23 And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli...
38 Which was the son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God.
Introduction
There is a story about a painter by the name of Stenberg who was struck with the beauty of a Romani girl. He took her to his studio and frequently had her sit for him. At the time he was also working on his masterpiece, “Christ on the Cross,” and the girl used to watch him paint. One day she said to him, “He must have been a very wicked man to be nailed to a cross like that.”
“No,” said the painter, “on the contrary, he was a very good man, the best that ever lived. He died for others.” The girl looked at him and asked, “Did he die for you?” Stenberg was not a Christian at the time, but the girl’s question touched his heart and awakened his conscience such that he became a believer in him whose dying passion he so well portrayed. The whole message of the Bible is that Christ died for you. This truth is expressed in many strange ways.
One of the strangest ways is found in Luke 3:23-38. Verse 23 and then verse 38 are like bookends that sandwich the great truth that I want to portray. Luke 3:23 says, “And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli …” And verse 38 says, “Which was the son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God.”
There are several interesting things about this text. Jesus has just been baptized, and he is ready to launch into his public ministry at the age of 30.
In the following genealogy table are listed 75 names that carry Jesus all the way back to Adam and then to God himself. I want you to notice that it says that he was “about 30 years of age.” Why did he spend 30 years in Nazareth if he had come to save the world? It is commonly believed that Joseph died at a very young age and that Jesus took upon himself the responsibility of supporting his mother, Mary, and his younger brothers and sisters until they reached the age where they could care for themselves. That is significant. If Jesus was to be the Savior of the world, it was essential that he should carry out the most limited task of family duties before he embarked upon his universal task of saving the world.
In the parable of the talents, Jesus said, “Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things” (Matthew 25:23). Unless we do the small, we are not qualified for the larger. In addition, if Jesus was to help men, he had to know how men lived. By working in a carpenter’s shop, he knew the problem of making a living, the haunting insecurity of the working man, the ill-natured customer, and the man who would not pay his debts. He became our sympathetic Savior and high priest through experiencing what we experience.
Note also that Luke 3:23 says he was “supposed to be” the son of Joseph. He was of course the son of Mary and the Son of God. He was conceived in her womb by the Holy Spirit. But obviously he lived a normal life in every way and people assumed him to be the son of Joseph just like their other children. They did not publicize the virgin birth until after the resurrection of Jesus.
Then there follow 75 names in his genealogical table. What is the purpose of all of this?
1. It stresses the real humanity of Jesus.
It stresses the fact that he was a man among men. He was not a phantom of a demigod. To save men, he became in the most real sense a man.
It might be interesting to know that the first heresy was not to doubt the divinity of Jesus, but to doubt the humanity of Jesus. There were those who said that the Messiah came upon the man Jesus at his baptism and departed when he was dying on the cross and he said, “Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.” Thus they say that the Christ was phantom, or a ghost who came and went.
To save men, Jesus became in the most real sense a man. He was born in a manger, and he worked in a carpenter’s shop. When he cut his finger, it ran red with blood like yours and mine.
He hungered and thirsted and grew weary. He was a real man in every sense of the word. The simple truth of all of this is that the Son of God became the Son of Man, that the sons of men might become the sons of God. John 1:11-12 tells us that he came so that we might become the sons of God.
2. It stresses universal redemption.
In Matthew’s account of the genealogy of Jesus, he stops at Abraham. But Luke goes all the way to Adam. Matthew implies that Jesus is a possession of the Jews. Luke says Jesus is the possession of all of mankind. He traces the line of Jesus all the way back, not to the beginning of the Jewish race, but to the beginning of the human race. Luke removes the national and racial boundaries forever from the ancestry of Jesus.
3. It stresses the extensiveness of redemption.
Jesus saves from the uttermost to the guttermost. To get this truth, we must move to Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus. Four women are listed among the ancestors of Jesus in Matthew’s account: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba.
That within itself is remarkable, for women did not count in the first century. It was a man’s world. It is even more remarkable that all four of these women were Gentiles. The most remarkable part of all is the fact that three of the four were harlots or adulteresses. Matthew seems to be saying that with scandals like these in the Messiah’s background, if Jesus did not come from racially pure stock, then the church he founded could not restrict its membership to Jews only. The doors were opened to all.
It also suggests that God may be far more gracious than we ever imagined. His love includes women, so no sex is excluded. His love includes Gentiles, so no race is excluded. His love includes harlots, so no sinner is excluded.
He loves women as well as men, Gentiles as well as Jews, prostitutes as well as prophets and priests. No one is excluded because of sex or race or character. The genealogy of Jesus tells us of God’s love for all of mankind and his desire to save them from their sins.