He Who Always Was King, Will Always Be

ME: Intro - I Just Can’t Wait [For My] King

He is risen!

[He is risen indeed!]

This morning,

We are talking about He who Always Was King,

And Will always be King.

So, it is not like Jesus was waiting with anticipation to become King.

He is not like Simba from the Lion King.

When He is a little lion cub,

His dad is king,

And as the future king,

He wants all the perks of being king.

He wants to go where he wants when he wants to do what he wants.

And in his impatience,

He sings...

“I just can’t wait to be king!”

Well, that is not the case with Jesus.

He always was king.

But the Jewish people,

They were more like Simba,

But their song was slightly different.

For thousands of years,

They were singing,

“I just can’t wait for my king!”

So, this morning,

As we celebrate Christ’s resurrection,

His victory over the grave,

We are also looking at the beginning of Matthew’s Gospel,

In vs. 1-17,

Empathizing with these Jews,

Who anticipated their King for generations.

Slide

The outline for our time is to look at the King in three different ways,

As...

The Anticipated King

The Unexpected King

The Forever King

The King’s grace overcomes the grave.

2 weeks ago, we started the Gospel of Matthew with the Great Commission at the end of Matthew,

Which commands us to make disciples of all nations,

Baptize them,

And to teach them to obey everything that Jesus taught.

So, this is what Matthew seeks to teach us.

Beginning with the identity of Jesus.

WE: The Anticipated King

Slide

This begins in the very first verse of Matthew,

Introducing the genealogy as the genealogy of Jesus Christ.

This genealogy shows the significant OT connections Jesus has.

Right in vs. 1,

We have two key OT figures that received promises from God.

First is David, the king whose throne God promised to establish for all time,

And second is Abraham, the one whom God promised to bless the whole world through.

But the fact that this is called Jesus’ genealogy is a little strange for Jewish culture.

Normally,

The earliest ancestor in the lineage is who it would be named after.

Because that person was considered the most significant,

Since everyone else derived from them.

But Matthew names this genealogy after Jesus,

The final descendent,

Because Jesus is the most significant person of all time.

So, this is the perfect introduction.

Because the Gospel is all about Jesus Christ.

Or more literally,

Slide

Jesus, the Christ.

Although Jesus Christ has come to be treated as His full name,

Christ more accurately serves as His title.

The word Christ,

Comes from the Greek word, Christos,

Which literally means anointed one.

The Hebrew word for the anointed one is Messiah.

Anointing is a big deal for Jews.

Prophets, priests, and kings would be anointed,

As God’s representatives before the people.

Most importantly,

Isaiah 42 promises the coming of the righteous Servant of the Lord,

Described as the anointed one,

The Messiah.

He is anointed above all others who are anointed.

Because He embraces all other anointed offices.

The Messiah is a prophet, priest, and king.

When Israel was divided,

Isaiah repeatedly prophesied about the hope of liberation,

And the reign of a king who would usher in an eternal peace, justice, and righteousness.

This king’s greatness was prophesied to reach to the ends of the earth.

Ezekiel also prophesied that God would gather His people,

And reestablish them with a new heart and new spirit,

Uniting them as a single nation in peace and prosperity,

Under one king, one shepherd,

Whose dominion stretches from sea to sea and to the ends of the earth.

However, generation after generation went by,

And failed hope after failed hope,

Caused the expectation of this Messiah to diminish.

Though it never fully died.

So, Matthew’s gospel begins,

By speaking into that strained hope,

Clearly declaring that Jesus is the Christ,

He is the Messiah,

The promised King,

The anointed One.

Matthew is saying to his fellow Jews,

“Jesus is the One we have been waiting for!”

Slide

After introducing Jesus as the Christ,

Matthew identifies Jesus as King,

By calling Him the son of David.

This title is a direct connection to 2 Samuel 7,

When David said to God that he wanted to build the temple for the Lord.

But God responds to David,

Saying He will raise up a descendant of David,

A Son of David,

And God will establish David’s kingdom forever.

God was promising that the line of David will endure to the end.

So, this promise extends beyond David’s physical son, Solomon.

The throne of the kingdom will last forever.

Again and again in this back and forth between God and David,

The word forever is used.

Eight times in one chapter.

God was not only promising,

He was driving home the point,

That the line of David would endure forever.

And it is incredible to think about,

That today, in 2023,

God’s promise to David back then remains alive and active today,

In us, the church!

This promise is still actively shaping eternity!

With the son of David is an eternal King reigning on the throne.

This is the one Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel prophesied about,

During incredibly needed times in Israel’s history.

When they were exiled,

Ripped from their homes,

And the temple was destroyed.

It was in these moments where it seemed that God’s promises had failed,

When God’s prophets spoke again,

Reminding them of God’s everlasting promises.

So, Matthew is beginning his Gospel by declaring,

The Anticipated King has arrived!

Jesus is the Christ!

Jesus is the son of David!

Slide

And Jesus is the Son of Abraham.

Before God made the promise to David,

He made a promise to Abraham back in Gen. 12.

A promise that God reiterated in chs. 15 and 17.

God promised that through Abraham’s line,

He will send a King,

And He will expand His Kingdom to all peoples.

So, God fulfills His promise to Abraham through the son of Abraham,

Jesus Christ.

Slide

Every detail in the OT was pointing to the eternal King who was to come.

All of history revolves around this eternal King.

Jesus meets all the prophetic qualifications.

He is the Anticipated King.

The Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham,

The true King!

And Matthew 1:1 is stating that the King has now come!

Jesus always has been and always will be at the center of history!

Not you and I,

Not our generation,

And not America.

Billions of people have come and gone throughout history,

Empires have come and gone,

Countries and nations,

Kings and queens,

Presidents and dictators,

All have come and gone.

But at the center of history stands the One who always was King,

And will always be,

The anticipated King Jesus.

Right from the start,

Matthew opens His gospel with the boldest claim about Jesus he can make.

That Jesus is the King of all history,

Therefore, Jesus should be King of your life.

When you realize this,

And submit to His rule and reign,

It changes everything about how you live.

GOD: The Unexpected King

Slide

After introducing Jesus as the anticipated king,

Matthew begins revealing how Jesus is an unexpected king,

As he lists out Jesus’ lineage,

Starting in vs. 2.

Luke’s genealogy in Luke 3 is different,

Luke goes all the way back to Adam,

Emphasizing how Jesus is the hope for humanity.

But Matthew begins with Abraham,

Showing how the hope of humanity began with the history of Israel,

And is fulfilled in Jesus.

So, there are different purposes behind these two genealogies.

Therefore, some of the names and the order are different.

It’s not because Matthew is Joseph’s lineage and Luke is Mary’s,

As some have supposed.

No, Matthew is showing how Jesus is the Son of David and the Son of Abraham.

He begins with Abraham,

Then shows the kingly line,

The legal line of David.

So, this is the first way this genealogy introduces Jesus as the unexpected king.

But this is just scratching the surface.

Slide

Vs. 3 is where Matthew’s genealogy starts to get really shocking and unexpected.

By mentioning the first of five women listed in this genealogy.

Women in a genealogy was unheard of in a first century Jewish genealogy.

But God has included them here,

Because these women are intrinsic to God’s purpose in sending Christ.

There are two clear threads shared among these women,

That we also can relate to.

First, they are not Jews, they are Gentiles,

And second, they are associated with some sort of sin.

First, we have Tamar in vs. 3.

She was Judah’s daughter-in-law.

And Gen. 38 tells how she pretended to be a prostitute,

To purposefully have an incestuous relationship with Judah.

And they did.

Judah, thinking he was hooking up with a prostitute from another region,

Ended up getting her pregnant.

Eventually leading to the birth of the twins,

Perez and Zerah,

Listed here in vs. 3.

These are Jesus’ ancestors.

Slide

The second woman listed is Rahab in vs. 5.

Now, Rahab did help Israel’s spies in Joshua 2,

By hiding them and helping them to escape with their lives.

But she was also not a Jew,

She was from Jericho,

And she made her living as a prostitute.

Slide

The third woman, also in vs. 5, is Ruth.

Ruth has an entire OT book dedicated to her.

She was a widow,

So, she was an outcast and a sufferer.

But from a Jewish perspective,

The real problem was the fact that she was a Moabite.

Why does that matter?

Because Moabites were known for their sexual immorality,

And Deut. 23:3-5 says they were cursed from coming into the assembly of God’s people.

But Ruth did become part of Israel when she married Boaz,

Her redeemer.

Slide

The next woman listed is in vs. 6 but she isn’t even named.

It just refers to her as Uriah’s wife.

But think carefully about what vs. 6 says.

David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah.

Think about that statement,

David fathered Solomon by the wife of another man.

This woman was Bathsheba,

And she was brought into David’s kingly line through adultery and the arranged death of her husband.

This was David’s sin with her in 2 Sam. 11.

Slide

Then, the last woman listed,

Is Christ’s mother herself,

Mary.

Mentioned at the very end in vs. 16.

She was seen as immoral because she was a young pregnant woman,

Who was not married.

The inclusion of these women signals God’s intention to include Gentiles and women and sinners and sufferers,

All the unexpected in His redemptive plan.

It is truly incredible to think about the line of sinners that Jesus came from.

And not just the women,

Abraham and Isaac and most of the kings listed had their own share of failures.

Yet, God remained faithful to bring about the unexpected king from a line of sinners.

Slide

Going back to vs. 5-6,

The time of Boaz, Obed, and Jesse,

Was the time of Judges,

Where the Bible says,

Everyone was doing what was right in their own eyes.

And yet, God remained faithful to His people.

Slide

Then, in vs. 7-10,

We have a list of kings,

Who are the sons of David.

Some of them honored God,

But if you read the OT accounts of these kings,

Most of them were really wicked,

Leading the people of God into sin and idolatry.

For example,

You had Ahaz worshipping Assyrian gods,

Practicing human sacrifice,

And defiling God’s temple.

Manasseh was even worse!

He promoted idolatry,

And even murdered innocent people.

While the other kings listed may not have been as outwardly wicked.

Outside of maybe Josiah,

Even those kings that would be considered good,

Still committed some pretty bad sins.

Jehoshaphat made some really wicked people his allies,

Hezekiah seemed great after Ahaz,

But then, he let his pride get the best of him,

And showed off the nation’s treasures to his enemies,

Only to have them eventually plunder Israel.

Then you have Uzziah,

He successfully ruled for years.

But that success eventually went to his head,

So, he began helping himself to the privileges that were restricted to just the priests.

So, what we see with Jesus’ genealogy,

Is an unexpected King,

Who is connected to the human race and all of our sinfulness.

Slide

Then, vs. 11 ends with the consequences of these sins,

With Israel’s borders failing,

The nation scattering,

And Jerusalem being conquered by Babylon,

Deporting its residents into exile in Babylon.

By this time,

Babylon was a cultural influence around the ancient world.

One of the world leaders in science and language.

It peaked under the reign of King Nebuchadnezzar.

But after he died,

His son only lasted for 2 years,

Before being overthrown,

Slowly weakening the city,

Until Cyrus of Persia conquered Babylon,

Eventually desolating the city,

But never fully eliminating their influence on the world.

Today, the ruins of this once proud city can be found about 50 miles south of Bagdad.

One thing notably missing,

Are the remains of a palace that once belonged to Nebuchadnezzar,

Because the bricks from that palace alone,

Were used to build the entire town of Hillah.

But at its peak,

Babylon was a significant presence felt throughout the OT.

It is referenced nearly 300 times,

Being used as God’s instrument of judgment against His people,

But also a representation of the epitome of human pride.

The Jews would be intimately familiar with this time in their history.

It would be a source of strong emotions for them.

Because the exile caused the line of kings to lose their legal rank.

Slide

So, in vs. 12-15,

We get a bunch of guys who got their name in the Bible,

Which is great, I guess!

Except that is it.

That is all we know about them.

Slide

It is not until we get to Jesus’ immediate ancestor,

Joseph, in vs. 16.

But what we know about Joseph,

Is that he was no king,

He was a simple laborer.

But Matthew’s point is not just to remind the Jews about their decline.

Slide

Rather, as he explains in vs. 17,

He structured it this way to show God’s covenantal faithfulness,

Despite their chaotic history.

The exile had essentially interrupted them as a nation,

But God still fulfilled his purpose.

David’s kingship had essentially ended,

But now Jesus has come to restore it.

That is what these three groups of 14 represent.

The first group strung together God’s promise to Abraham,

To God’s promise to David.

This was the high point for them as a nation.

The next group goes from the high point of King David,

To the low point of the Babylonian exile.

Then the third group is a quiet season that leads up to the Christ,

The Messiah,

The unexpected King!

So, imagine being a first century Jew,

Considering that this Jesus Christ might be your Messiah,

Or that you already put your trust in Christ as your Messiah,

And as a result you were losing family or possessions or safety.

A genealogy that traces your heritage to Christ like this would be huge!

That is why Matthew introduces Jesus as the unexpected King.

He is the leader who will take sinful people into eternal life.

Slide

This genealogy is so much more important than a list of names,

Or simply a historical record.

It is introducing Jesus Christ as the climactic fulfillment of God’s promises.

That He is the unexpected King!

Who saves us by His sovereign grace,

Despite the mess that is His family tree!

If you think your family is messed up,

You have good company.

It was through this ancestry of sinners and sufferers,

That the incarnate Son of God,

Entered into human history.

This is a family tree that includes;

Evil kings,

A polygamist who lied about his wife,

Giving her over to a foreign king,

An adulterer who had the husband of his mistress killed,

And the list could go on and on.

It is crazy,

The great, great, great, great, great grandparents of Jesus,

Hated God,

And were leading others to hate God as well.

But the King’s grace overcomes their unrighteousness.

Likewise, Jesus saves you,

Not because you are righteous,

He saves you in spite of your unrighteousness.

That is why these people are included in Christ’s family tree,

And that is why,

If you trust in Jesus,

Your name is included in His family tree.

Because the King’s grace overcomes your unrighteousness.

Praise God that He delights in saving the sinful, immoral outcasts.

This is why He is the unexpected King.

Because He saves us,

Not based on our own merits,

But completely based upon His sovereign grace.

If He did not save us in this way,

We would all be doomed.

Jesus truly is the unexpected King,

Who has come to save us from our sins,

He is the anointed One,

The Son of David,

Our hope,

And our Savior!

How does this unexpected King save us?

By the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

We are saved by the King’s grace.

Do you trust in who this unexpected King is?

Do you trust in what He has done?

WE: Conc.

Slide

Today,

We are celebrating how this unexpected king is the forever king.

Proven by how He unexpectedly rose from the dead,

Securing His reign over death forever.

Not only has He overcome the grave by His grace,

But His grace overcomes so much more.

Think about the author of our Gospel for example.

Matthew was a tax collector for Rome,

Who made a lavish living by cheating his fellow Jews on their taxes,

Essentially stealing from them for his own gain.

But because the King’s grace overcomes his stealing,

When Jesus called Matthew to follow him.

He became a disciple.

Making him a first-hand witness to Jesus’ life and ministry.

So, he wrote an accurate,

God-inspired record of Christ’s life and ministry,

A reliable narrative of Jesus Christ,

Even though he,

And most other Jews,

Saw himself as one of the least likely people to write a Gospel.

Matthew is such a fitting author to write about the good news of Jesus Christ.

The things he witnessed were memorable for him.

It can be felt by his writing.

And it makes sense,

I mean,

Think about how memorable events get seared into our minds.

When I was in 5th grade,

The intermediate school over in Greene had a bomb threat written on the 5th grade boys bathroom wall.

I happened to be one of the boys who signed out to go to the bathroom during the window of time when it had been written.

So, a day or two after the bomb threat.

The police called my house,

And I vividly remember my mom hanging up the phone,

And trying to calmly tell me I have to go down to the police station for questioning related to the bomb threat.

I burst out crying thinking I was going to jail,

And my dad,

Trying to reassure me,

Asked if I did it.

I told him, “No! Of course not!”

“Then,” he said, “you have nothing to worry about.”

“You won’t go to jail, if you didn’t do it.”

But I was still terrified walking into the police station,

Sitting down across the table from a cop,

Who was just this huge intimidating figure to me.

The details of this experience come to my brain effortlessly.

Even if I wanted to forget it,

I couldn’t.

Even though it turned out to be nothing in the end.

Slide

So, think about the disciples,

Like Matthew.

They saw Jesus reach out, touch, and heal lepers,

They saw and heard Him calm a storm with His words,

They served and ate the bread and fish He multiplied for thousands of people.

And they saw firsthand His resurrected body,

With the nail marks in His flesh.

These things are permanently lodged into their memories.

So, we can trust what Matthew writes.

Think about these disciples,

They are very sympathetic characters.

When we first meet them,

They are men of little faith.

But as the narrative continues,

And Jesus teaches them more and more,

Their faith grows as you turn the pages of Matthew.

And it is not like a perfect upward trajectory.

They repeatedly move back and forth between great confessions regarding Christ,

To kinda pathetic errors.

But as they listen to Jesus,

Recover from their failures,

And continue to grow as disciples,

They demonstrate a readiness to implement the Great Commission.

The disciples are not presented as a finished product.

They follow Jesus,

Make mistakes,

Ask questions,

And deepen their understanding.

Their flaws are flaws we can resonate with.

Therefore, Jesus’ answers and commands and teachings and corrections to His disciples,

Are also spoken directly to us.

Being ready for Christ’s commission does not mean we have arrived spiritually.

It means, like the disciples,

We grow in Christlikeness,

Through watching, listening, learning, and repenting from failures,

To grasp the meaning of Christ’s teachings.

Like the disciples,

You may feel like one of little faith.

If that is you,

Consider what Christ had done through these men of little faith.

The King’s grace overcomes your little faith.

Slide

This is what Matthew wants from the readers of His gospel.

Eventually, he himself went from one of little faith,

To one who gave his life for this message.

Think about that for a moment.

Would the disciples really be willing to die for a lie they made up?

Why?

To what end?

What would it benefit them if the events in the Gospel were not true?

If Jesus Christ never actually rose from the dead?

If they made it all up,

They went from being men of little faith,

To men who suffered and died for no reason.

It’s irrational,

It is outside of their character,

It makes no sense!

So, clearly, this is not the case.

They lived and died for Jesus Christ,

Because they saw Jesus Christ died and lived.

Slide

So, we have assurance that the Gospel of Matthew can be trusted,

That Jesus Christ died on the cross and rose from the dead.

Although Matthew was originally written to a Jewish audience,

As the Great Commission tells us to make disciples of all nations,

The forever king is not just king of the Jews

He is your king and my king,

He is the King of kings,

The King of all nations.

So, Matthew is written with this expectation that disciples will take the gospel of Christ to the nations,

As Jesus commissioned us to do.

This global interest was already demonstrated in Jesus’ genealogy.

Rahab was from Jericho,

Ruth was a Moabite,

Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband, was a Hittite,

Thus Bathsheba was at least a Hittite by marriage.

All these non-Jews holding prominent roles in Jesus’ lineage.

This means the King’s grace overcomes ethnic and national barriers.

The Kingdom of heaven has room for all the nations.

When any person,

Regardless of ethnicity,

Trusts in Christ’s death and resurrection on their behalf,

The King permits them to enter His Kingdom.

Slide

Jesus fearlessly, gently, and powerfully declared the Word about His Kingdom throughout His ministry.

Not only that,

He prays for and cares for His people.

He knows and assesses the heart of every person.

He is the embodiment of wisdom,

Who offered Himself on the cross to be the final sacrifice for sin.

And rose from the grave,

Securing our victory over death.

All those kings we looked at in Jesus’ genealogy could not ultimately protect the people,

Provide prosperity,

Uphold the law,

And establish justice forever.

But the forever king does.

He does so perfectly,

Without any sin or failures.

The forever king overcomes all His enemies.

Sin, Satan, and death stand no chance against Him!

He protects you by His Spirit,

He guides you with His Word.

And His death and resurrection was the climax of human history.

So, the genealogy is really a declaration of Jesus’ identity.

It is an introduction to knowing this forever king,

Who ultimately had to be the one to die on the cross.

Because only the perfect forever king is satisfactory.

Why?

Because the perfect forever king is God.

Jesus demonstrates this truth throughout Matthew’s Gospel,

He accepts worship,

He judges humankind,

He knows the hearts and minds of people,

He forgives sins,

He asserts that His presence is God’s presence,

He grants life,

He performs miracles,

And He applies OT texts for God to Himself.

So, the forever king is clearly God!

So, when Jesus is giving instruction,

God is giving instruction.

And His instruction is more than just a behavioral or legal code.

His target is our motivation,

Or as Jesus most commonly says,

The heart of a person.

His instructions are not just for outwardly good morals.

No, He wants to change the source of every thought, word, and deed,

The King’s grace overcomes your wicked heart.

Slide

And as the individual hearts change,

It shapes the entire life of the covenantal community,

The Church,

His Body!

So, as individual hearts are changed by His grace,

We become empowered to resolve conflict, to end abuse, to protect the innocent, and to restrain evil.

But we are utterly dependent on His grace to overcome our deceitful hearts.

Without it,

We are condemned.

We cannot uphold His standards without His grace.

He prohibits all anger and lust and careless speech and the love of praise and worry.

And He demands generosity and love for enemies and turning the other cheek.

He demands that we are to be perfect as He is perfect.

These standards sound great!

But as each of us hold ourselves up against these standards,

Our inability to uphold them becomes painfully more pronounced.

Be perfect?...

I…can’t...

Why would Jesus give such a demoralizing standard?

What are we to do?

First, acknowledge how we have fallen short of His perfect standard,

Second, repent of it,

Meaning we turn away from it,

And set our target back on Christ’s perfect standard.

Third, trust in the King’s grace.

Because the King’s grace overcomes our imperfections,

By His perfect sacrifice on the cross for our imperfections.

Daniel Doriani explains this well,

He writes how,

“The commands [of Jesus], challenging as they are, entice people to keep reading till the end, when Jesus gives His life as a ransom for sinners.”

Slide

Throughout His life,

Jesus not only gave powerful instruction,

He also performed many miracles.

These miracles reveal the ways of God and His Kingdom.

Because not every disease is a direct consequence of personal sin,

Jesus’ miracles show how the King’s grace has the power to overcome Satan’s power.

His miracles point to God’s salvation,

And serve as evidence that Jesus is the forever King!

A miracle is an amazing act of God in this world,

That disclose His character,

And arouse wonder in us to promote faith.

But they ultimately manifest His redemptive purposes in a single concentrated moment.

And it is not like Jesus did all these things privately.

Many were public,

Demanding attention.

And even His enemies who witnessed it,

Could not refute His power,

But they refuted where His power came from.

These miracles are not just incredible stories.

They present the power of the forever King.

Slide

So, behold His power!

The forever King is King over everything;

Over all of humankind,

Over nature,

Over Jews and Gentiles,

Rich and poor,

Men and women,

Even over sin, sickness, disease, and death!

There is no problem or obstacle beyond the King’s power!

He cures those who could never be cured,

He stops demons in their tracks,

And He commands nature with His voice.

And He does this out of mercy and compassion.

Because the miracles were not ultimately about a physical healing.

The King’s miracles show how His grace overcomes the consequence of sin.

He paid for that penalty with His life on the cross.

Slide

And the miracle of miracles is what we are celebrating this morning,

That the King’s grace overcomes the grave!

So, every miracle represents this redemptive work of Christ.

They are samples of restored creation,

Which will come in its fullness when Christ returns,

And all sin, corruption, evil, suffering, and death will be ended.

So, these miracles testify that the forever King has come,

He has inaugurated His Kingdom,

He has overcome the grave,

To reign forever,

And by His grace,

We can overcome the grave as well!

Pray.