Luke 3:21-38

Scripture Introduction:

In just a moment we’re going to read through the baptism and genealogy of Jesus. Now I’ll be honest and say that when I’m preaching through a section like this it’s really tempting to just pick up with chapter 4 and start talking about the temptation of Jesus. The genealogy just seems like some historical names that don’t matter all that much.

Now I’m not going to read through all of these—mostly to preserve Amy’s fingers and my dignity in not trying to butcher some of these names. But this list is here for a reason.

When studying for this I heard a really cool story from a Wycliffe bible translator.

When a Bible translator in Papua New Guinea started to translate Matthew’s Gospel, he thought, “The last thing I want to do is bog these people down with a genealogy.” So he began with chapter 2.

But the day came when all the other chapters were done. He called together the men who were helping him, and they decided on the best way to say “begat.” Then they proceeded with Matthew chapter one: “… Abraham begat Isaac. Isaac begat Jacob. Jacob begat …”

By the time they completed about six of these “begats,” the translator could sense the men were becoming excited.

“Do you mean that these were real men?” they asked.

“Yes,” he answered. “They were real men.”

“That’s what we do!” they added, referring to their custom of keeping track of genealogies. “We had thought that these were just white man’s stories. Do you really mean that Abraham was a real man?”

“Yes,” the translator said, “that’s what I’ve been telling you.”

“We didn’t know that,” they said, “but now we believe.”

That night they gathered the village together and said, “Listen to this!” Then they read the first chapter of Matthew. This chapter was the key for belief in the tribe.

So what’s happening here is that Luke is placing Jesus into real history, connected with real people. But it means something for you and I as well. What we will see in this text is that in Jesus we have our word from God, and we have the one who can stand in our place.

Let’s try to tackle a few of these names here...

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It wasn’t just any kiss from any dude that would awaken sleeping beauty. It had to be a handsome prince and it had to be true love’s kiss. That’s an element to many different stories.

But it’s really something they are borrowing from the oldest and greatest and most realest and truest story ever told—the story of God saving sinners. It is the story of a God who delights to give His kingdom to his little flock. From the beginning pages of the Bible we see that God delights to create. He creates humanity to extend His glory and to enjoy Him forever. But humanity has shipwrecked this high calling. We are in need of redemption.

But just as sleeping beauty could only be rescued by a handsome prince so also there are qualifications to our rescuer. What is needed for our rescue is no less than God Himself. But it’s also going to have to be a man who rescues us. This text is going to show us two major things. One, that Jesus is the one who opens up heaven—the way is open to hear from God. And secondly, that Jesus is the one who is qualified to stand in our place.

First, let’s look at Jesus’ baptism. It’s interesting that in Luke he just kind of mentions it in passing. The other gospel writers highlight the communication between Jesus and John the Baptist. But for Luke he’s wanting to highlight that John is the forerunner…Luke wants to get straight to Jesus. That’s phrase “when all the people were baptized” doesn’t mean that every single person in all of Israel were baptized, it means that all those who were to be baptized were baptized and it’s highlighted by saying...”and when Jesus had been baptized”…that was the climax. It’s pointing now to a new era.

There are a few significant things that happen here at Jesus’ baptism. Heaven was opened, the Spirit descended, and a voice from heaven spoke to Jesus. Let me tie all this together.

The Jewish people at the time when Jesus lived (the nerdy term is second temple Judaism) believed that when the OT prophets stopped prophesying the Holy Spirit ceased speaking directly to God’s people. When Ezekiel prophesied of the Spirit leaving the temple that spelled disaster for them. They said that God’s voice now was just a “daughter of a voice” a distant echo.

But what’s happening here with heaven opening is that God is once again speaking to His people. And it’s also communicating something that the Spirit transcends in the form of a dove...

Luke, Vol. 1—That You May Know the Truth Luke 3:21–22

Thomas Goodwin, the great Puritan theologian and president of Magdalen College, Oxford, explained:

All apparitions that God at any time made of Himself, were not so much made to show to men what God is in Himself, as to show us how He is affected toward us, and to declare what effects he will work in us.… For a dove, you know, is the most meek and the most innocent of all birds; without gall, without talons, having no fierceness in it, expressing nothing but love and friendship to its mate in all its carriages, and mourning over its mate in all its distresses. And accordingly, a dove was a most fit emblem of the Spirit that was poured out upon our Saviour when He was just about to enter on the work of our salvation. For as sweetly as doves do converse with doves, so may every sinner and Christ converse together.

So God is communicating and he’s communicating a message of Good News. It’s a new era. An era of good news. Then the voice comes from heaven and says, “you are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.”

This is straight out of Psalm 2. And it’s huge because of what Psalm 2 represents. It represents that God has set his king on the throne. This is my Son. Delight in Him. Be rescued by Him. But He is a King with a kingdom and it’s a conquering kingdom. If you aren’t part of His kingdom then it doesn’t spell good news for you.

But what does this mean for you and I? The fact that you and I can now talk to God goes back to this very moment when heaven was opened. We live in a new era because Jesus broke through history. The Spirit as a dove is because of Jesus. We have the king that we need. We have the one who guides, leads, directs. You need to know what God says about something? Look to Jesus. We have our answer.

But there is also representative language here.

The Gospel according to Luke Luke 3:21–22

Early in Israel’s history, “Son of God” is thus defined in corporate rather than individual terms, a description of Israel rather than a single Israelite—although it will take Jesus, the True Israelite, to restore the ideal of Israel.

Let’s move now to the genealogy. Why is this here? It’s unique where Luke places this. Matthew has it at the very beginning. Luke has it here. It’s an interesting placement…but Jesus is about to be launched into ministry and he’s wanting to make the point that he’s qualified. He’s qualified to wake up Sleeping Beauty.

Being the son “as was supposed” of Joseph, the son of Heli. Okay so we’ve got a couple difficulties here. First, there are differences between the genealogy of Luke and Matthew. Joseph is called the son of Heli here but in Matthew it’s Jacob.

There are a couple of suggestions. One is that Joseph had a father of physical descent but his natural born father had died and so he also had an adoptive father. Matthew then traces Joseph’s royal line of descent and Luke traces the physical line. Another suggestion is that Heli is actually Mary’s father and Joseph, whose parents had died, was adopted by Mary’s father.

Either way, the point is that Jesus is both physically and legally a descendant of the throne of David. There is a point in here to be made about adoption. And it’s very much connected to the gospel. First,

Luke Luke 3:23–38

Legally, adoption does not entail second-class status: adoptees enjoy full rights and privileges of family membership (cf. Rom 8:14–17; Gal 4:5–7).134

You aren’t less of a child to your parents if you are adopted. That’s great news for us as believers in Jesus, we’ll see in just a moment. But as one scholar put it, “Jesus belongs to the house of David just as truly as if he were in a physical sense the son of Joseph. He was a gift of God to the Davidic house, not less truly, but on the contrary in a more wonderful way than if he had descended from David by ordinary birth”.

We need to understand that adoption is a beautiful thing. It’s a picture of the gospel. I find this words from Russell Moore stirring:

If the people in our congregation become other-directed instead of self-directed in the adoption of children in need, they are going to be other-directed instead of self-directed in their verbal witness to people in their community. On the other hand, the same self-interest that sears over the joy of birth will sear over the joy of the new birth. The numbness to earthly adoption is easily translated to numbness to spiritual adoption. But if people in our churches learn not to grumble at the blessing of minivans filled with children—some of whom don’t look anything alike—they’re going to learn to not grumble at the blessing of a congregation filling with new people, some of whom don’t look anything alike. If our churches learn to rejoice in newness of life in the church nursery, they’ll more easily rejoice at newness of life in the church baptistery and vice versa.

I love that even here in the genealogy of our Lord something so precious as adoption is highlighted. It is amazing to me that of all the ways the Lord could have come and chosen to rescue us being adopted is one of those.

BUT Luke is also going for something else here. There are a couple of big differences. Luke does something here that is incredibly unique. Most ancient genealogies start differently. Abraham begat Jacob who begat....but this is one is “the son of...” And notice where Luke is taking us. All the way back to Adam. Who is the son of God it says.

Why is he doing this?

There are two son’s of God in this passage. There is Jesus…who was “supposed to be of Joseph” and then there is Adam.

Is Adam any less human because he was birthed by God? We don’t make that argument, do we? But when we see that Jesus was born of a virgin…he wasn’t born the same way…we somehow think he cannot be as human. But that’s not the case. He’s fully God and fully man.

I want to show you what all this means but we need to go a couple of other places. First Romans 5.

Romans 5:12–21 ESV

Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned— for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come. But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. And the free gift is not like the result of that one man’s sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought justification. For if, because of one man’s trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ. Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men. For as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous. Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Arguing. In Adam. You die. In Christ you live. Which one are you?

Secondly Paul’s argument in Galatians 4

Galatians 4:4–7 ESV

But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.

Adam…son of God. Rest. Rule. Relationship. But he shipwrecked it. We are sons of Adam by birth. We are born into an inheritance of death.

Jesus…son of God. Rest. Rule. Relationship. He fulfilled what it means to be human. He fulfills what it means to be son of God. Accurately represented and imaged God and spread His glory. As such He inherits the kingdom.

And what does Galatians 4 means for that? If you have received “adoption as sons” then you receive ALL the benefits of His kingdom. The kingdom he delights to give you. Able to call him Abba Father.

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Are you in Adam or in Christ?

If in Christ…is this where we are getting our identity and the identity we are living out of?

Do you see the goodness of God in rescuing you and adopting you?