| 2004 Advent Messages |
First
Sunday of Advent, Matthew 1:1-17, November 28, 2005
The Unnamed Father
“. . .and Jacob the
father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, and Mary was the mother of Jesus
who is called the Messiah.” Matthew 1:17
1.
Give careful thought to the first line of Matthew’s Gospel: “The
book of the Genesis of Jesus Messiah, Son of David, Son of Abraham.”
Matthew is writing a new genesis with Jesus as the main subject. Dale
Brunner observes, “the deepest beginning in history was not the
birth of the world but the birth of the world’s Savior.”
2. Jesus is identified as the Son of David and the Son of Abraham.
We can benefit from comparing these two promise filled descriptions. For
the title Son of David consider 2 Samuel 7:12-16. For Son of Abraham consider
Genesis 12:1-3. Because of Jesus, who can be a true child of Abraham (see
Matthew 3:9; 8:11; 22:32)?
3. Genealogies are usually dry, but Matthew’s is exciting for several
reasons. In the first section (1:2-6; note that the last line of the first
section is the first line of the second section), what names stand out?
Why did Matthew include these names? What is theologically significant
about their presence in the genealogy from Abraham to David?
4. In the second section (1:6-11), Matthew makes four alterations. This
is complicated because most of our versions have “corrected”
two of Matthew’s “alterations” even though our best
Greek texts support them. Here are the four “irregularities”:
(1) Instead of “Asa” (1:7) the best manuscripts read “Asaph,”
Israel’s worship leader and author of 15 psalms. (2) After Jehoram
(or Joram), Matthew skips three generations (Ahaziah, Joash, and Amaziah,
842-783, 2 Chronicles 22-25). (3) Instead of “Amon” (1:10)
the best manuscripts read “Amos,” Israel’s eighth-century
prophet. (4) Matthew skips Jehoiakim just before Jehoiachin (or Jeconiah).
If these alterations are in Matthew’s original text, what message
was he seeking to convey? It appears that Matthew was using history to
present the gospel. By changing two names he stressed the theme of judgment
and by subtracting four names he got his fourteen generations. Is Matthew
too “foot loose and fancy free” with history or is he making
his point creatively through history?
5. In the third section (1:11-16), from the exile to Christ, Matthew
ends his genealogy by naming a fifth woman, Mary, and making a fifth
alteration. Instead of saying, “Joseph the father of Jesus,”
he deliberately says, “Joseph, the husband of Mary, and Mary was
the mother of Jesus who is called the Messiah.” Once again Matthew
compresses the generations. He refers to only nine names covering a 500
year period from Zerubbabel to Joseph, whereas Luke refers to eighteen
names in his genealogy. But the most striking feature of the last section
is the last line which is noticeably lacking in a reference to Jesus’
father and a 14th generation! Who is the unnamed father and who is included
in the unnamed fourteenth generation?
6. In a genealogy of three times fourteen (7 doubled) generations, Matthew
stresses the sovereign rule of the Kingdom of God. Dale Brunner asks,
“Is it possible that the fourteenth generation (in the third section)
is the unnamed but major ‘generation’ in the whole series—the
divine ‘generation’ of Jesus in the womb of Mary?”
