The End of Exile - Matthew 1:1-17

Illustration

Disney and backstories. Constantly telling backstories to my kids (Walt Disney himself and the original stories and characters).

They’ve seen the characters. They could point out Sleeping Beauty, but they couldn’t tell you her story, but once they entered into the Magic Kingdom at Disney World, they were compelled to learn the backstories. They instinctively knew that they would appreciate the kingdom more if they knew more of the old stories.

That’s what we’re doing here!

Matthew’s Use of the OT (Jesus’ Bible)

We are continuing our series on Matthew’s use of the Old Testament (his Bible).

We saw last time that Matthew expects us to be very familiar with the OT. The more familiar we are, the more we’ll see the riches of the portrait of Jesus that Matthew is painting.

Last month I mentioned that there was hardly a paragraph in Matthew’s gospel that didn’t refer to the OT in some sense. So as we continue in this series, we may pause on one verse, or we may stop and look at the literary shape of multiple chapters, or, like today, we’ll do something in between.

Today we will look at what may seem like Matthew’s most blatant use of the OT…everyone’s favorite literary and historical device, a genealogy! Hopefully I can begin to show you that it’s not just a literary or historical device, but that it is also richly theological…meaning its main purpose is to communicate to us who God is.

The Genealogy

The Book of Genesis (Βίβλος γενέσεως, LXX)

Something NEW is happening in King Jesus!

A New Creation (cf. Gen 2:4): What King Jesus accomplishes has cosmic consequences. The scope of his redemptive purposes stretch out further than we often realize. Consider Romans 8 “All creation groans, it eagerly waits for King Jesus’ redemptive plan to come fully into effect.

2 Chronicles

Genesis and Chronicles are marked by lists of descendants. Matthew is stitching his book to his Bible. As a climax and fulfillment!

Matthew is obviously using these two books to assemble this genealogy.

Matthew’s point here is that the whole of the OT testifies about the Person Matthew is writing about. He’s the alpha and omega. From beginning to end the OT has been preparing us for this moment.

Structure:

Abraham - David - Exile - Jesus (Matthew is telling us the OT story at the very outset of his story about King Jesus)

14 = David (Note on “David the king”)

Some notes on the Genealogy:

“And his brothers” - Exile/Exodus

The Women - Gentiles/Outsiders

Asaph/Amos

Closing Point

Peter Pan (illustration continued). READ THE OT!

Jesus was a man. The Christ was a man.

Romans 9:1–5 (LEB)

I am telling the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears witness to me in the Holy Spirit—that my grief is great and there is constant distress in my heart. For I could wish myself to be accursed from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my fellow countrymen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom belong the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the temple service, and the promises, to whom belong the patriarchs, and from whom is the Christ according to human descent, who is God over all, blessed forever! Amen.

As we enter into holy communion in just a minute remember that Jesus entered into our world as a human. The High King of heaven and earth shed his blood and gave up his very human body for us.

“So we read the genealogy of Matthew and see the royal lineage of Jesus. He’s the one who will bring the blessing of Abraham to the whole world. He’s the royal son of David that all of Israel has been waiting for. He’s the one that the prophets wrote about, and the psalmists sang about. He will be the king of Israel who blesses all of the nations of the world, especially the outsiders. We know all of this because Matthew tells us in a genealogy that carefully reveals the hope that has arrived in Jesus.” - Tim Mackie