To judge by the current content of our media, the hope of the world is that we destroy our perceived enemies, whether they be our own politicians or given sides in European or Near-Eastern wars.  It’s us against them, winner take all—a fallen world view that has been inflicting suffering since Cain murdered Abel.  A more Heavenly approach seems to forgotten.  

Against that backdrop Matthew’s Gospel introduces Jesus into the story.  The Lord’s faithfulness to undeserving people in unfair circumstances is the huge reality we ignore when we open the New Testament and skip over the list of names to find a messy story of a virgin birth.  That conception is a sign of the very different work that the Lord is doing.

But first, Matthew reminds his Jewish audience that they have a 2000-year-history of hard times.  Those names aren’t a mere list; they are stories of suffering and grace. Mathew’s people know the stories of Abraham’s long wait for a son, Tamar’s struggle with rejection, Rahab’s daring covenant with the the Hebrew spies, Ruth’s redemption into the family of the Savior, David’s enthronement and his horrific abuse of power, and the nation’s fall and captivity in Babylon.  

Matthew highlights the birth of their nation, the founding of their kingdom, the destruction of that kingdom, and the Lord’s purposeful presence in those events.  He brought into that story bloodlines that were Canaanite, Moabite, Hittite and more.  The Savior comes not for one nation but for all nations.  When God’s people abused foreigners such as Hagar, Tamar, and Bathsheba, the Lord was with those women and gave them a place in his plans.   

That is the backdrop for the story of Joseph and Mary.  Matthew describes it without the kind of angelic announcements that Luke reveals.  The already milennia-old story continues with Mary already promised to Joseph as his wife but then found to be pregnant.  Matthew reminds his people how easy it is to misjudge women who are part of God’s plans.

This child will save his people from their sin condition—a condition that makes them so obsessed with their own “righteousness” that they repeatedly abuse disadvantaged women and foreigners that God places in the story.

When God entered the story in the flesh, He was both Heavenly and rejected.  He accepted rejection in order to save the vulnerable abused and the self-righteous abusers from their abuse.  

That is why he is called “Savior” and “God With Us.”  He is not here to condemn the world but to save it.  He came to experience condemnation so that we can be saved from condemnation—not by staying self-righteous and hateful but by choosing grace instead.

To choose grace is to admit you don’t deserve it.  Instead of condemning the Sarahs and Hagars, Esaus and Jacobs, Judahs and Tamars, Uriahs and Bathshebas, Josephs and Marys, grace teaches us to ask, what might the Lord be doing in these troubling situations?  How might I join what is Heavenly rather than choosing sides that perpetuate the problem?

The Savior entered the world in a way that refuses to whitewash the stories of its superstars or to turn a blind eye to the vulnerable.  This story starts out messy because it involves the Savior of the messy.  It’s not a myth to neatly divide imaginary good guys and bad guys.  Its the reality of messy people in need of a grace that has only one source.

Matthew is saying, “While you’re busy looking down your noses at those you imagine to be less deserving, the Lord is doing something radically different.  He’s subverting your self-righteous reflexes with Heavenly purposes.  You can focus on the same old brokenness and division—or you can join in Heaven’s subversion.”