Well, good morning. My name is Travis. If I haven't had an opportunity to meet you, it is uh uh it's just great to be here with you all. We're going to be starting a short little 3-week series on the incarnation of Christ this morning. As you can see on your screen, and I was told that as long as the candles burn, I could talk. Just what I was told. You guys do things a little bit different here in Boise. And I appreciate that cuz I heard they're 8-hour candles. Um I I think I've told you this before, but one of my favorite shows is a a show, TV show called Who Do You Think You Are? Does anybody watch that besides me? Anybody else nerdy? Okay, good. A couple nerds. It's always good to know who the fellow nerds are. Who Do You Think You Are is a show that picks a celebrity and then with the help of ancestry.com and historians they they face they uh trace their family their family line oftentimes traveling to where their ancestors come from and then connecting with local historians there and uh and finding out more about their family. And it's always interesting to me to watch a show because I love hearing people's stories, the stories of their life, what makes them tick, what excites them, uh what are some of their great disappointments in life. I love hearing all of that. And it's also interesting because within every family tree, there's both saints and sinners. There's people I mean, in every family tree, I mean, you think about it, there's hookers and prostitutes in almost every family tree. Uh there's people who do amazing things and then there's people who do some incredibly wicked things. And it's interesting to watch the emotional journey that the person whose family history is being traced. the emotional journey that they go on as they find out more about their family as it puts pieces together in their mind of oh this is why I'm this way and this is why we our family ended up over here and this is why we uh celebrate certain things over in in this in these ways and a while back I was watching one it was an episode with Josh Dell do you guys know who Josh Dell is he's an actor uh starred in all of the transformer movies uh and he traces he doesn't know much about his grandmother's history. And so he traces his grandmother's lineage 12 generations back to his 12-time great-grandfather, a man by the name of Thomas Thomas Norton, who studied at Cambridge in England. And so Dell goes to uh he goes to Cambridge and as he's there, he discovers that his 12-time great-grandfather was good friends with John Calvin, the great French reformer. and he wrote a play, his great-grandfather did Thomas Norton wrote a wrote a a play that was performed in front of Queen Elizabeth I. And some historians believe that Shakespeare picked up some of its themes and actually plagiarized some of his lines and used it in King Lear. And of course, Dumal, who's an actor, is thrilled to have this piece of information about his 12-time great-grandfather. He can't believe it that his 12-time great-grandfather inspired and influenced Shakespeare. This is all too wonderful for him to hear. And he says in the show, it's like a dream come true. And he's incredibly proud of him. And it's this high moment in the show. And then the shoe drops because what they find out is that what Thomas Norton is most known for is not as a playwright. He's not known first and foremost for inspiring and influencing Shakespeare. What Thomas Norton is most known for is a title as the rackmaster. The rackmaster. What's that? The Rackmaster was a man who was known for torturing Catholics who were suspective of trying to overthrow Queen Elizabeth as she was a Protestant. And Del's a Catholic. And so he hears this piece of news that his 12-time great-grandfather used to lay people up out on a table and would attach their limbs to ropes and then tighten it and tighten it and tighten it until they would confess if they were trying to overthrow Queen Elizabeth. And all of a sudden, you could see his his his expression drops. And he went from being incredibly proud of his ancestor to being distraught over him. And the show kind of ends there. Family histories, they're a messy thing, aren't they? Maybe you've done some digging in your own parts of your family lineage, and like Demell's family, there's parts that make you proud and you rejoice over, and then there's parts that you're scandalized by because there's scandal in every single family tree. There's some names that you'd like to highlight and there's other names you'd like to leave off. Is that not true? It is true because again there's scandal in every family tree. You may be surprised to know. You may be surprised to know that Jesus himself had an incredibly messy family tree. And when you start to dig into Jesus's genealogy, the fact that his lineage is incredibly messy, that turns out to be good news for you and it turns out to be good news for me because what it reveals is that his grace can change your past. And being connected to him can completely alter your destiny. So turn with me to the Gospel of Matthew. And if you're new to the Bible, the book of Matthew is in the New Testament. So the second half of the Bible, in fact, it's the first book in the New Testament, which is if you get to the New Testament, Matthew, and then it becomes Mark and then Luke and John. And so it's the very first book in the New Testament. And we're going to be looking at uh Matthew chapter 1. And right as you open it and you see it, you recognize that it's a genealogy. And I know for many of you, genealogies are the sections of scripture that you skip over in order to catch up on your Bible daily, your daily Bible reading plan. Um, but they're actually incredibly important. And what you'll find as you read the genealogies, especially the one here in Matthew chapter 1, is deep within the genealogy is this incredibly good news for you and me and the rest of humanity. So this morning, what we're going to do is we're going to work our way through the genealogy. And yep, I'm going to read every one of the names and then we're going to consider how can a genealogy actually be considered good news. So let's begin. Matthew chapter 1, beginning in verse one. The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Now, um I know most of you know this, but some don't. And I don't want to just communicate Christianity to insiders, but to outsiders as well. The name Jesus is a personal name. Christ is a title. Uh so you got a title with a personal name. Um and Christ means Messiah or anointed one, the king. And so again, the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David. And again, ma uh Matthew's highlighting that Jesus is the heir to the Davidic throne. And you got to put this in its context because Israel has been waiting for King David's greater son to reestablish the throne in Jerusalem and to reestablish the kingdom of Israel as in the golden days of Israel when David was the king. And this is what all of Israel was expecting the Messiah to do. So, Matthew tells us that Jesus, who is the Christ, is the son of David, who is also the son of Abraham. And that connection means Jesus is a true Israelite, who can trace his ancestry all the way back to Abraham. But more than that, it lays out one of Matthew's main purposes, which is to show that Jesus is the fulfillment of the great Abrahamic promise that one would come from Abraham through whom all the nations would be blessed. And then verse two, it picks up the genealogy proper and it moves from father Abraham to King David. Verse two, Abraham was the father of Isaac

and Isaac the father of Jacob and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers. Now notice that Matthew highlights Judah here. Um because it was Judah who in Genesis 49, which we'll get to in like a year. Uh but in Genesis 49, right before Jacob dies, he gathers his his 12 sons and he said to Judah, "The scepter shall not depart from Judah." And Matthew's showing that Jesus comes from the royal line of Judah. He's he's fulfilling this. He's establishing, Matthew's establishing Jesus's credentials. This is like a resume. A genealogy is like a resume. We'll talk about that when we close. So he says he's comes from Judah. Verse three, and Judah the father of Perez, and uh Perez and Zarah by Tamar, and Perez the father of Hezron, and Hezron the father of Ram, and Ram the father of Abinadab, and Abinadab the father of Nishan. and Nishaw the father of salmon and his brother Steelhead. No, I'm kidding. That's not in there. I just can't help myself. Um, drop the L. Son, uh, and, uh, Solomon, the the Son, the father of Boaz by Rahab,

and Boaz the father of Oed, by Ruth, and Oed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David the king. And now the genealogy, it traces from King Solomon to the Babylonian exile. And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah.

And Solomon the father of Rayobam. And Rayobam the father of Abijah. And Abijah the father of Asaf. And Asaf the father of Jehosaphat. And Jehosaphat the father of Joram. And Joram the father of Uzziah. And Uzziah the father of Jotham. and Jotham the father of Ahaz and Ahaz the father of Hezekiah and Hezekiah the father of Manasseh and Manasseh the father of Amos and Amos the father of Josiah and Josiah the father of Jeconiah and his brothers at the time of the deportation to Babylon. Now, you read those names and and I don't know if it it hits you, but it's what's striking about it is this section is alternating a series of godly kings and wicked kings. We see that wicked kings produced good kings. They father good kings and good kings fathered wicked kings. Wicked Rayob and his wicked son had offspring who were good kids, good good kings. Asa and Jehosaphat, but their offspring was wicked. How do you explain that? Da Carson in his commentary, he says, "Good or evil, they were part of the Messiah's line. For grace, now listen, for grace does not run in the blood. God's providence cannot be deceived or outmaneuvered." What he's saying is God was at work in all of them to bring about his eternal purposes, his anointed one who would rescue humanity and who would renovate the material universe. And now the genealogy, it picks up hope and it picks up steam as it moves from after the exile to the birth of Christ. Look at verse 12. And after the deportation to Babylon, Jeaniah was the father of Shieldiel. And Shieldiel the father of Zerubbabel. And Zerubbabel the father of Abaihood. And Ab and Abihood the father of Elkim. And Elkim the father of Azor. And Azor the father of Zadok. And Zad the father of Akim. And Achim the father of of Elihood. And Elihood the father of uh Elizazar. and Eleazar, the father of Matan, and Matton, the father of Jacob, and Jacob, the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ. Now, notice the switch that takes place there. Everyone else, it's it's so and sothered. So and sotheathered this person and this person fathered that person. The same pattern continues 40 times in the active verse. But here in the active voice, but here in the 34, the 41st name, it switches into a passive voice emphasizing the uniqueness of Mary and she is unique. She was chosen to to bear the child and the supernaturalness of Jesus's conception whereby Mary conceives by the Holy Spirit preparing the way for the virgin birth. And we'll look at that next week. And then Matthew closes out his genealogy by saying, "So all the generations from Abraham to David were 14 generations. and from David to the deportation to Babylon 14 generations. And from the deportation to Babylon to the Christ 14 generations. Okay. So this g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g g genealogy what it does is it if you step back from it and you slow down and you read it and you meditate upon it, it should cause you to marvel at God's love because it tells us three important, hugely important truths that we need to understand. So let me give them to you up front and then we'll unpack them. What's the first one? God's promises come true. You can fill this in in your outline if you want right now. God's promises come true. God's grace changes everything and God's son gives you lasting significance. So, first one, God's promises come true. One of the main things this genealogy teaches us right out of the gate is that God's promises, all of them. Come true. He's the one who keeps his word completely. All of God's promises come true. Well, where do you find that? Right in the opening line. It's the very first thing this genealogy tells us. the book of the genealogy of Dave of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. And what Matthew is doing now, think about what Matthew's doing. He's linking Jesus to the two great promises in the Old Testament. The promise to Abraham and then the promise to David. Well, what were those promises? Well, to Abraham, beginning in in Genesis 12, we see it later repeated in Genesis 15:1, 17, and 22, which again we'll see in the weeks ahead. But in Genesis chapter 12, the Lord tells Abram this. Lord says to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you, and I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you and him do and him who dishonors you I will curse and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. And of course the initial fulfillment of this promise was the gift of a son in old age to Abraham, the son Isaac. It was a miraculous it was a miraculous supernatural birth. It was against all odds. But Isaac pointed to someone much greater than Isaac. He pointed to the ultimate offspring of Abraham, a son of Abraham who would come and who through this promise that all the nations of the earth would be blessed would be fulfilled. And we know through the New Testament, this from the New Testament, this very clearly points to Jesus. Jesus is the fulfillment of that covenant promise. He's the offspring of Abraham. So the promise to Abraham was kept. It came true. But Matthew says so does the promise to David. In second Sam in 2 Samuel 7, what happens is the Lord promises to King David that he would give him a son who would sit on the throne forever and who would reign his people forever. And at the center of that promise, 2 Samuel chapter 7, it's up on the screen. We read these words in verses 12 and 13. When your days are fulfilled, the Lord says, and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. And of course, the promise was immediately fulfilled in Solomon, the son of David, who became the next king, and who built a temple in Jerusalem. But Solomon didn't sit on the throne forever. In fact, by the time you get to the Babylonian exile, there are no more Davidic kings sitting on the throne. So, this is a promise that's waiting for its ultimate fulfillment. And so, the Jews by the time of Jesus, they were hoping for the Messiah. And one of the names for the Messiah was the son of was son of David. And there's 10 times in Matthew's gospel that this phrase son of David is used and at least nine of them are clearly messianic. And right here, what's happening right here in the very beginning, the very opening line of the genealogy. He's presenting to us that Jesus is the son of Abraham and the son of David. Frederick Dale Bruner in his commentary that I stole from Kelly Barber this week, he writes this, and it's so true too. He says, "The two great baskets of promise in the Hebrew scriptures are the promise to David of a son who would be a king forever and the promise to Abraham of a seed who would be a blessing for everyone." A promise meaning Israel's longing for an eternal David. And a promise meaning the Gentiles yearning for a universal savior. Son of David says, "Israel, here is your Messiah." son of Abraham says, "Nations, here is your hope." And this is what the genealogy just at the outset is beginning to tell us. The promises that God has has made are coming true. And this is one of the main points of the genealogy that in Jesus, God's promise that stretches all the way back to Abraham, but then centers on the promise to David. It comes true. It's all coming true. So, the first thing this genealogy tells us is that God keeps his promise. But also, here's the thing to note, though, and this is the part we don't like. It took centuries for him to fulfill his promise. And boy, we don't like that. Lord, you made me a promise. It should have happened like yesterday. It took centuries for him to fulfill his promise. Jesus Christ came along 2,000 years after Abraham, 1,000 years after David. And so, the promises come true, but it takes a long time in the coming. And more than that, history didn't even look like it was moving in the direction of of the promise before Jesus. Before Christ came, there were 400 years without prophecy in Israel. It had died out. And the people of Israel had been subjected to Rome. And so it it wasn't that it just took a long time. It looked like God had completely forgotten about his promise. It looked as if he wasn't concerned about his people. And then bam, the Christ is born. The Messiah is here. You know what that means for you? You You want to know why this genealogy is such good news? It means that God never forgets his promises. And he's always providentially at work in bringing them about even when it doesn't look like it or when it doesn't feel like it. Which means you can't you cannot judge God based on your time frame.

But boy, we like to do that, don't we? It hasn't come about yet, Lord. I thought this was going to take place by now. And so therefore, I'm going to I'm going to take the moral high ground and judge you. You can't do that with God. You can't do that. You can't judge him based on your time frame. He always keeps his promise and he's always at work in bringing about even when it doesn't look like it, even when it doesn't feel like it. But he brings it about in a way that's beyond anything we could imagine. And just one of the promises, just any one of the promises that he's going to fulfill in your life will blow your mind. And you know, one of the promises of the Bible, just one of them, that when your life gets connected to the Lord Jesus's life and that you delight in him, he'll actually give you the desires of your heart. Did you know that when your life gets connected to his life and you start focusing in on him and you allow his Holy Spirit to change the um the framework of your heart that he'll actually give you the desires of your heart and he'll do it in a way that you can't even imagine. He keeps his promise to Abraham. He keeps his promise to David. He keeps his promise to you. The Bible says in Psalm 37 that when you embrace the Lord Jesus, he'll give you the desires of your heart, but it'll take much longer than you think and it'll come about in a way that you can't even imagine. Now, many of you are Christians and you're thinking to yourself, "Well, it doesn't seem like he's given me the desires of my heart, and it doesn't even feel like I'm moving in that direction." Now, here's the reality. Everybody feels like that at some point or another in their life. Every single one of us as a Christian feels like that at one point or another in our Christian life. Which means you have to rely on what you do know. Not what you feel, but what you do know. And what this genealogy tells us is that God will fulfill his promises, but not in the way and not in the time frame that we expect, which means we have to keep trusting him. So, here's the second thing this genealogy tells us is that God's grace changes everything. His grace changes everything. Within this genealogy, I don't know if you noticed, I should have had you highlight it. There were there was mention of four women apart from Mary. And that's incredibly interesting. Somebody's phone going off. It's totally cool. Don't worry about it. Um, no, seriously, don't worry about it. Like first time I was ever preaching, I heard this phone go off in the back and I'm trying to figure out whose it is and it was my wife's phone going off in the back and I was like such respect. Um, so there were four women that were mentioned in the genealogy and that's unusual for all sorts of reasons. First of all, because women were weren't usually a part of genealogies unless they could enhance its purity and the women who were mentioned here certainly couldn't do that. And then secondly, all four of the women were non-Jews. And none of these women were models of morality. Not one of these women would you take your daughter to and say, "Go follow their example." You just wouldn't do it. The first one we see is Tamar. Do you guys remember who Tamar is? If you don't, some afternoon reading for you, apart from your kids. Uh Tamar in Genesis chapter 38. It's one of the most sorted tales in the scriptures. Uh the story is found in Genesis 38. And what happens is Judah has three sons and he gives his first son in marriage to Tamar, but the Bible says he's wicked. And so the Lord puts him to death. And so Judah, the dad gives his second son in marriage to Tamar. But that dude is also wicked, maybe more so. And so the Lord puts him to death. And so Judah, the dad, looks at the situation and he thinks to himself, "There's no way I'm giving my third son to Tamar." But he goes to Tamar and says, "I'll give him to you when he grows up. When he matures, you can have him in marriage." But she knows that he's lying to her. And so it comes about in the course of time that Judah, who is not a paragon of virtue, by the way, he takes a business trip. takes a business trip out of town and Tamar gets wind of it. And so what she does is she dresses up as a prostitute and Judah um propositions her and she says, "Well, what will you give me?" They didn't have credit cards. They didn't have Venmo. And he says, "Well, I I'll give you a young goat." I don't know if that's a good deal or not, but he says, "I'll give you a young goat, but I don't have it here with me. I'll send it to you. But for the time being, he gives her his signate ring and a staff that was in his hands. And he goes and he sleeps with her. And he forgets all about it. And he goes back to his village and he sends an associate to go back and pay her. But the associate couldn't find her. And Judah forgets all about it. He doesn't think any anything about it. He's already deleted all of the emails, all the text messages. He couldn't care less. But then three months later, Tamar shows up and she's showing and Judah's ticked off because she's engaged in immorality. She didn't wait for his son. And he thinks to himself, "This will be the perfect opportunity to get rid of her. I'll bring her up in front of everybody. I'll shame her and then probably stone her. I'll shame her and get rid of her. Perfect opportunity to get rid of her." And so as she's being called to go up before him, she has the signate ring and the staff and she says, "By the man to whom these belong, I am pregnant." Boom. How's that for your family tree? Prostitution and incest right there in Jesus's genealogy. But more than that, you have Rahab, who was a Canaanite prostitute. She was a Canaanite prostitute who lived in the walls of the city of Jericho who hid the spies when they came to view Jericho. And then when Joshua and his armies when they marched around Jericho before the walls fell down, Rahab because of her kindness to the two spies, because of her hospitality, her life and her household uh they were spared and she later converts uh becomes a part of the worshipping family of Israel. The next one you see is Ruth in verse five. And Ruth, as you know, maybe you know, was a Moabitete. And Moabites weren't even allowed to come into the presence of God. And Ruth, her husband dies. And so she goes and she works in the fields of Boaz. And Boaz um takes notice of her. Let's just say it like that. He takes notice of her. And he prays over her by saying, "May the Lord repay you for the kindness and may he spread his wings over you." And that evening when Boaz is done working, he was threshing barley all day in the hot sun. He had a little bit to eat and probably a little bit to drink. And Ruth, what she does is she takes off her grieving garments and she puts on clothes that would signal to him that she's available. And while Boaz is sleeping, she curls up next to him and says,"Sread your wings over me." And what she's saying is, "May you be the answer to your own prayer? May you be my covering." And Boaz does. He marries her. She takes the initiative. She takes this gigantic risk. Again, this is not how you would want your daughter's daughters to like snag a man and just go curl up next to him. This isn't how you'd want this to go down. She curls up next to him and says, "Spread your covering over me." She takes this gigantic rick, but it pays off. And Boaz marries her and she conceives and bears Oed. And Oed becomes the father of Jesse. And Jesse becomes the father of King David. Now, think about these three women. This is all incredibly messy, is it not? It's so messy in Jesus's genealogy. Rebecca Mclofflin in her short little Christmas book called Is Christmas Unbelievable? She says, "The fact that it's messy and it's kind of embarrassing, not kind of, it's super embarrassing." You know what it does? It validates its authenticity. Because if you were going to make up a story about God becoming flesh, you wouldn't include these people in your genealogy. You would never do that. You would only include people whose lives were completely pure. But Matthew mentions these women. You got Tamar who was a Canaanite who committed incest with her father-in-law. You have Ruth who was a Moabitete. And Moabites, like I said, they were essentially banned from coming into the Lord's presence. And you have Rahab, a prostitute. These women, based on their racial background, and their immorality, they they didn't deserve to come into God's presence. But then

Matthew says Uriah's wife.

Why didn't he just call her Ba Sheba? He named every other woman by her name. Why doesn't he do that with Ba Sheba? Why does he call her Uriah's wife? And here's the reason why. He wants you to think through the story. He wanted you to remember that it was David who fell in lust with her, who took advantage of her, who committed adultery with her and then premeditated murder against Uriah. Well, why would Matthew bring this out? Because David was somebody everybody would want in their genealogy. He wasn't a woman. He was a man. He wasn't a Moabitete or a Canaanite. He was Jewish. He wasn't irreligious. He was absolutely religious. And yet what Matthew is reminding you is he's no more worthy of being connected to the grace of Jesus than these outsiders and immoral women. Again, Frederick Bronner in your in your notes, I put it in your uh your outline. He says, "One gets the impression that Matthew poured over his Old Testament until he could locate the most questionable liaison possible in order to insert them into his record." and to so finally preach the gospel even in his genealogy. The gospel teaches, now listen to this, it's so good. The gospel teaches that God can use not only non-Israelite Gentiles, but he can also forgive, overcome, and use Jewish and Gentile sinners, soiled but repentant persons for his great purposes in history. Is that not good? Is this genealogy good news? Oh, heavens yes. Now you think about your own life. Think about your own life for a second. Are there things in your past that you're tormented by? Are there things in your past that if you could hit the delete button and never have that file come up in your memory again that you would do it in a heartbeat? Of course there are. Do you ever look at your past sins, your past sins, things that you don't want anybody to know about and think to yourself, "God can't forgive me. He can't forgive me for my past. And furthermore, he can't use me in the future." You know what the genealogy tells you about that line of thinking? Hogwash. That line of thinking is hogwash. The truth of these stories is that God can use anyone. that God can take the worst sinner, forgive them, redeem them, rescue them, and use them for his purposes. Your past sin is no match for Jesus's present grace and for his future purposes in your life. Is that not wonderful? You guys don't seem very excited about this. This is hello. Your past sin is no match for Jesus's present grace and his future purposes in your life. That is the most astounding news. And I'm running out of time, so I got to go quick. Here's the last thing we see. God's son gives you lasting significance. God's son, the last thing we see in this genealogy is God's son gives you lasting sign significance. Let me close by asking you a question. Why did ancient people look at genealogy and have such interest in it and we look at a genealogy and our eyes glaze over? Why does that happen? Here's the reason why. If you want to have a place in this world, a place in this world, if you want to find significance in our world, you got to have credentials. In our society, the way to get the way to get your place in that world, the place in our world, the way to convey our significance is through a resume. It matters greatly who you studied with, who you apprenticed under, who you worked for, where you went to school. That's that's a resume. And if you want a position, if you want a place in this world, you you put it on the resume and you take it to somebody and they look at and they say, "Oh, you went here. You went to this school. You went and studied under this person. The reason I went to Western Seminary is so that I could study under one professor and one professor only. One person. You went to this school. You went studied with that guy. You you did this thing." Well, then based on your resume, we'll consider you. You show people your credentials. And because we live in such an individualistic society, that means our credentials is always our individual accomplishments. But in ancient times, the times of uh Jesus and even in some traditional cultures today, people are not so much concerned with your individual accomplishments as they are with your family. What mattered in ancient times was who's your family? Who's your family? What's your family's place in the world? What's their character? What's their accomplishments? That's what's really mattered. Who are you related to and who's your family? Now, in our day, because the individual resume is the king, we tend to either pat our resume or pass over certain details in our resume. But that's not what you have here in the genealogy. This genealogy includes all of them. And think about it. 2,000 years later, 3,000 years later, after many of these people are dead and gone, they're dead and gone. And yet, we're still reading their names. We're still hearing about their stories. We're still thinking through their lives. Why have these names not perished? One reason, and one reason only, because they're related to Jesus Christ. If they weren't related to Jesus Christ, I don't care how impressive they were. I don't care how many accomplishments they had. I don't care how beautiful they were. Nobody would remember them. Their names would have perished. But their names have not perished because they're connected to Jesus Christ. Again, your past doesn't define you. You being connected to Jesus does. The message of Christmas and the message of the gospel is this. You want lasting significance. You want something that outlives this age? A million years from now, your name will not perish if you're related to Jesus Christ. If you're a part of his family and the way you become a part of his family is simply by accepting his gift, his grace this Christmas. You can come to him and receive his grace. By coming to him in repentant faith by trusting him for the forgiveness of sins and new life in his name. God's son gives us lasting significance. So brothers and sisters, in this season of Advent that we're celebrating together, the coming of the son of God, the advent of Christ, the incarnation of Jesus, the story of the incarnation of Christ is really a story of grace. He's God's inexpressable gift and it's a gift of grace. And why did Jesus come

from the cradle to the cross to the crown? All of it was done with you in mind so that he could redeem us by bearing our sins. And if you've never trusted Jesus, I want to encourage you to do so this morning. Your past doesn't need to define you. The love and the grace of the Lord Jesus does. Amen. Why don't you stand and I'll pray and then we'll worship the Lord together.

Father, we thank you for the season of Advent. We thank you that this genealogy tells us of the gospel. Tells us of your great love for humanity, that you're the keeper of the promises, that your grace will transform any life no matter how wicked the their past has been. And that you will use us going forward for your great purposes in redemption. Lord, these are marvelous truths and we pray as your people that they would fill us with joy and with hope and with purpose and with meaning and that as we leave here and go back into our homes and our neighborhoods, our places of work tomorrow that the good news of the gospel would so fill our hearts that it would spill out through our lips and then through our hands in service to others. We trust you for these things in Jesus name. Amen.