If you'll take your Bibles now
and let's turn to the book of Matthew. The book of Matthew. Matthew chapter 1. The book of the generation of
Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Abraham begat
Isaac. Isaac begat Jacob. Jacob begat
Judas and his brethren. And Judas begat Phares and Zerah
of Tamar. And Phares begat Eshom. And Eshom begat Aram. Aram begat
Amenadab. And Amenadab begat Naasan. And Naation begat Salmon. And
Salmon begat Boaz of Rachab. And Boaz begat Obed of Ruth. And Obed begat Jesse. And Jesse
begat David the king. And David the king begat Solomon
of her that had been the wife of Uriah. Solomon begat Reboam. And Reboam begat Abiah. And Abiah begat Asa. And Asa
begat Josaphat. And Josaphat begat Joram. And
Joram begat Osias. And Osias begat Joathim. And Joathim begat Ahaz. And Ahaz
begat Ezekias. And Ezekias begat Manassas. And Manassas begat Amon. And
Amon begat Josias. And Josias begat Jeconias and
his brethren about the time they were carried away into Babylon.
And after they were brought to Babylon, Jeconias begat Salathia,
and Salathia begat Zerubbabel, and Zerubbabel begat Abiad, and
Abiad begat Eliakim, and Eliakim begat Azor, and Azor begat Sadok,
and Sadok begat Achim, and Achim begat Eliud, and Eliud begat
Eleazar, and Eleazar begat Mathan, and Mathan begat Jacob, and Jacob
begat Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus,
who is called Christ. So all the generations of Abraham
to David are 14 generations. And from David unto the carrying
away into Babylon are 14 generations. And from the carrying away into
Babylon unto Christ are 14 generations. Now I want to begin a new study
this morning in the book of Matthew. Matthew marks the beginning of
the New Testament, what we call the New Testament. Somebody said
the Old Testament gives witness all the way through that somebody's
coming. The four Gospels tell us that
somebody came. And then from there to the book
of Revelations, it tells us what he did. And then in Revelations,
it declares he's coming back. coming back. The Old Testament
begins with the account of creation. The New Testament begins with
the generation of the Lord Jesus Christ, He of whom the whole
Old Testament gave witness. These four Gospels are very important. Their design is to give witness
to the fact and by infallible evidence. If you read these These
four Gospels carefully, they give infallible evidence to prove
that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ. He is the Christ. It tells us what he did. It tells us who he was. It tells
us where he came from. It tells us what he accomplished
and where he is now. Why four Gospels? Why not just
have one? Why not just have a man like
John the Baptist? man who was prophesied throughout
the Old Testament. Why not just have him come, have
his witness, and be done with it? Why have four Gospels? Well,
there are several reasons. I'm going to give you a few of
them. I believe, first of all, to establish the truth by more
than one witness. You remember what I told you?
He's going to prove to you by infallible evidence that Jesus
is the Son of God. He's not going to do it through
one man. He's going to do it through four men. four men. And it's accepted and approved
both in the law of God and in all the civil laws that I'm aware
of that vital facts be established by two or three witnesses. Isn't
that what it says? And then secondly, we've got
four Gospels to show us our Savior and Redeemer in the full scope
of His character. I don't know if you've studied
these four Gospels very carefully or not, but if you do, you'll
find that each one has a different perspective on the Christ. Each one. And they all set them
out right at the outset of the book. Matthew shows us Christ
as the covenant seed of Abraham and the rightful heir to the
throne of David. It sets him forth before us. All the covenant promises. Everything
in Him. And then Mark takes a little
different perspective. Mark tells us of Jehovah's servant. If you read through the book
of Mark, you'll find that Mark represents Him as the servant
of the Father who came to accomplish all the will of God and the purpose
of God. And then Luke sets before us
the Son of Man. Go through Luke's Gospel and
he sets before Christ as the Son of Man, full of tenderness,
compassion, sympathy. And then John, which we've already
looked at, sets the Lord before us as the Son of God. He said,
the Word was made flesh. Do you remember how John began
his book? In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things
were made by Him. So John sets before us the Christ
as the Son of God. And then another thing I want
to call your attention to is that these were troubled, very
turbulent times. There's no way that we can sit
here and even halfway imagine how turbulent the times was when
these Gospels were written. Hebrews chapter 8, verse 13 says
that, in that he saith a new covenant, a new testament, he
hath made the first oath. Now that which decayeth and waxeth
old is ready to vanish away. This was the beginning of the
end for natural Israel. This was the beginning of the
end of all those Old Testament ceremonial types and the priesthood
and everything that established religion. And I'm talking about
religion in general that represents the living God. Everything that
was about to be brought before this world in the way of types
and pictures and figures and that type of thing was about
to come to an end. I know people get upset. Well,
what have you got against hanging a picture? Why not hang a picture
of Jesus on the wall? What's it going to hurt? I'll
tell you why I ain't going to hang anything on the wall because
the days of types and figures and pictures is over with. It's
done. The Son of God has come. He's
come, and he's not worshiped that way anymore. He's not going
to honor your worship when you worship him that way. They that
worship God must worship him in spirit and truth, not by symbols,
not by these visual aids. This time was coming to an end,
and it was offensive to the Jew. Jew's not going to take this
sitting down. He's got generations. I read
to you 42 generations. You think about that. Forty-two
generations from the time God called Abraham out of that idolatrous
place where he was at unto the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Forty-two generations these Jews have been going into a tabernacle,
going into a temple, looking at all these figures and types
and going through the ceremonies, all these type of things. God
who once spoke through the mouth of His prophets will now speak
by His Son. All ceremonial worship, the priesthood,
the natural representation of the church. There was no other
representation of the church in this world other than Israel
in the Old Testament. None. You can't find it in any
of the Gentile nations. You can't find it anywhere except
in Israel. Everything God had to say to
this world, he said in Israel. That's where his church was represented.
But this is all coming to an end. In a little more than 33
years, everything the Jews as a religious society represented
would be swallowed up by the glorious coming and the ushering
in of a new age, this coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and
this gospel age. Christ would fulfill every Old
Testament type and prophecy, and he'd become the end of the
law for righteousness to everyone that believed. They were turbulent
times. Men suffered and died for these
Gospels. They were outcasts. John wrote
the book of Revelations exiled on an island. Exiled out there
by himself. Cut him off. Cut him off from
everybody except God. And even out there alone on the
island, God still inspired him to finish up the Scriptures.
These men were outcast from their families. We've seen that in
the last few weeks. Outcast by their families. Isolated,
kicked out. They have some kind of a gathering
and a fellowship. They don't even invite you. They
don't bother sending you a card. And I'll tell you this, the prevailing
governments They didn't go down quietly about this either. They
didn't like all this internal strife. They didn't know what
it was all about, but they didn't like it. They didn't like it. Well, why didn't they side against
natural history? Why'd they side against Christ? Pilate knew. He told them he
knew what it was all about. It's very clear to me in the
Scriptures when you read about the death of Christ that Pilate
understood exactly what those Jews were doing, but they were
better at it than he was. And they tricked him and trapped
But they're not going to tolerate this thing. They'll just get
rid of him. He's nothing to them. They're not going to tolerate
this internal strife in this newly conquered kingdom. But
as the Jew and Gentile both were set against the Lord and both
came together to silence the Lord's Christ, everything they
did only accomplished what God's counsel and God's hand determined
before to be done. Everything they did, everything
they said, was prophesied in the Old Testament and fulfilled
exactly to the T as it was foretold. I don't really know a whole lot
about Matthew. I know that he sat at a receipt
of custom, that he was a tax collector. You ever been audited? How highly did you think of the
tax collector, huh? You're still talking about him.
Matthew was a tax collector. But like many of God's witnesses,
they were overshadowed by the one they bore witness of. Like
John the Baptist, he said, I must decrease that he may increase. I do know this about Matthew.
I know the Lord called him. He said, Matthew, follow me.
And it said he followed. I know the Lord called him. I
know the Lord taught him. I know the Lord loved him. And
I know the Lord used him for his glory. What else do I really
need to know? Isn't all the rest of that just
junk? All the rest of it just dung to be taken out and forgetting. That's what Paul said. Those
things which are behind us, just forget those things. Let's just
throw those. Here's what's important. Here's
what's important. Christ. When you come right down to it,
we all have the same confession. We're all sinners on the road
to hell. But God intervenes by His grace,
and He calls us, and He turns us around. Now, as I said before,
the great design of Matthew's Gospel is to prove by infallible
evidence that Jesus of Nazareth is the Christ. Aren't you glad
I read that and didn't have you read that? genealogy. You can get so twisted up in
those genealogies, your tongue will just get wrapped around
itself. You can't hardly... But these genealogies are important. They're important. There was
two very prominent men in Israel's past, Abraham and David. See how Matthew said, this is
the book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David,
the son of Abraham. That's what this genealogy is
all about. It's to prove that Jesus Christ,
Jesus of Nazareth, how do you say that down here? Who is called
the Christ. It's to prove that he who is
called the Christ was actually the son of Abraham and the seed
of David. Two very prominent men. If he
be not Abraham's seed, then he cannot be him through which all
the promises were given. I want you to look with me at
a few scriptures. Galatians chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3 and verse
16. Now to Abraham and his seed were
the promises made. He saith not unto seeds as of
many, but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ." You see
why it's so important that he be Abraham's seed? Turn with
me to Romans chapter 9. In Romans chapter 9, Paul tells
us of his kinsmen who were Israelites. and that their rejection of Christ
was not proof that the Word of God was of none effect. The Word
of God said some things. The Word of God established Israel
and the Israelites and all of their seed and all of their bloodline
all the way down through. God dwelt with them. God used
them. But He used them as a typical
people. And so when Paul talks about
Israel, he's going to show you that. He's going to tell you
the things that are important about Israel. In Romans chapter 9 verse 4 he
talks about his kinsmen and he said, who are Israelites to whom
pertaineth the adoption. Now God separated Abraham from
all the other men in this world and out of his bowels he raised
up a nation to bear witness of his name. He says he adopted
them and called them his sons. These are my people. Ain't that
what he told Moses to go down and tell Pharaoh? You've got
my son captive and you turn my son loose that he may worship
me. To whom pertaineth the adoption?
And then secondly, and the covenants. God established covenants with
Israel alone all through the Old Testament. He didn't make
any covenants with Egypt. He didn't make any covenants
with the Canaanites. The Hittites, the Amorites, go
on and on and on, the Moabites. He established covenants with
Israel, period, end of story. That's all he'll ever establish
his covenant with is Israel, spiritual Israel. And then he
said, and I know I'm taking this out of order, and the giving
of the law, just skip over that one for a minute. He took Moses
up into Mount Sinai, and there gave him his law on tables of
stone, which law in turn Moses delivered to Israel. The law
came by Moses. That's what it says in John chapter
1. And he said, and the glory. God revealed his glory in Israel. His glory. Moses said, show me
your glory. God said, all right. Didn't He? Sure He did. He showed Him His
glory. His glory filled the tabernacle,
didn't it? That's what it says. Moses received
this law of God, went up there on Mount Sinai, came back down,
and his face shone with the glory of God until they had to put
a veil over him. He was frightening the people
with this glory that shone on his face. And you can go on and
on and on with that Shekinah glory of God. He showed that
to Israel. He made known to them the glory
of his holiness on Mount Sinai. Not an animal could touch that
mountain lest it die. He showed his justice. He showed
his mercy. He showed his love. And then
he tells us this. The service of God pertained
to them. Israel had the priesthood. Nobody
else. There wasn't a priest anywhere
else that God had any respect to except in Israel. He appointed
them unto a priesthood. Isn't that what Paul tells us? You are a royal priesthood. They
had the service of God. He gave them instructions of
life and worship, the priesthood, the sacrifices, the washings,
the brazing altar, and on and on. And they had the promises. God had nothing to say concerning
the heathen nations. He gave his promises to Israel.
Abraham wandered down there as a sojourner in a strange land,
but that land belonged to him. He was an outcast, but he owned
it. God gave it to him by promise. And then he says in verse 5,
whose are the fathers? Every Old Testament prophet was
a Jew with maybe the exception of one that might be Job. And Job, according to most of
the old writers, predated Abraham. They don't even know how old
Job was. They just guess at it and put a date on his writing. But here's where I'm going with
this. We're talking about Abraham's seed, both natural and spiritual,
and in verse 5, Talks about Israel. Now listen to what it says. And
of whom as concerning the flesh. See there? We're not talking
about spiritual things now. We're talking about fleshly things.
And of whom as concerning the flesh, Christ came. See what's
going on in the book of Matthew? Out of Abraham's bosom, Christ
came. who God overall blessed forever.
Now, if Jesus of Nazareth cannot trace his lineage back to Abraham,
then he cannot be the Christ of Scripture, and we look for
another. You see what I'm saying? This
is the Christ. To be the Christ, he must be,
according to the flesh, be able to trace his roots back to Abraham.
And then secondly, The second prominent man was David. Now
I want you to, I know I'm probably worrying you this morning, but
I want you to turn with me to 2 Samuel chapter 7. Matthew's gospel begins with
a genealogy. And this genealogy is very important
because it proves that Jesus of Nazareth is both the seed
of Abraham and the seed of David, which promises pertain to the
Christ. Now, in 2 Samuel 7, verse 12,
God is speaking to David here. He said, And when thy days be
fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy father, I will set up
thy seed after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels. And I will establish his kingdom,
and he shall build a house for my name. And I will establish
the throne of his kingdom." Now listen, forever. Forever. I will be his father, and he
shall be my son. Now turn with me to Acts chapter
2. I know that 2 Samuel chapter 7 verses 12 through 14 that I
just read you was fulfilled by David's natural son Solomon. I know that. Solomon was raised
up to sit on the throne of his father David and he built the
temple, what was called the house of the Lord. And he built it
there in Jerusalem God did establish his kingdom, but he didn't establish
it forever. And the scriptures, Brother Barnard
used to say all the time, are bifocal. They're bifocal. Acts chapter
2, verse 29. Peter stands up after Pentecost,
and he stands up under the power of the Holy Spirit, who inspired
the men to write 2 Samuel chapter 6. And he tells Israel, to whom
he speaks, he said, men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you
of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and
his sepulcher is with us unto this day. Therefore, being a
prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him
that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would
raise up Christ to sit on his throne. He, seeing this before,
spake of the resurrection of Christ. He wasn't talking about
Solomon. He was talking about Christ.
That his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh did see
corruption. This Jesus hath God raised up,
whereof we are all witnesses. He's the root of Jesse, who was
David's father. He's the seed of David, and he
is of the tribe of Judah. The scepter shall not depart
from Judah till Shadokah, Christ. Now, if the Jews could prove
by their genealogies that Jesus of Nazareth could not be traced
back through David unto Abraham, then they could take away his
rights to the kingdom and all claims to be the Christ. From
the days of Abraham, the Jews kept very accurate records of
Abraham's seed, believing their physical relationship to Abraham
secured to them the inheritance that was promised through him.
But in truth, there was only one relationship that mattered,
and that was Christ. Only one tie that had to be proved,
and that was Christ. And that's what's being proved
right here in Matthew chapter 1. Now, all those efforts and
all that diligency to keep those records, you know, Paul talked
to Timothy and he said, don't give heed to these doctrines
and to these endless genealogies. And that's what he's talking
about. Can you imagine the genealogies concerned in 42 generations? Can you imagine? It would fill
this church house up with books. And those Jews were diligent
with these things. They'd get together and they'd
talk about this one's blood relationship and this son. Now, I know it
was a harlot, but listen, you know, she was married to such
and such and so on. Endless genealogies. There's
only one relationship in all those genealogies that matters,
and that was Christ's relationship to Abraham and David. So when
Matthew talks about it, he don't go into details about all these
individuals. He goes into one detail about
Christ. And then if you'll study the
genealogies in Luke, in Luke's gospel, and you look at them,
you're going to find some discrepancies between Luke's genealogies and
Matthew's. I don't know if you've ever noticed
that, but there are some discrepancies there. The reason for the discrepancies
is very simple. Matthew traces the roots of Joseph,
and Luke traces the ancestry of Mary. And there's the discrepancies. Now these records is no doubt what Paul refers
to with these endless genealogies. And ironically, what the Jew
labored diligently to keep to secure their own interest in
Abraham's inheritance, God used to justify the very Christ they
rejected. Isn't that something? They labored
so hard on this to have this inheritance, to show that connection
of which God had no respect whatsoever, and took the very evidence that
they hoped in and used that to secure and justify the Christ. that they rejected. I thought
that was amazing. He said, at the end of this sermon
I read to you a while ago about Peter talking about David. He
now sat on the throne. He said on down in verse 36 of
Acts chapter 2, he said, let all the house of Israel know
assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus. You see that? That same, oh,
that word raped, that's like fingernails on a blackboard to
these Jews. God made that same Jesus that you crucified, both
Lord and Christ. And they said, oh, what are we
going to do? What are we going to do? So first of all, these
genealogies of Matthew proves that Jesus of Nazareth qualifies
by his relationship to both Abraham and David. And then secondly,
I want you to see that this genealogy stands as a sacred witness that
God is true to His word. What God says, He'll do. He'll do. Forty-two generations
may pass, but He'll do it. He'll do it. God says He'll do
a thing, He'll do a thing. Problem is, we want it today.
We want it tomorrow. We pray for our children, and
then we wake up tomorrow morning, and they ain't saved, and we're
like, what's the trouble? Ain't no trouble. Ain't no trouble. Just keep praying. Keep praying. The Word which God is keeping
here is His promise of life eternal. 1 John 5, 11, it said, This is
the record that God hath given to us eternal life, and this
life is in His Son. Acts 411 said, this is a stone
which was set at nought of you builders, which has become the
head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in
any other, for there's none other name under heaven given among
men, whereby you must be saved. And 42 generations would live
and die. Hundreds and hundreds of years
would expire. But when the fullness of time
was come, ain't that what Paul said? When the fullness of the
time was come, God sent forth his son exactly the way he promised.
in exactly the manner that He said He would, a virgin would
conceive. The woman see. You see what He
is saying? When the fullness of the time
was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under
the law, to redeem them that were under the law. Matthew sets before us Christ
as He set forth concerning Israel. And He uses these 42 generations. 14 generations from Abraham to
David, 14 generations from David to their carrying away into captivity
in Babylon, and 14 generations from that captivity in Babylon
to the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ. Faith is believing
God. That's what it is. Matthew don't
set these accounts out to justify anything to this world. He sets
out these accounts for us that we might believe God. That's
all Matthew's interested in. That's all I'm interested in.
The world is not even concerned with what I'm doing here this
morning. They've got no interest. I don't know why we're so shocked,
you know. Somebody will come up and say,
well, I don't believe that. Boy, we just get all tore apart.
Ain't no reason to get upset, honey. The world, John said,
we know that we are a God in the whole world, life and wickedness.
They've got no interest in these things. The Word of God is the
children's bread. They have an appetite for it.
They hunger for it. When I lay these evidences down
to the world, others go to the next thing. Did you know that? The world speculates all the
time. Just because they're wrong don't mean nothing to them. The
world's flat, hundreds of years. You better not go out there now.
You sail out there, you're going to go rile thin. All of a sudden,
they found out the world was round. They didn't even apologize
for the thousands of years they said it was flat. They just said,
now it's round. Now you're supposed to believe
them again. But when God says a thing, he proves it. It comes
to pass. And that's how he said, you'll
know my prophets. You wait and see. He said, if
anything my prophet says don't come to pass, take him out and
stone him. He ain't a prophet. Faith is believing God, God's
account of man and his fall, God's account of man and his
history, God's account of man and his religion, God's account
of salvation by grace through the Lord Jesus Christ. And God
always keeps his word, always. God consoled Joseph. That's what
we're going to get into next week. He consoled Joseph who
was troubled from the pregnancy of his wife-to-be. And here's
what he told him, Matthew 1, verse 22. I whet your appetite
just a little bit. He said, now, all of this, all
of what? All those 42 generations, all the begatting, all the trouble,
all the differences, all the years, all the ceremonies, all
of this, all of what? All the Old Testament. Because
that's pretty much what Matthew's saying. The entire Old Testament
bore witness of him and how he's here. All of this, all these generations,
all these circumstances, all that was recorded in Israel's
history and right up to this very moment, all of this was
done that it might be fulfilled which God already said. You see
that? Behold, a virgin shall be with
child, that's his wife, and shall bring forth a son,
and they'll call his name Immanuel, which is being interpreted, God
with us. All these things come to pass
because God said they would. And Paul writes to the church
in Titus chapter 1, and he said that we have hope of eternal
life, which God, who cannot lie. which cannot lie promised before
the world began. Oh, God is thankful to His Word. Might He make us thankful to
His Word also. Thank you.