If you are going to prove someone is the king, you must affirm his genealogy. The Gospel of Matthew (Matthew 1:1-17) presents the genealogy that proves Jesus of Nazareth is the King, specifically, King of the Jews. Let us see how Matthew traces the royal lineage to Jesus of Nazareth, Messiah.

1 The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David,

Messianic prophecies throughout the Old Testament, including the Davidic Covenant (see 2 Samuel 7:12-16), firmly establish that Messiah [as King] was to be the son of David. Therefore, Matthew begins the genealogy of Jesus by stating Messiah Jesus is the son of David.

But then he adds:

Why does Matthew add that? Because Messiah Jesus would be the King of the Jews, and Abraham was the first Jew.

Messiah would come through Abraham; however, the genealogy narrows:

2 To Abraham was born Isaac; and to Isaac, Jacob; and to Jacob, Judah and his brothers;

Why does he say Judah and his brothers? Because all twelve sons of Jacob (all Jews) were to receive the divine blessing given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. However, the royal line was to continue through Jacob's son, Judah—

The line continues to narrow:

6 And to Jesse was born David the king.

Why does he say David the king? Because Messiah would be a King according to the pattern of David.

I think Matthew is being delicate here; he does not mention Bathsheba's name [like I just did indelicately]. I believe the author is slightly hinting that the sin of adultery committed by David and Bathsheba was more David's fault than it was Bathsheba's. Matthew was intentionally sparing Bathsheba.

The Old Testament revealed the One Who Was To Come was to be an Eternal King after the pattern of David. God would accomplish His purposes on behalf of His redeemed people, a royal priesthood and a holy nation, through the promised Messiah.

Additionally, Messiah would be a direct physical descendant of King David through his immediate son (see 2 Samuel 7:14). The only problem was the name of the offspring was not mentioned and David had a lot of sons, because he had too many wives—

Yahweh revealed to David that the royal Messiah would come through one of David's sons, who was later designated as Solomon (see 1 Kings 2:1-4), and through his future sons–kings (see 2 Samuel 7:13 and Psalm 89:36). Therefore, all of the kings who descended from Solomon were in the royal line.

It is not surprising that Matthew gives all of the names of these ancestor kings presented in the books of Kings and Chronicles. And there is no question that this is the royal line that leads to Messiah Jesus.

Solomon was named. Now let us move further down the list, starting with the great king, Hezekiah. [You may recognize some of the names because they were kings of Judah.]

10 and to Hezekiah was born Manasseh;

What a jump! From one of the very best kings, Hezekiah, to one of the very worst (possibly the worst), Manasseh.

Amon was a bad king.

Josiah was a good king.

11 and to Josiah were born Jeconiah

Jeconiah was also called Coniah in the Old Testament.

and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon.

As you can see, the captivity interrupted that line. And then Jeconiah, who was an evil king, reigned. He was the last king of Solomon's line to actually rule over Judah.

The royal line continued. And to whom is that messianic line leading? To Jesus of Nazareth.

It looks as though God withdrew something He had said.

God [Himself] was speaking to David in 2 Samuel 7—

12 "When your days are complete and you lie down with your fathers,

Meaning, when you die.

Who was the descendant to be? Solomon.

13 "He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever."

That too was Solomon.

16 "And your house and your kingdom shall endure before Me forever; your throne shall be established forever."

How many ifs did you count in that passage? I counted zero. Is that the same number you counted?

GOD said:

He did not say Unless somebody misbehaves or Unless you get some bad sinners in that line. I do not see that, do you?

GOD tells David:

There was no question — The line of MESSIAH was to go from David, to Solomon, and to all the future kings of David's line. The Lord had clearly spoken.

With that promise in mind, let us consider a remarkable, but contradictory, passage in the book of Jeremiah:

24 "As I live," declares the LORD,

Do you think the LORD was about to say something that He meant? I think so!

That is, Jeconiah, who was in the royal line from Solomon.

25 "And I will give you over into the hands of those who are seeking your life, yes, into the hand of those whom you dread, even into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of the Chaldeans."

26 "I will hurl you and your mother who bore you into another country where you were not born, and there you will die."

27 "But as for the land to which they desire to return, they will not return to it."

28 "Is this man Coniah a despised, shattered jar? Or is he an undesirable vessel? Why have he and his descendants been hurled out and cast into land that they had not known?"

29 "O land, land, land. Hear the word of the LORD!"

30 "Thus says the LORD, 'Write this man down childless, A man who will not prosper in his days; For no man of his descendants will prosper, sitting on the throne of David or ruling again in Judah.'"

What did we just read?

There appears to be a serious problem here—

My theological response is:

Prior to the time of Jesus of Nazareth, there were some false messiahs (individuals claiming to be this Person, but were not), and just after the time of Jesus of Nazareth there were a lot of false messiahs.

1. He was in the royal line.
2. He was not of the royal line.

Notice: GOD had made an everlasting promise; therefore, the same holds true for anyone claiming to be Messiah today.

The Gospel authors (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) recorded hundreds of occurrences when Jesus of Nazareth fulfilled messianic prophecies as foretold in the Old Testament about Messiah's first advent to earth. As we study the book of Matthew, we will see Jesus of Nazareth revealing Himself as the true Messiah through the fulfillment of all of these prophecies.

Anyone who would like [somehow] to fake fulfilling the messianic prophecies would have to be really convincing. However, having said that, who could possibly fake or pre-arrange fulfilling prophecies, as follows: He would—

• Be Born to a virgin in Bethlehem of Judea.
• Be taken to Egypt (as an infant) by His parents.
• Be brought back up (as a young boy) to Nazareth.
• Have a ministry in Galilee.
• Heal the sick, give sight to the blind, enable the lame to walk, and resurrect the dead.
• Show authority over nature and demons.
• Appear in Jerusalem on the very day that Daniel predicted Messiah would come as King.
• Be crucified.
• Resurrect Himself from the dead.

And something else that is inconceivable: He would prove—

1. He is in the line of David to Solomon so He could be the King of the Jews, and
2. He is not in that line so the curse will not be on Him.

I suppose somebody could come up with a false genealogy. Actually, that is what will happen during the Tribulation [which is not far away]. A religious person, who claims to be Jewish but is not, will appear on the scene—

The false prophet will deceive even the nation of Israel into thinking he is the messiah. I suppose he will concoct a phony genealogical record that shows he is a descendant from David. Otherwise, it is difficult to understand how the Jewish people would accept him as their messiah.

However, I wonder how many of those trusting people will realize he must also prove he is not an ancestor of that line. Remember what GOD said:

Here we have a contradiction, do we not?

I have no problem with GOD doing the impossible, but can GOD do the contradictory?

I have always hated that question, because the query itself is contradictory. But I am confronted with a similar type of question, because Messiah has to come through the royal line to be king; however, anybody who comes through that line is cursed.

How do we answer that? To answer that problem we go to another problem.

Moving forward—

Back To: Matthew Series Page

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