 1:1-17 (ESV - English Standard Version) Scriptural Explanation Genealogies were important in the ancient world and played an especially significant role for the Jews. According to the Old Testament, God’s people kept extensive genealogies, which served as a record of a family’s descendants but were also used for practical and legal purposes to establish a person’s heritage, inheritance, legitimacy, and rights. Knowledge of one’s descent was especially necessary, if a dispute occurred, to ensure that property went to the right person.

The overriding importance of Matthew’s opening verses is to understand that God is faithful to his covenant promises to Israel and to all the nations. With the birth of Jesus Messiah, the dawning of salvation has arrived for all people regardless of ethnicity, gender, or status. Indeed, by including these unexpected names in the messianic genealogy, Matthew shows that God can use anyone—however marginalized or despised—to bring about his purposes. Against the backdrop of a world increasingly hostile to Christianity, Matthew solidifies his church’s identity as the true people of God, who transcend ethnic, economic, and religious barriers to find oneness in their adherence to Jesus Messiah. But this list? To say this family has some dysfunction is an understatement.

Matthew jolts readers by including a quartet of women in his genealogy, contra the norms for genealogies of that era. This would be a mind-blower because, you see, Jewish men prayed this prayer daily: “God, I thank You that I was not born a Gentile, a dog, or a woman.” It was a tremendously male-oriented kind of society, where women’s names were never included in genealogies. What’s the Lord doing?

The women share two threads: Gentile connections and flagrant sin. First is Tamar, daughter-in-law of Judah, Jacob’s son. In Genesis 38, she played the prostitute to gain an advantage over Judah and as a result became pregnant by him. She was also a Canaanite, hence a Gentile. Rahab comes second. A prostitute in Jericho, she hid Israel’s spies and helped them escape (Joshua 2).

The third woman is Ruth, a Moabite widow and daughter-in-law of Naomi. She became a part of Israel when Boaz married her (Ruth 1–4). Fourth is Bathsheba, whom Matthew calls “the wife of Uriah.” She was David’s mistress and the mother of Solomon.

Since Rahab and Ruth were both foreigners and Bathsheba at least married a Gentile (a Hittite), we see that Jesus’ line includes Gentiles. This reminds us that God always intended to bring Gentiles to himself. Further, since three of the four women were involved in sexual sin, the genealogy highlights the fact that Jesus came from a line of sinners. Once we see this, it is easy to enumerate the failings of Abraham, Isaac, and the rest.

Abraham failed and lied a few times in major ways. He also failed to fully trust and have faith and had a child with another woman that was not the way God said the promise would come.

Isaac showed partiality to Esau over Jacob. This caused a rift and deception, where Jacob deceived Esau and conned him into giving away his birthright. Then he deceived Isaac and received Esau’s blessing rather than trusting God to bless him as his mother had been told.

Judah sold a brother into slavery. Illegitimately impregnated a daughter-in-law and tried to have her offed until it was revealed it was him who did it. The second set of names contains the names of kings and prophets and monarchs: the likes of Rehoboam, Asa, and Jehoshaphat. Leaders of the nation of Israel—some of them more-or-less good, others undeniably corrupt, others incompetent, and others such utter failures that the people bearing the messianic land are forcibly dragged out of their own land and exiled, left to die under a foreign tyrant.

The final group is Abi'ud, Eliakim, Azor, Zadok, Achim, Eliud, Eleazar, Matthan, and Jacob, the father of Mary's husband Joseph. Pick up a Bible concordance, and you'll find out why these names are odd at first galnce. Every other name Matthew gives us in his genealogy can be found somewhere else in the OT, somewhere else in Israel's saga of salvation. But these names in the last group don't appear anywhere. They're anonymous. They're nobodies. They make a cameo appearance in Matthew 1, and then they're gone forever. They're the little people who don't get written up. They're the ones who bear the promise of hope anonymously.

Now this list looks like a mess without direction or meaning. Yet, through all these people, God brought the savior of the world. He used broken and failed people to show He was greater than all the failings.

Remember with me back to Genesis 3, when God promised ultimate defeat would come to Satan at the heel of the offspring of Eve. God made a promise of land and blessing to the nations that would come through Abraham’s offspring. Later, God made a promise to king David, that someone from his family would sit on the throne of an unending kingdom.

So, as you look at the genealogy here, with every new name, digging deeper does give us hope, & it shows us a long history of the promise of hope. Matthew is showing the continuity that Jesus has with the line of David and the line of Abraham. He is the promised Messiah whom God stated he would send into this world. Application KEY TRUTH With Jesus, There's Always Hope.

Each one of these groups reveal hope. Lets look at this list a little deeper, starting with the last group & working back. Let's start with the nobodies. The cameos. The little people who disappear.

One reason so many churches are having problems to day is that to many people want to stand in the spotlight and be recognized for their contributions, efforts, and abilities. But Matthew’s list reminds us that God more often than not uses people who willingly serve behind the scenes and are only focused on God getting the glory. They don’t mind that people forget or overlook their efforts because they serve to further God’s Kingdom not their ego. They remain anonymous because they realize that even though future generations may not remember them God will use their efforts to change eternity. That is who God uses. Let me give you an example…Tim Hall, Mac Roberts, David Brock, and Sarah Hobbs: Have you ever heard any of their names? I know that you probably haven't. Why… they were my youth minister, the pastor who was preaching when I accepted Christ, my middle school Sunday School teacher, and my RA leader... Anonymous bearers of hope! Though most of the world won’t remember them or even me, God used their faithfulness to change my eternity. With Jesus there's always hope because God uses people who time will forget. He's not dependent on a few popular, well-known, popular, historic people. For most of history God has used the unknown, forgotten, anonymous people of the world. This group says with Jesus there's hope because God uses everyone to progress the message of hope.

The second series of names, beginning with Solomon and ending with the disintegration in Babylon means, means that the promise of God is held in nations, and people-groups; it resides institutions - hear that? Religious institutions like first Israel and now religious institutions like CHURCHES. That's right, churches! Matthew is saying simply: You churches, out there—yes, even you Mt. Gilead, wondering in 2022 if you can even make a difference in your world anymore—the hope of Christ is found in you; when you're bound together as a group you can do SO MUCH MORE than you can when you're scattered about.

In our society spirituality has become a positive but church, religious institutions, are frowned upon and viewed negatively. People believe that God is good but the church is not. And yes the church has failed to live up to all of its responsibility but it is through the church that the promise of hope must be carried out to the world. God brought the promise to pass through institutions and the promise will continue to be pass along from generation to generation through institutions including the church. No matter how disillusioned we ever get with the idea of church, and worship, and gathering together for fellowship, the church is important because with Jesus, there's always hope & the church is to share that message to a lost & hurting world. And lastly the first group. We are often puzzled by life and wonder if there's hope for us. Life does not always fall into easy straight lines; life has complications, there's problems, there's difficulties. A lot of those we bring on ourselves. We struggle with hope because we wonder if we have gone too far for God to redeem us. But look at the start of this list.

Abraham’s lies were not just white lies, they were world history altering lies. The world's conflict with Islam & Christianity still rages on because of Abraham's lies. Isaac loved Esau the rugged outdoors man son more the skinny jeans latte sipping son Jacob. That set the stage for Jacob to swindle his brother in such a way that it alters generations beyond their deaths. Judah human trafficked a brother, and made a profit off it. Tamar does things that are taboo in our time (that’s saying a lot). Rahab was open with her prostitution profession. Ruth is the quintessential outsider. Bathsheba was a Dateline special as an adulteress & probably a co-conspirator in her husband's murder.  Everyone on this list is an all elite level sinner.

But everyone on this list reminds us that Jesus came for you. He’s not disappointed with your origin, your ancestry, your station in life, your past sins, your failures, or even your current struggles. He can & will redeem it all to give you hope & an eternal home.” Conclusion Matthew shows in verse 16 how Mary can be a virgin, but Jesus is still of the line of Abraham and David. Jesus is the son of Mary, who was married to Joseph, and so Joseph raises him as his own son. Jesus’s earthly father is of the direct line of Abraham. Matthew’s genealogy reveals the people Jesus came to save: Jews and Gentiles, men and women, sinners suffering the effects of their rebellion. There's hope because Jesus came for everyone, including you who still doubt it. This is Jesus’ story.

What’s your story? What failures have you experienced? Maybe you have been let down or disappointed by broken promises or hurt from others... Maybe you had a father or mother who failed you. Maybe you’ve failed your own kids. Maybe you've failed a spouse or two. Maybe your career has never taken off, and it’s been let-downs after setbacks after let-downs after setbacks.

All of this has left you without hope. God's Word gives us hope. Even the genealogy of Jesus gives us hope. With Jesus, there's always hope. According to Matthew, hope doesn't just start in a manger in Bethlehem. No, it started with Adam then Abraham, and, incredibly, God moves through sinners, traitors, flawed institutions, and nobodies tell you one thing...... there's hope.

A promise made is a debt to be paid. God promised to pay our debt of sin. As sinners, we couldn't pay it, so he told Adam and eve, and he's telling you He willing will pay it. He gave hope to Adam, then to Abraham, then to an entire nation. That hope has carried on through every generation since, including you. You have hope because God kept His promise and sent Jesus.

With Jesus, there's always hope.