♪ ♪ ♪ My prayer for this church is that this, what I'm about to say never happens, that it never happens to you, that you never feel this way. Have you ever felt like an outsider like you don't belong anywhere? The ones who raised their hand, keep your hands raised. Have you ever felt like you didn't fit in, whether it be racially, religiously; any, any criteria? Every hand now should pretty much go up, all right. This message is so long overdue. It came into my mind months ago and then I kind of pushed it away, and then it came back some weeks ago and then I pushed it away, and I said I'm not going to fight it anymore. I'm just going to do it. What if I told you, "You don't belong in this church"? Oh boy, Rick's looking at me like, "Say what!" What if I told you, Charles, "You don't belong in this church"? Oh boy. And you, over there at the end? Yeah, everybody could say it's a standing joke. Supposedly, the church; supposedly, the church should receive all. Jesus said, "Come unto me, all those who labor and are heavy laden, come unto me. And him that comes unto me I shall in nowise cast out." And yet, I find the disease that is so prevalent in Christendom, is self-righteousness. The self-righteousness; it's so hard for me to understand this, but every once in a while I encounter it. And I know if I encounter it as a very fierce, tenacious person in Christ, how many around me encounter and may not deal with it the same way? I really thought, you know, maybe I'll get old enough one day; I will by the way; but I'll get old enough in Christ, one day. I might live to see the church, as we call it, finally peel off the pharisaical onions to where what is exposed, what remains maybe just the pungent odor of people who have either been removed or changed. Now it's rather interesting to me, because if I understand my Bible aright, ever since man became, humankind became a sinner and sinful, ever since then, man has tried to boast in his righteousness. The prophet Isaiah, in Isaiah 64 says, "All of our righteousness"; plural, righteous-nesses "are as filthy rags." Yet, I find myself perplexed. Even in Christ's day, where people came and here is the Lord of Glory speaking to them, yet they elevated themselves above. They keep the law. They do this perfectly; which is a lie, no one keeps anything perfectly. I hate to tell you. If you meet a person that says, "I do everything like this, perfectly. I've never lied. I've never stolen. I've never cheated. I've never...," just breathe up a little prayer for them because they're lying. I'm wearing makeup, that's a lie. We're all wearing clothes, thank God, but that's a lie too. Thank God. My point is that if carefully looked at in that small little area before the fall, when man possessed righteousness, Adam possessed God's righteousness, but it was, it was given to him; before it was imputed it was given to him. He didn't boast of righteousness. It's only after the fall, we find men becoming self-centered and therefore boasting in their own righteousness. Now, the message is very simple, and I don't want you to lose sight of why I'm doing this. There are people that will not come into this church or any other church because they're scared. You listen at home, but you won't come in the church, because you're scared that someone will judge you as you come in the door. That you've either done something too bad or you've lived too bad of a life style, or you've been too much of a failure that, God forbid, you should come into a building where God's saints are gathered. Why I love this church, there's no one here, at least to my knowledge, that doesn't believe that Romans 3:23 applies to them. It applies to your Pastor first and it applies to you afterwards, "All have sinned and fallen short." Not some, not just this group over here that we can identify. All have missed the mark, which is Christ. I love the fact that I don't have to worry about you as a congregation thinking, "Well, I'm beyond that now." That's a daily principle, hourly; sometimes minute by minute; that we should live by. There is no perfect one, except Christ. Now the reason why this comes to my mind, just like Job, when he said, "If I should justify myself, I'm a liar. If I should justify my tongue, I'm a liar before God." And he had it right. So, if I said to you there might be some who don't come into the church because they're scared of not belonging, of not fitting in, then this message is for you. And maybe, in some other church, they might say, "You don't belong here." Maybe in another church they might say to you, "Your income's not high enough; you don't belong here." Or, "You have the wrong vocation. You know, to come in you have to have a certain requirement and academic background." No, I'm sorry, that's not the right church I was thinking of, because some of those churches require no thought process at all. Thirty minutes of about ten minutes of sound bite of something that sounds wonderfully good. So, I am going to try and tap into a concept to see why it's important that this message really just sink in today. And I'm going to start in the strangest of places. I want you to turn with me to Matthew's Gospel, the first chapter. What a strange place to start a message; strange if you know your Bible, because that's the genealogies. Now, while you're turning to Matthew and chapter 1, I'm going to launch out a few names at you. Now that you've found the first chapter, you can look at me now. If I said, Naasson, Abia, Abiud, and Azor; real important names, You'd go, "Yeah? Huh." We don't know who they are. But if I said Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, David, Solomon, and Manasseh, you'd say, "Oh, yeah. I know all those names," because those are names, we know them as large persons of the Bible. We know them to be a part of the genealogy in this first chapter. And my fear is that, because I know it's true, most people do not read the Bible and put flesh and blood on these people. We know that Abraham; Abram, and then Abraham, after his name was changed; he lied. He was slightly disobedient, he lied. We know his son, Isaac, did about the same thing with his wife, the same, the same deception. We could go down the line to Jacob. Jacob: cheat, liar, deceiver. I mean real good stuff here. And as you travel down just a little bit more, you encounter people the likes, for example, of Judah (that's a good one, we'll get to that one shortly); and David: adulterer and murder, murderer; and Solomon, who couldn't have enough wives and concubines; and Manasseh, very evil, evil person, as recorded in the scriptures. Now, if you take just those names and understand who they are, real people. I'm curious to know if David, in type, were to sit beside you today, a guy who just, he murdered some wife's husband in order to get the wife. Shhh; the wife's looking at me going, "Oh, great analogy. Good one Pastor." I wonder how you'd feel if he sat down right beside you, putting him as a real person. This is the problem- I think a lot of times we read people in the Bible, we read about them, but they're so far removed, their events are not real to us. I hate to say that. We read them, we understand them, but the prison cell that Paul was in couldn't have been that damp and that terribly dark. We don't think about the lashings and the beatings. The things that are recorded, they're; we read them and maybe because we get familiar, we don't put that extra reality on it. And I think if David sat down beside you, knowing he had just murdered a man would you say, "Hey, brother, welcome to church"? Yeah, we'll give him the left hand of fellowship over here; the furthest one away. But you'd be surprised. Now, I paint this picture, because you'd be surprised at how many people I will encounter who will say, "Oh, I went to a church and I did not feel welcome there. I did not feel like I was welcome there." Some of these people are from diverse walks of life, but you'd be surprised this happens all the time. It's the hypocrisy of the church that says, "We welcome you; as long as you come in looking a certain way, talking a certain way; as long as you act like us. As long as you do what we do, and do it exactly the way we do it, we accept you." That's not Christianity. And in fact, I'd be so inclined to say that when Jesus was preaching to the multitude, giving them this wonderful Sermon on the Mount, He didn't say, "Now, before I address this, before I open My mouth and tell you this most important sermon, I want to make sure you're all wearing shoes and you've all got the right hairdo. They'll be a coffee barista, Galilean"-we'll find some word for this, but, "Star-makers Coffee come by, to serve you your espresso, so you can all stay alert, while I deliver My most famed sermon. Then we'll pick up the cups, and we'll have question-and-answer and commentary." Okay, now that I have your attention, why this first chapter is important, why genealogies are important, it's; this is very simple, so don't tune me out, because you might say, "It's so simple," you go beyond me. Genealogies are very important, primarily to the Jews. It established for them as a people a record of who could inherit and buy property, it established a record, a family record for a myriad number of reasons. In fact, I highlighted out of The Anchor Bible Dictionary, I highlighted just a few of the things that they, genealogies would be useful for: "to ground a claim to power, status, rank, office, inheritance." And I mean there's a really long, long list. I just gave you the short one, but extremely important. And I think sometimes, in fact I've never heard this first chapter of Matthew put to music. That'll hit you in a minute. Like some people have sung the "Lord's Prayer"; the disciple's prayer, they put it to music. I've never heard this put to music. There's very few people that have memorized this chapter. You know, you'll always hear people quoting Proverbs or some other thing, but they never quote Matthew, chapter 1, "The book of the generations of Jesus Christ, the son of David," there. Very over looked, but extremely important. Now, for the Jews, as I said, it established something factual. It established the fact that there were roots. This person named Jesus wasn't just some random person on the stage of history, that He was a real person, all-God/all-man, but real person, foretold and spoken of in prophecy. Now, to the Jews who reject Christ, "Don't talk to me about Jesus," but Matthew's writing this specific, precise way in opening, "The book of the generation of Jesus Christ." And notice how he begins with "son of David, the son of Abraham." Logically, we would say, "But Abraham came before David." Right, but the thing that Matthew is establishing right here is Jesus' right to rule, to the throne, because it was declared in 2 Samuel, and I believe it's 7, regarding a promise that from the line of David and one coming from the line of David. So David is put first, "the son of David, the son of Abraham," reverse order, because for the Jews, it would establish Jesus' right to rule as the royal line. In fact, you could go further back in Genesis 49, I believe, where the blessings are being given out, and you'll read exactly that- part of that line descending from the tribe of Judah, descending down to David, descending down to Christ. So, the genealogy is extremely important. Messiah must come from the line of David. That's one. Number two; it's interesting how these are arranged. If you're reading them as I'm reading them, we have this beginning now. We're going to go to the beginning at chapter, at verse 2, it says, "Abraham begat Isaac," so, you can see how this is the focus is foremost the attention of the Jewish people to see the lineage of Christ's right to rule: son of David; son of Abraham. Now, we begin, "Abraham begat Isaac, Isaac begat Jacob," and there's a lot of begatting going on, right? Right. This is the chronicle of the people. I want to highlight four people in this genealogy, because as often as we have taught on them, as often as I've mentioned them, I want today for you to take what I think has been slightly caricatured, how we read things sometimes as just a Bible story, and I want you to take it today and put not only flesh and blood on it, I want you to see yourself in some dimension where these people are. Now, I've just chronicled the men, and said that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, David, Solomon, Manasseh; not a very good repertoire if we were building a church, most churches would say, "You can't stay here, friends. Go find another church." That's the hypocrisy. And because the likes of these people, if you really, if you wrap your mind around it, it's not good. So, the first person I want to focus on in this beautiful tapestry of the way God does things in your King James, the name is spelt like this, Tamar, "Thamar," but it's actually Tamar. And we read of Tamar; you might say, "Is this going to be a forerunner to a Mother's Day message?" No. It could be, because there's a lot of mothers in the Bible. We find Tamar's story in Genesis 38; will you turn there, please? I really want us to take the time to look at these people and put it in perspective of why they, they are in the genealogies, and how this applies to us, today. So, we encounter Tamar in Genesis 38, and I would simply have you note that while we were teaching through the series on Joseph, this chapter is just magically stuffed in there for some reason; makes no rhyme or reason, no sense, except when you put it all in the tapestry. It makes sense afterwards. So this chapter stands alone. It says that, "It came to pass that at that time, Judah went down from his brethren, turned in to a certain Adullamite, whose name was Hirah. Judah saw there a daughter of a certain Canaanite, whose name was Shuah; he took her, and went in unto her. She conceived, bare a son, called his name Er. She conceived again, bare another son; called his name Onan. She conceived again." The third son is Shelah or Selah, and if you see how interesting this is. Verse 6 says, "And Judah took a wife for Er his firstborn, whose name was Tamar." And there she is, spelt the way, the second way I've spelt it, Tamar. Now, "Er, Judah's firstborn, was wicked in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord slew him." I like the way God does things here- He don't like you, you're out of the picture. "Judah said unto Onan, go in unto thy brother's wife, and marry her, raise up seed to thy brother. Onan knew that the seed should not be his," so when it came time to do this, he didn't fulfill his duty either. The Lord slew him, too. All right. "Then said Judah to Tamar his daughter in law, Remain a widow at thy father's house, till Shelah my son be grown: for he said, Lest peradventure he die also, as his brethren did. And Tamar went and dwelt in her father's house." Now, I love this, because if you read the whole story through, you recognize that this woman, Tamar, desperately wanted to fulfill having a child, being married and having a child. In those days, by the way, if a woman didn't have a child you had no value in society. That's just the way things were. If you did not produce children, you had no value. So, I love the fact that during the course of this all these kids are dead and gone. And she dresses up, puts on the appearance; she feigned herself to be a prostitute. Covered her head, she sat by the roadside, and here comes Judah. I love this, it's so good. Here comes Judah, he goes into her. They; I don't know. Listen, I don't know. Did she keep her head wrapped? Did she put a bag over her head? I don't know, but he didn't know that that was, that was his daughter-in-law. He did not know, but; and you know the story all too well. As he goes into her, and now we have this dire picture that she conceives. He says, "You know, I have no money. I can't pay you now. Just joking, but, he says, "I'll send a kid from the flock." She said, "You give me a pledge that you'll send it. Give me something. Give me something tangible that I can hold onto." "What pledge shall I give thee?" She said, "Your signet, your bracelet, your staff." I love when Dr. Scott taught on this passage many times. He said it's like the American Express card; "Don't leave home without it," because all the things that she's asking for are pretty much all the man's possessions. That's; the staff would have a definite identification of who this staff belonged to; the same thing with the bracelet and the seal, as well; the signet, as well. And of course it says, "She conceived by him. She arose, went away," put off her veil, and put off; put on the garments of her widowhood. She went back to the way she looked previously. Of course, "Judah sent the kid by the hand of his friend the Adullamite, to receive his pledge from the woman's hand," but she wasn't anywhere around. "Anybody see a harlot around here?" "Nope." You know, the Bible's interesting. I don't know why people aren't interested in reading it, It's very interesting. "There was no harlot in this place," it says, in verse 22. "Judah said, Let her take it to her, lest we be shamed." But he didn't find her. "It came to pass about three months after, it was told Judah, saying, Tamar thy daughter in law hath played the harlot; she is with child." Three months, that's about the time you might be able to see a little tummy. "Judah said, bring her forth, let her be burnt." Nice in-laws there. In fact, this is the type of behavior I'm speaking of when I speak of hypocrisy. It's exactly that type of behavior. Not willing to acknowledge his own sin and his own disgusting act, but the first thing that comes out of his mouth is, "Let her be burned." Live long enough as a Christian you'll have these experiences, and you'll say, "God put this in here for a reason." "When she was brought forth, she sent to her father in law, saying, By the man, whose these are, I am with child." Guess who these items are? Read the name on the card: "Judah." I like this. "Discern, I pray thee, whose are these, the signet, the bracelet, and the staff. And Judah acknowledged them, said, She hath been more righteous than I; because that I gave her not to Shelah my son. And he knew her again no more." Of course, she brings forth two children, but I want you to see the full flux of this. A Gentile woman, not part of a lineage that would be looked at with great honor, someone who feigned herself; I say feigned, devising this scheme to conceive. And this is one part of the genealogy in the line descending to Christ. Now, last time I checked, and I'm reading from God's word, this lady appears in Matthew 1, in the genealogies, showing us that God is not focusing on the woman's sin. But we are to focus on God's grace. If we understand we are, in all of us, I would say there's a little bit of Judah and there's a little bit of Tamar. That idea that no one has walked perfectly as life takes its toll. Sometimes we, we devise things to improvise instead of waiting for God. We've all done that. You can, you can make this the big scale as it is or you can reduce it down to right where you are, including the attitude of Judah to say, "Burn her." I met a few Christians like that, so eager, so ready. It's because they can't see themselves. Not only that, I just tell you one thing. In the New Testament, Christ describes how people will know that you are a disciple; a learner of Christ. Do you know what He says the mark is? That you love, that you have love for one another. So the next time a brother or a sister comes at you with some "Ahem...," the mark of discipleship, if you want to just go down right to the brass tacks, Jesus said it, I didn't; that you love, that you have love to one another. Including, by the way, if we are partakers in what Christ in His work, if we're partakers of His life, His death, and His resurrection, He loved the unlovable. He loved the worst. Now, I'm not Christ and neither are you, but Christ who dwells in me, that Spirit that dwells in me; there's the mark right there, friends. When somebody says, "Not your kind," understand maybe Tamar and Judah are not your kind. Let's go to the next woman here. The next woman I want to tell you about is in Joshua: Rahab. She's in that genealogy too. You think God's so willy-nilly that this was the only harlot or prostitute in this place? Joshua sends the spies into that land to go and spy out even around Jericho. Do you think that was the only, excuse me, do you think that was the only whorehouse in town? I don't think so. It was a very common profession in that day. I don't think so. But it just so happens, if you will, that God sends these spies, through the charge of the leader, to go and see out this land. I'm reading from Joshua 2. It says, "They went, came into a harlot's house, named Rahab, and lodged there. It was told the king of Jericho, saying, Behold, there came men hither tonight of the children of Israel to search out the country." Now, the king dispatches men, but before anything can be done, Rahab hides these men, and when inquired of where they went she says, "They went that a way. They ain't here." This is how she goes down in history. She will be forever remembered as a harlot. The book of Hebrews records her that way. But I don't care what you say; I'd rather take a woman like this who has the faith to be obedient to God's word. When she's told to let down that scarlet cord, that she and her whole household would be saved, I'll take a woman like that any day, regardless of her profession, who's willing to have the faith to trust God and take Him at His word that her household, she and her household would be spared, than anymore, perhaps a woman who ran a very dignified household who had no faith at all. Give me that woman like that. I'll take her any day. And she makes a declaration, by the way, regarding the living God. You know the story. She's told to hang that cord out the window, and she says something very staggering about this God they're referring to, "We have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea for you. We've heard about this thing." This harlot is saying, "We've heard what God did for you when you came out of Egypt. We heard what God did for you." They simply tell her, "Hang this cord out your window. You and your household will be saved." And of course, when everything else comes tumbling down, sure enough, she and her household are saved because of that act of faith. But she still lied. She was a woman of ill repute and she lied, but she had faith. So when people talk about the line, the descending line, it's noteworthy to take back in Matthew 1, Rahab would be the great-great-grandmother of King David; the great-great-grandmother of King David. Now, you can read this and remain in that, "This is a Bible story," or you can put flesh and blood on this. I haven't met too many self-righteous ones, but the ones that I've met, they all smell the same. They're all too good, too important, they want to be seen doing good benevolent work, only if they can be seen doing it. If no one's around to see it, they don't want to do it. It's exactly what Jesus said. We have the same inculturated mindset, pharisaically speaking, as Jesus did in His day, "Oh no, no, no, no." I used to go to a very large women's facility. And as I always amazed, it's applicable to men and to women, but more for the ladies than it is for the men. These are ladies who got themselves into lifestyles of drug or prostitution, become; they became products of their; their environment made them even worse. They end up in jail or in prison. And when they're released, I love this; all the churches come in and they want to minister to the women, but God forbid those women should show up at the door of the church and say, "I'd like to sit and attend." "Well, what crime did she commit?" And everybody gets all panicked, as if, as if you're any better, because according to what Jesus says, not me, but according to what Christ says, it you think the thought. If you are angry and hate in your heart you've already, you're already a murderer. Self-righteous hypocrites. It's like the man who said to me, I was speaking to a man who had done 20, 25 years, was just about to be released. He said, "Can I come to the church?" I said, "Anybody can come to the church." You respect the house here. Anybody can come to the church. "Well, don't you think people are going to be worried?" Hey listen, you know, I'm sorry, but I don't know where all you've been. You don't know where I've been. I worry about this one guy over here, and he's worried about you. Lord, help us. Did I ever tell you the story about the gal? I'm going to try and say this so I don't name names, but she, she went on a nationwide program, and she gave her testimony. I think I told you the story. She gave her testimony of the type of lifestyle she lived. She, I think she was a stripper, she embezzled money, she was a tax evader; a long, long, long list. She was going to go on a speaking tour to other churches to encourage people that God can change you, "If God did this for me, He'll do it for you." And while she was on this program most of the churches that were listening to this program decided they didn't want to have her kind come and speak in the church. No, tell me what would you like? What type of person would you like to come in? We don't, that's why we don't do testimonies, because I believe everybody has one. And frankly, if we're new creatures in Christ Jesus, if we are made new, the old things are passed away. The memory bank may remain, but supposedly washed and cleansed. Why are we keep going back to the junk pile and bathing in the junk? We like to bring more junk out and show the people this is what junk looks like. Keep your junk in your trunk. We don't want to see it. "But, but, doesn't it help? Doesn't it help?" You do what you want with that. "Doesn't it help if people know, if you tell people like this young lady did?" And the answer is no, because her testimony may be very much like these that I'm highlighting. But guess what? If we're honest with ourselves, we all have things that we're ashamed of that we'd rather not share with anybody except God. And to me the greatest affront that's ever happened is what I've called the perversity, and it is perverse. We just want to know about how deep in the mud did you go? How long did you stay there? Did it feel good? What was it like? And those very same people that are busy bathing in the mud, what about the cleansing power of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ? What about? Listen, we all have the experience. Ephesians 2 makes it abundantly clear, we were all aliens, we were all strangers, we were separated from God. There was enmity, there was a wall, there was separation between our ability to talk, to understand, to apprehend. Christ came and He tore that wall down that we might be joined again, we might have communion, we might be restored, cleansed, reconciled. But you'll see how needful this is, because it's so easy to get into the, what I call "the Christian program," and then, it becomes an exclusivity club. As long as you are this type of person you can get in. For 37 years, in my case now extending from Dr. Scott's ministry, now for me, in these last few years I've said we welcome all people. There isn't anybody; I've never; there's never been a time where I've said you can't come in here. I tell people, please don't show up wearing shorts. That's my one criteria. Please, I don't wear shorts to the church. If I'm not wearing shorts, you're not wearing shorts. Okay, I have to tell you this, because otherwise you're going to say, "Well, that's unreasonable." But I want you to know this, and I think I'm okay to share this now. Boy, many years ago, there used to be a woman that used to come and work in the church. She's going, "Oh my God, I can't believe you're going to say this." She used to come work and she would come in shorts, because it was a time where no one, surely, no one would say anything. Do you remember that? Oh, God. Listen, if you have nice legs, that's wonderful, but her legs, honestly, they had the map of the United States on them, all right. Yeah? And maybe Canada and Mexico, too, okay. And she insisted on coming in, and it was the shorts and the sandals, and it was like, oh boy. And no one would say anything to her. And finally one day I just said, "Please, go put some pants on." She was mad. She was really mad. I didn't care. I didn't want to look at those legs anymore. I had to work with her. I didn't want to look at those legs. So the decree; I don't care how good they look, if you let one person do that, then everybody gets to do it. Cover it up. If you're going to come in my presence, cover it up. You want to walk around in shorts do it at home. That's really my only criteria. I don't care what your hair looks like, if you're tall, if you're large, if you're thin; just cover the legs up, please, all right, thank you. I just I had to tell you because you might say, "Well does she have a thing about shorts?" Now you know, and the woman has gone down in great fame. Never mind, we'll come back to that later. We may need to pray for restoration of legs. I'm not sure, all right. So, we have, getting back to my message here, we have Tamar, we have Rahab, we have Ruth; these are all found in Matthew's genealogy table. And the only thing I want to say about Ruth is she was a Moabite woman. And if you want to know about why that's so special, you've got to go back into Genesis and read when Lot fled to Sodom and Gomorrah. And when he's running for his life, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah is upon that land, and he's running for his life, he, his wife, and his daughters, they're running away. The wife looks back, turns into a pillar of salt. He escapes with his two daughters into a cave. They deceive him. It's a pattern I guess. They deceive him, get him drunk, they both sleep with him. The children that are produced are Ammon and Moab. And they became bitter, bitter enemies of the children of Israel. So this woman, Ruth, who bears a book by her name in the Bible, is part of that, from that line of bitter enemies of Israel. And why this little book is so important, she's included in the genealogy, but why this little book is important, it portrays the picture of a great love affair between Ruth, the Moabite, and Boaz, the Israelite; a picture of our Kinsmen Redeemer. More importantly, if you're going to navigate down, I'm giving you a picture of these women, because in my mind she doesn't, she's not a type of person that would fit in. We're talking about, now another Gentile. We're talking about a woman who just on the face of everything, she may have had a kind heart, but in terms of if, if there would have been a committee whether or not she would be allowed to participate in the things that she did. In today's world they would have said, "Phsht, you're not part of our group. You can't come in." No matter how good of a heart she had. Now, I love the fact that if you're going to follow this tapestry all the way down, we have this woman getting married, and in that line descending down, we have David's great-grandmother, Ruth. All of this is so important, because the fundamental thing that is, is intrinsically wrong with the church is people have forgotten what type of people God is still using today. There are no perfect people. There are no sinless people. I know there's many groups of Christianity that say, "Well, once you come in and you get saved and you get sanctified, and you sin no more." Good luck. I know my brain. I'm, listen, let me look in there: I'm a sinner. I sin every day. There's many things I don't want to do, but just like Paul, I find myself doing them. And I know every day I ask for daily forgiveness. Psalm 51 is my, that's my daily bread. I don't do it as a rote performance, I come to God every day and say, "Wow, I really messed this one up, again. God forgive me, because I sinned against You." That's my daily bread. Somebody might say, "Well, maybe your Christianity's wrong. Maybe you don't got it." No, I got it. I really got it. I have a great understanding. It's those other folk, the ones that say, "You come into the church, and you'll never fall down again." I'd like to see that. Not because I'm sadistic, but because the reality of life is the more you walk with Christ, the more challenges and the more temptations will come your way. And as you keep walking and you gain more strength in Him and you become more empowered in Him, greater will be those challenges, greater will be those temptations, greater will be those obstacles; but with Christ I can overcome. But there isn't a guarantee that I'm always going to overcome every single thing that comes my way. And anybody who says they overcome everything, we need to go back to square one: all have sinned. Last in the genealogies that I want to discuss, she is not named by name, but I'll read you what Matthew 1 says of this woman. So we've now mentioned Thamar, Rahab, Ruth, and in Matthew, first chapter of Matthew, sixth verse, it says, "Jesse begat David the king, David begat Solomon of her," italicized, "that had been the wife of Urias." And we know the "of her" is referencing Bathsheba. That is the "her," but so that you don't, so I'm not adding, we'll just put "her," that one. We know it's Bathsheba. When we read about Bathsheba, and if you were trying to go back and read the whole thing you'd find her. I'm not going to read it; I'm just going to give you the overview. You'd find the story in 2 Samuel and chapter 11. But let me just say this, because I mentioned David was an adulterer and murderer, and we see clearly this is the connection that Bathsheba; he saw her, she was bathing, he saw her, he said, "Wow," and sent for her, and begat her. No, he didn't begat her, but he got something, and she got pregnant. And she was married and David knew this was an egregious thing, so he said, "Well, we got to get rid of the husband and then it will be okay." And you follow the whole warped thinking about how he's going to get rid of Urias. He sends him off to battle to the worst place. He's; it's everything that could possibly go wrong to get rid of the husband, and finally, of course, the deed is accomplished. But it remains that this woman is named in the genealogies descending to Christ. Now, I find this very, very, very powerful, because for most people, they will hone in, they'll focus on the sin of these women, the sin of these men. I'd prefer to focus on something much greater: God's grace, that He permitted people so broken, so messed up, so hurting, so alienated, so not part of God's plan, but He, by His grace, He lets them be included. Not only that, He lets them be recorded for the ages, forever, so that the record should never be forgotten that the type of people that God uses. It doesn't mean that you have to go out and be a mass-murderer to be accepted in the church. I'm not saying that, either. I'm simply saying that when people come to that mentality, "You don't belong here: your kind, your people," that's not the church of Jesus Christ. And the line that ultimately culminates in the coming forth, in the bringing forth of the Messiah is peppered with people who are so absolutely, frankly, it's just weird, broken, messed up, dysfunctional, that I'm perplexed when people say, "Well, how could that person call themselves a Christian," or "That's not a Christian." The only thing that I'm seeing is the person who's busy throwing the stones. I seldom, I seldom refer to that passage anymore about the woman taken in adultery, because it's a dubious passage based on the manuscripts. It's dubious that it's actually in the most ancient manuscripts, but granted we even use that. Jesus is quoted saying, "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone." Impossible; absolutely impossible. I would just say about those self-righteous people, and there are a few; oh, I've heard the echoes, by the way. I've heard the echoes of people say, this person or that person. Once we start picking off people, tell me who is eligible to come into the church? Once we start picking you off, because, let's see, because of your background, your ethnicity, your color, your mess ups, your past, your job, your family, "Oh, you're associated with those people over there. You can't come in," once we start stripping down, who can come in the church? Who can come in the church? And then, once we've stripped away all you folks, let's talk about the ministers. Who came up with the idea that somehow the public decides who's a good minister? And why is the church so bound up in; I've seen this everywhere. Somebody said, oh, another minister who's in a very strong denomination said, "Well, we can't barely do that because, you know, the board and the brethren and...," and I'm thinking this is all wrong. I'm sorry, it's all wrong to me, because when I read I don't read that a committee is appointed to elect, but rather God in His sovereignty reaches down. He usually picks the most unlikely, and as I mentioned, David as being the youngest. There was an older brother, rightfully, it would make sense the oldest of Jesse's sons would be the king; but it was the youngest son, the most unlikely candidate. So, all I'd like to do is kind of focus in on God's grace. I'd like to share something that dove-tales with all of this, because while the self-righteous are busy out there, "Well, you know, well, I...," they have every excuse to make for not receiving, for not accepting, for not understanding. I want to show you what Christ tells me, and whether you like this or not, these are words from Christ. This is what He's saying to the church today, and He speaks to this till the end of time in final judgment. Open your Bibles; turn to Matthew 25. This will give you the picture of why I said we are not to judge. You know how many people sit in judgment of me? Whether it's because I'm a woman or who they think I am or what my relationship with Dr. Scott was, I could keep going. There's only one criteria. Do I come to you with anything except the Bible open, ready to encourage you and equip you in the word? And give you, sometimes it's very strong meat and some of you complain, "I don't want to do grammar and language," and other times it's a simple message like this, that everyone can walk away saying, "That's right, this is what the Christian church looks like." It's not the first church of the self-righteous, but listen to what is being said about a future time in Matthew 25 and 31, "When the son of man shall come in his glory; when he shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory: and before him shall be gathered all nations; and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: He shall set the sheep on his right hand, goats on his left, Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry, you gave me meat: I was thirsty, you gave me drink: I was a stranger, you took me in: Naked, and you clothed me: I was sick, you visited me: was in prison, you came unto me." I really want you to just take a second look at this, because that should shut the mouth of those self-righteous lions who want to puff up and say, "Well, we have a duty." Who appointed you? Who made you judge of God's people? There are some different people coming into this church, and I'll tell you, the first ones that I'll put outside the door will be those that are judgmental. There's no place for that here. And by the way, I love; yeah. I love, I love the fact that Jesus makes it abundantly clear, with the same measure you judge somebody that is the measure by which you shall be judged. That is very harsh, because you know if you search your heart, and we've all done this at one time, we've all done this, we're all guilty of this, we've all sat for a moment and uttered something about somebody. With the very measure that you, by that same, whatever amount it is that you have meted out judgment to somebody; that is the measure that will be given back to you at the final judgment. Don't quote back to me, "Well, because you're in Christ Jesus there's no more condemnation." No ultimate, but there is a judgment seat and every child of God will stand. "Well, I don't like that." Well it's not my words it's God's words. So then, where were we? All right. "But then shall the righteous answer him." And I want you to notice who's talking, saying, "Lord, when saw we thee hungry, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me." And that really is what I want to tie this all together with. So needed for some of you sitting out there who say, "I, I just feel like I don't belong anywhere." Well, welcome to a place of people who don't belong anywhere either, because this is the place where I say come. We're all sinners being saved by grace. There is, there is not only just a Rahab and a Tamar and a Bathsheba and a Ruth, there are David types in here, and we could just name off the names; the one that everybody likes to herald: Paul, you were so opposed to the church and now suddenly you can't be, wild horses couldn't drive you away. That's why God included these most important genealogies. Why do you think, when you read the Book of Ezra and Nehemiah, the genealogies of those who returned? Extremely important, they're not just put there because God would like to entertain us with some very strange named people, "Children of the flea and..." No, they're there for a record with a purpose. Ultimately that purpose, by the way, culminates right down to this perfect road in the person of Jesus Christ. I don't know where you are today. I don't know if it's, if it's you're failures, if it's the situation and circumstance of your life. We once took a call on the faith lines of a lady who was locally, and we'll say about 20 minutes, 25 minutes away. She was in a motel room. She was a hooker, and right between tricks she said she was watching me on TV. And I'm going to tell you something. Probably any other ministry would have said, "Just don't deal with it." I was the one to say I've got to talk to this woman. Now, it took me a little while to find this woman. But I'm telling you something, I think the most remarkable thing is that your Pastor stands here telling you there isn't anything that you have done, or I've done, or any other person beside you, or yet to come into this church that God's going to be so shocked that He's going to fall off His rocker when He finds out. He already knows where you've been, and that's the beauty of the message of grace. No matter where you've been, there's always a time and a place for you to turn. And there's only one, by the way, only one thing that God really does require of us, that we turn from our ways. I'm guaranteed when I read the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, when it references "Rahab, the harlot, by faith," I can tell you that moment of hanging the cord out her window and her and her, her whole household were saved tells me I'm pretty sure her life was changed forever after that. God's not saying, "Hey, you've got to change before you come in the church." If you will come in this church with an open heart and an open mind, you better look out. God's going to be changing you every single day, week in and week out, as you open your heart and your mind to receive the word of God. It is that transforming power. We cannot see it. We don't necessarily understand it; that, inside, something is morphing you and changing your being. And God says through His word, and I'm telling you today, the message of grace, the message of grace to this church, to His church: unmerited favor. We don't deserve what He's even, the kindness He's shown us, like the song they sing, "Why me, Lord?" How did I, I hate to use the word, how did I get so lucky as to be a recipient of goodness I don't deserve? That's every single person in this sanctuary. So, I tie this together and say to you like those self-righteous ones who will always be there. They were there in Jesus' day. I think they'll be with us; the self-righteous and the critics you'll have with you always. Just remember the tapestry that God has designed, included this beautiful genealogy to show you and me; not highlighting the sin, because our condition, Romans 3:23 says, "All have sinned," it's highlighting His grace. And His grace, my friends, is sufficient, no matter where you are, it's sufficient. Receive it today, in Jesus' name. That's my message. You have been watching me, Pastor Melissa Scott, live from Glendale, California at Faith Center. If you would like to attend the service with us, Sunday morning at 11am, simply call 1-800-338-3030 to receive your pass. If you'd like more teaching and you'd like to go straight to our website, the address is www.PastorMelissaScott.com
