God's Trick Play

by Kallie and Aubree Richardson | December 19, 2023

This time of the year, most Christians will be turning their Bibles to the story of Jesus’ birth.  I doubt, however, they will start with the genealogy of Christ.  So many “so-and-so begats.”  Why do we even need to know that?  There are some surprising twists and turns one may not expect in the genealogy of our Lord.
Jesus’ genealogy is recorded in Matthew and Luke.  They are similar but have some key differences.  Luke begins with Joseph (Mary’s husband), “son” of Heli.  However, according to scholars, the term “son” actually means “son by legal adoption.”  
This means that what Luke recorded is actually Mary’s genealogy.  In the Torah, Moses made an exception for the daughters of Zelophehad (Numbers 27) in that if a man died and had no male heir and his daughters married within the tribe, his inheritance could pass to his daughters by legally adopting his sons-in-law.  
Therefore, Joseph is not Heli’s son, but his son-in-law and son by legal adoption.  Remember this.  It’s important.
The two genealogies split when they get to David.  Matthew (Joseph’s genealogy) follows the genealogy through King Solomon, the first surviving son of David and Bathsheba; the royal line.  But by the time the line gets to a king named Jeconiah (a.k.a. Jehoiachin), God is so fed up with their idolatry He pronounces a blood curse on the entire line.  
“Thus saith the Lord, Write ye this man childless, a man that shall not prosper in his days: for no man of his seed shall prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling anymore in Judah.”  Jeremiah 22:30.  This is a problem.  
God had already prophesied that the Messiah would come from the line of David and rule from David’s throne.  But here, He pronounces a curse on the line and states that no seed of that line from Jeconiah on will prosper on David’s throne. 
So what is God going to do?  How will He keep His Word to fulfill these prophecies of the Messiah but also fulfill the prophecy of the blood curse of the line?  Bible scholar, Chuck Missler, states this, “But then I visualize God turning to the angels and saying, ‘Watch this one!’”  God had a trick up His sleeve.
Luke (Mary’s genealogy) takes a left turn at David, going through his second surviving son, Nathan, and down to what our Bibles say is Joseph, son of Heli, but is actually MARY’s father.  Jesus, being biologically related to Mary but not Joseph, avoids the blood curse of the royal line, but still descends from the royal line of David.  
This gives Jesus the legal title to the throne through Joseph, his legal father, and blood title to the throne through Mary, his biological mother.  Therefore, the Messiah descends from both the house and the lineage of David.
Of course, we didn’t discover all of this ourselves, we’re not Bible scholars.  Chuck Missler has a very interesting study on this called, The Christmas Story:  What Really Happened.  Check it out at www.khouse.org! 
Merry Christmas, Everyone!