God Uses Broken People

I want you to turn to your Bibles to Matthew chapter one and what I'm going to preach on this morning is typically neglected throughout scriptures you can turn my mic down just a little bit because I'm gonna get excited this morning this this this passage is typically neglected from the pulpit often neglected and I make this personal in my quiet times and when I tell you what we're going to look over you're gonna say ah I get it please do not check out I promise you you look up to score the Cardinals up it is what it is so let's pay attention if you can't just to the word because I want to bring some light and when I study I want you to know that I first study with the intent of wanting God to impact my life for what his word is saying in the faithfulness of the text then I recognized as a community of believers we come together you see this all throughout the Bible that when you have corporate worship they sit underneath the teaching of the word of God and so I want you to follow with me I'm gonna have a lot of information here but I want you to follow with me I'm going to speak on the genealogy of Jesus some of you close your eyes already but it's actually much greater much more powerful than you would assume if you do you sit and look at the context and if you sit the way our God the Creator managed to put everything in its perfect position I promise you it would expose and it will expose the character glory and goodness of who God is so I want you to sit with me now if you have your Bibles please turn to Matthew chapter 1 or if you have your iPhone just google Matthew chapter 1 here's what we're going to see now normally if you're a visitor I have a stand up and read the Word of God together I don't know about you but I didn't want any of us trying to read these names out loud I will be the scapegoat and I'll be the fool this morning but as you turn to Matthew chapter one we're gonna I'm gonna hit on three things this morning if you're taking notes it's gonna be the prophecy the people and the promise all that we will see throughout the genealogy of Jesus leading up to the birth of Jesus and so first I want to speak to the prophecy of Jesus so when you look at verse 1 Matthew a little context is speaking to a primarily Jewish audience therefore the Gospel of Matthew is really focused towards the Jewish audience I want you to keep that in mind when you look at the genealogy of Jesus if you look don't turn now if you're taking notes look later Matthew chapter 1 speaks to the genealogy genealogy of Jesus so does Luke chapter 3 but there's a problem they don't share the same genealogy it's different now there are many reasons why scholars think it's different let me let me speak to some one they say well maybe it's not real well that's negated because if you study Jewish history there's a a Jewish scholar by the name of Josephus who we don't even believe is Christian he took down all the historical evidence it hasn't all together the debate is not whether Jesus was a real person you won't really found find that debate anywhere we know Jesus was a real human being the debate is was he the son of God that's the debate so you can trace the lineage of Jesus and see that absolutely he was born absolutely he was a real person now another debate could be this it's interesting when you look at Luke chapter 3 he does not mention Mary anywhere in the lineage when you look at Matthew chapter 1 it mentions Mary so some scholars say this is probably why one lineage is tied only to Joseph the other lineage is tied all to Mary then you have a whole other concept of well maybe the lineages followed from the biological family to the legal family so there are many process but here's what I want to do it just sit on what we do know about this text the reason why Matthew writes it the way he writes it is because when the awaiting of the Messiah is upon them and upon an entire nation he wants to prove to the nation of Israel this is the Messiah that you have been waiting for in fact he goes to the described in genealogy because the genealogy has to match up to the prophecy here's what I mean this is what I love about Ward studies in the text the record of the genealogy of the of Jesus the Messiah that we read that that's no big deal they read and like okay we must pay attention because now they're calling this man born in Bethlehem a carpenter the Messiah you imagine how let down they were when they pictured a messiah they pictured one coming from the clouds and royalty and now they're hearing that Jesus the carpenter is the Messiah you know that word Messiah means all it means is deliverer rescuer so now the Jewish audience who waiting for deliverer is saying wait that scrawny guy is our deliverer a carpenter yeah can you see why they probably had some problems with this and it's no different from when somebody becomes a Christian Fossey ology says that everything's going to get better you have expectations of God and when God doesn't come through we are let down or we not or we are frustrated it doesn't mean God is wrong it means our theology is wrong because God is consistent here their theology of who the Messiah was going to be he was totally wrong so now they're looking at the rescuer as Jesus the Messiah now this is important because Jesus was Jewish and they knew that that the Messiah would come from this bloodline so now they put the the Messiah on Jesus the carpenter but I want you to pay attention to the next things it says about Jesus how it labels Jesus now if you study the Bible you understand this next portion of this verse one is not in chronological order there's a problem here why is it not in chronological order he's speaking of the genealogy but it's not in chronological order look what he speaks to first Jesus the Messiah the son of David then he says the son of Abraham what's one comes first in scripture Abraham why in the world does the Gospel of Matthew had the son of David first I will tell you why it was important that the Jewish audience understood they knew that the Messiah will come out of the Davidic lineage they knew that the one who came out of the Davidic lineage to have the son of David stamped on you meant royalty so what he does first to capture the audience's attention he says Jesus is the son of David that's like oh this is royalty he's talking about another reason to fulfill the prophecy which I preached a couple of weeks ago that's found and excuse my handwriting doesn't matter Isaiah 9 verses 2 through 7 what's happening here Isaiah prophesied in chapter 9 that there'll be a Prince of Peace remember when I preached on that 700 years later it came true 700 years later here comes the Messiah born in the manger the Prince of Peace the mighty God the eternal God the reason why he had to write down that what he wrote down and what he said was the son of David is to help them understand this is fulfilled prophecy Isaiah said 700 years before that there was going to be this Messiah the son of David he was going to come from the lineage of David now here it is the prophecy being fulfilled if Jesus did not come out of the lineage of David he would not be the savior of man you understand how important this is like you've been like Jerry Springer episodes everywhere during this time you know what I mean like a well hold on here what's going on this needed to happen then he goes on to talk about this son of Abraham fulfilling another prophecy mentioned in Genesis chapter 22 verse 18 Abraham what is that his name mean the father of many right what was told to Abraham in Genesis chapter 22 verse 18 through you a descendant will bless many nations who is that descendant it's Jesus what do you see already the first verse to fulfilled prophecies one in Isaiah one in Genesis 22 also listen to this who was the first spiritual father to the nation of Israel Abraham Genesis chapter 12 remember the Tower of Babel they're all jacked up so so God comes in and says Abraham you will now lead the people that'll be as many as the Stars you are the spiritual father everyone has respect for Abraham here all the Israelites see him as a spiritual father what does this text do who is the new spiritual father of the new Israel Jesus who is the king Jesus who is the spiritual father Jesus two prophecies fulfilled and one verse and needed to take place this way and need it to unfold in the text this way the prophecy and by the way there are about 400 prophecies in Scripture that are fulfilled this way about Christ 400 look what happens the next verse 2 will go to the people this this this really blew my world apart when I thought about the lineage of who the Messiah came through okay the lineage and keep in mind it starts with Abraham if you look at the lineage in Luke chapter 3 it starts with Adam why what's the big difference Luke chapter 3 starts with Adam to show that Jesus was here for all mankind right so we start with Adam here he's speaking specifically to a Jewish audience so he starts with Abraham does that make sense he wanted to grab their attention and they wouldn't have it wouldn't have been the same if he started with Adam so he started with Abraham who is Abraham I've said this before my sermon Abraham name means the father of many Abraham had a wife her name was you remember the angel appeared before Sarah what did she say hey I know you're old but you're gonna be pregnant you were say yeah that ain't happening well I'm 90 every times 100 sleep in separate beds and ain't happening I'm telling you ain't gonna happen and so they make a joke about it yet they get tired of waiting on God what do they do probably many of us have done in our lives God you're not moving fast enough all right I need an email from you a slide into my DM God give me something give me an answer and when God didn't move quick enough quick enough what did he do Sarah and Abraham came up with the plan Abraham sleep with the maidservant remember and look at what happens because of disobedient disobedience Abraham sleeps the maidservant what's her name Hagar listen Isaac was the promised son right Abraham out of disobedience has Ishmael look pay attention look at look what happens here Isaac was the promised son who Jesus was it come from this lineage because of disobedience they have Ishmael through the lineage comes Jesus through this lineage of Ishmael comes Muhammad from Muhammad comes Islam from Jesus comes Christianity you see what disobedience did this this man here yes father of many many great things about him but but he was disobedient to God why would you have his name in here gets much better though so you have Isaac and there are so many names you have to go home and study for yourself I'm just going to hit on several but I'm going to introduce us to a next portion of names I'm which in here you'll see five women mentioned why is this a big deal well I'll tell you why it's a big deal I'm back historically probably even today Jewish man would pray this prayer listen to this they would pray this God every morning they probably still do God thank you I wasn't born a woman that's that's no joke that's what they're thankful they weren't born a woman second thing they say thank you I wasn't born a Gentile that means everybody else I'm glad I am Jewish now it's interesting because I got a soul specific and detailed and intentional in the genealogies if you look back and study the genealogies are primarily only who men because it's a male-dominated culture so the genealogies if you study it's always men men men God allows the author to insert women and not only normal women women who weren't even Jewish ha now so God not only broke this this man being up here and women they're down here but now he God is staying true to his word saying male and female are created in the image of God with different roles both equal different roles according to Scripture so God's putting that back line to his scripture so now you have one but I want you to see the women that he uses now you ready Tamar you know she did she she disguised herself as a prostitute then she slept with her father-in-law then had twins congratulations your name's gonna be in the Bible now this is not a green life for any of us to go do that in fact let me go ahead and say this right now God is absolutely sovereign if there's anybody I've ever met God knows how to take junk and he knows how to make beauty out of my failures and out of my sins I've never met anybody else like that I've met people who get tired of me I I often get tired of myself and I'm sick of myself sometimes but to to be following a God who never gets tired of me and gives me chance after chance after chance it blows my mind now what you have to understand is that God's sovereignty does not negate man's responsibility because there's there are consequences attached to our sin right there is no here me say hey yeah I'm glad he says something cuz I have a New Year's Eve party that's gonna be awesome no because with that awesome party will come consequences if it's not pleasing to God and hear me very clearly so although God is sovereign it doesn't get your responsibility that's because all jacked up people and it gets much better the more jacked up they are the more better I feel about myself now look you know how it is we all do it the look at the next woman Rahab a prostitute from Jericho who he is going to use to be part of his perfect plan no look keeps going Ruth Moabite who marries a Jewish man who's a foreigner who's an immigrant who God sees value in and now you have a mixed marriage in a racial marriage here going on in Scripture which was forbidden who's not Jewish sorry freaking the baby cry but it's true it's not she's not Jewish it's much better gets much better okay I'm gonna stop harassing the women look he should have been out at war and he stayed home he probably got bored and lonely which is a recipe for disaster he begins to see according to Scripture this woman bathing from a distance so he calls assert and say see that woman bathing now I want you to bring her to me what happens David the one we call King David who was a man after God's own heart who pinned most of the Psalms as an adulterer and a murder and and you see they fathers Solomon and of this adulterous affair and God is so good that he cares about life from the womb to the tomb it is he doesn't throw away Solomon because the marriage that wasn't legitimate he uses Solomon to rebuild the temple oh it takes two to tangle girl you in trouble too she was married she was married yeah we we we blame it on David she was married to she had a part to play in this they both had a part to play in this that caused so much hurt and pain for everybody else that's what sin does your sin doesn't just affect you and so now you see poor buddy he was the murder one murder Dolf glad his name made it to and then it goes to verse 7 begins to mention all of these Kings there were kings of Judah Kings honestly that weren't great Kings many of these Kings if you stop and study them it would be called evil Kings evil people now I have to be honest with you I I can't comprehend and the list goes on and on and on and I can't comprehend why God would use all of these imperfect people I don't get it I don't I don't get he could have chose any way this is not I mean this is not the heroes of faith here no one probably wants to name on this list let me tell you why because God's faithfulness wasn't dependent on their righteousness God's faithfulness was not dependent on their righteousness Joe 42 to that no man will thwart the planes of God God will accomplish his plans and will through broken humanity he's been doing it since the beginning of time he is the only person who could take a prostitute and use her to be part of his plan he's the only person he's the only God who could take a murderer and use him to be part of his plan he the only one who can do it none of you can do it in here you can't do it for yourself only God can do it only God could take your junk in your mess and somehow get together and recycle all of your stuff then all of your failures and he gets it and somehow when we give it to him he recycles it and uses it for his glory he's the only one who can do that the only God there is nobody else there are no self-help books there are no classes there are no counselors while all of that helps the only one who can do this is God that's it look what God does he goes to this entire list he mentions Mary it's like Abraham was jacked up Rahab was shacked up Ruth was jacked up they're all jacked up but then here comes the glory the glory through me messed up jacked up people who is called the rescuer well I guess it gets much much better do you understand what happened when the rescuer came in God the Creator became the created through His Son Jesus why to rescue a bunch of broken people so what happens according to Romans chapter 3 here's what happened Jesus came not only to take care of his sins of the present in the future but a corpsman according to Romans chapter 3 do you know what happened Jesus came to also take care of all of their sins the reason why they made the list was not because they were so great and they didn't fell and they went to Bible study and they bla bla bla bla bla bla the reason why they made the list because our Savior was so faithful to die for the broken and the imperfect people that when he died on the cross it covered the sins from Genesis to Revelation to today that's why we can celebrate the birth of a savior it doesn't get much better than that who was the Messiah he is the Promised One now before I land the plane here let me tell you what rocked my world as I was reading this especially this morning I thought about God will come back again for a second coming and here's what I did by myself and listen him clearly I don't mean I'm part of this lineage I mean that before his second coming there is the book of life and my name's in that book my name's not in that book because I'm such a great person or Christian man when I read my name on here all I can think of is my goodness why are you so good god I didn't do anything to deserve to be in the book of life when I see my name you know what comes up not success is when I see my name what comes up as failures now why am i God want any part of me I don't really know you know what I do know because of the cross my failure is not final the cross had the final words so charged let me listen I know some of those Phil so one worthy and the truth is we are put your name in there somewhere I don't want my name to be in there knowing the critical spirit no II the gossiper noe the arrogant and prideful one how has to be no II who was faithful at all cost to his wife who was faithful to the church who was faithful to Christ and who served with a grateful heart because of what the cross meant to me and my sin that doesn't sleep this is what I wanted to say you know what's interesting about God he's not gonna force you to do anything he's not there's there's a part of God I don't understand there's Calvinism there's Arminianism many I don't know I don't care I know he's so good I don't know whether God does it all and I do some I don't know I don't know the answer to that but I know I'm responsible there's a portion and here somewhere so church you can dictate how your name is read Wow pastor you said the word adulterer and it just I was an adulterer and it did something in me pastor you don't know I've had many abortions pastor you don't know my life pastor I got all these secrets here's a great thing recycle them to God and let him use them for his glory he can do it he can do it I wonder did she live with guilt all her life how did how did her family members view her see the ones we are tempted to throw aways the ones that God really values in that interesting well we get to heaven one day Joe I didn't think you'd be here you were lost as a goose you were jacked up you never came to church how did they let you in and the ones you think will be there won't be there God doesn't work like man and I'm glad he doesn't you can control how your name is viewed to some you can't control your past but you can give God your present in your future and let him be the author and perfecter of your faith he is a good guy the first coming the little manger the second coming and he will come back this is gonna be like a warrior to conquer and my desire and I pray this for our church all the time I hope you don't take offense to this I don't want anybody in this room not going to heaven I want every single person in this room to say I know that I know that I know that I'm jacked up but I know that I know that I know that the cross of Christ is paid my sin and therefore I will be singing in heaven won't sound as good as Kristen but I will be singing in heaven isn't God good when we celebrate God for Christmas we don't celebrate because of our merits we celebrate because of his love and sacrifice let's pray together listen I'm gonna call two calls and one is for the Christian I don't know if you were to write your name in there what if you're being honest what does it represent when nobody's looking I mean is it critical is it judgmental that what what is their secret sin in the closet I don't know but I do know that sin always finds its way out of the closet and so for the Christian here's what I want you to do I just want you to just repent before God you and God he knows your heart already and the altars will be open but but they're not but then I want you another group to know if you've never heard I mean you've never really seen the genealogy and recognize like whoa whoa God really does use the messed up people and you've disqualified yourself from being part of the family I would say don't don't do it he loves you and he's died for you I don't want you leaving here without knowing that your name is in the book so if you're here this morning listen I just want you to be honest all eyes closed and heads bowed Christians don't you go ahead and deal with your stuff the truth is we all have stuff there are no good people there's bad people and there's Jesus and sin made us bad only one is good the scripture says but if you're here this morning Christian I will beg you don't coast in this life live all that you are for Jesus make a difference for Jesus please then there's some of you in here you've never surrendered your life and then you feel broken and empty let me just tell you you're supposed to feel that way without Jesus nothing feels it but Jesus the greatest gift you can give you as a scientist awaiting you if you are here this morning and you've never surrendered your life to Jesus and you're saying I don't know if my name will be in the book that terrifies me well you just raise your hand there's nobody looking just just raise your hand all across the room so I don't know pastor I'm gonna pray for you to say I don't know just raise your hand just keep your hands up as they come across the room just raise your hands out a little pastor I'm looking up in the balcony all across the room we're gonna have pastors up at the front [Music] and listen the altars will be open if you need to come pray with the pastor confess repent I would just come thank him for his son the altars will be opened father we're so thankful for your word and the truth of your word God and the power behind it [Music] God will you infuse something in us to live in a way that is honorable to you to live in a way father that pleases you I don't want to coast throughout this life being Christians we want to be warriors for Christ Lord we love you I'm so thankful for the birth father of your son Jesus the Messiah the Savior the deliverer or the rescuer we give you all the credit and glory you deserve that's in Jesus name we pray amen you may stand as we've seen together

Channel: North Phoenix Baptist Church

Views: 243

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: rAY5jhBERTU

Length: 35min 16sec (2116 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 14 2019