Day 94: Matthew 1:1-17

This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham (v. 1).

The genealogy David and Christ shared was of obvious importance. In Matthew 1:3, we see that both David and Christ were descendants of Judah, one of the sons of Jacob. In the prophecy that Jacob spoke over Judah, he said, “The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet” (Gen. 49:10). You see, David was not a random choice. He was one of the most important figures in the genealogy of Christ, “the Lion of the tribe of Judah” (Rev. 5:5).

I never fail to be encouraged by Christ’s heritage. How do you respond to the fact that the only perfect person in Christ’s genealogy is Christ Himself?

To me, Christ’s flawed family history serves as a continual reminder of the grace of God in my life. In my human desire for perfection, I want to be so good that I need no one and no thing. It may surprise you to know that this desire grows from a biblical base: the tower of Babel. The tower pictures graphically our human drive to take God’s place.

But whenever my perfectionism kicks in, I run back to Scripture—to the only source of perfection:

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus (Rom. 3:23–24).

God chose David. On the surface, the choice made no sense. But God doesn’t work on sense; He works on grace. God called you, and God called me. He knew what He was doing.

In many ways David’s life foreshadowed or pictured details of Christ’s life. God illustrated the unknown about the Messiah through the known about David. David was not divine or perfect, but God has used him to teach us truths about the One who is.