"Matthew: The Bad Beginning"

Pastor Laura Guy

February 21, 2010

Here's an instant replay of what happened in worship:

We played a little game where we tried to guess the name of the book by hearing the famous first line from it.
We thought about what makes a good beginning to a story, how it draws us in. So how does Matthew, the first book in the New Testament, begin the most important story ever written? We read Matt. 1:1-17. (Ok, we didn't really. It's too boring. We stopped after 4 verses.)
We wondered why Matthew would start his story with such a boring genealogy. We realized he was writing to Jewish Christians, and they knew all these names and the number thing about 3 groups of 14 was probably important to them, but how about us? Then there are the additional problems with the list not actually adding up to 3 x 14, and it doesn't match Luke's genealogy, and there aren't enough people to cover the years between Abraham and Jesus - and it's traced through Joseph, whom we're told isn't even Jesus' biological father! What a bad beginning to this story!
We looked again and saw that there are five women in this list - women who were desperate, sinners, outsiders, foreigners, the fodder for town gossip. Why would Matthew include women, and lots of less-than-stellar men, in this list of Jesus' family tree? So that we would know this Gospel is about us and for us. No matter who we are and where we've been, we, too, can be a part of Jesus' family. That's not such a bad beginning to a Gospel at all!
We prayed in gratitude for being welcomed into Jesus's family.
We talked about Freedom Sunday, a special day set aside to focus on the people trapped in slavery in the world. Using information from the International Justice Mission, we learned that there are 27 million slaves in the world today. We watched a clip from "Amazing Grace" - based on the true story of William Wilberforce and his efforts to end the slave trade. (We will be showing this film and having a discussion on human trafficking this Friday, Feb. 26 at 7 pm. All are welcome.)
We prayed for an end to slavery and for comfort for those who wait for an end to their suffering. Clifford Hall sang the spiritual, "When Israel Was in Egypt's Land (Let My People Go)."
We sang Amazing Grace and remembered the story of the man who wrote it - John Newton, a former slave ship captain. Even slave ship captains can be welcome at Jesus' table, a part of his family. We who have discovered that amazing grace ourselves celebrated at his table.