THURSDAY, December 24 Eve of the Nativity

Matthew 1:18-25. Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way.

That is not the first sentence in the Gospel of Matthew. Seventeen verses precede it, but most people never read them. They appear in the Daily Office Lectionary only as an optional add-on to the reading for Monday following the Third Sunday of Easter.

Why is the opening of Matthew's gospel glossed over? Because it's the "begats" (from the word in the King James Version meaning "was the father of"). This is a famously boring passage of scripture. Those who do read the "begats" often wonder about them. Matthew apparently thought all this was important. Why?

Matthew begins the "begats" with Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation, and then carefully traces Jesus' genealogy through the kings of Israel and Judah. This roots Jesus in time and place, in history and geography. You cannot understand who Jesus is and what he is about apart from that history and that geography. We are not talking here about eternal and universal truths, but about a particular event that had a particular context. Pay attention to the context. If you don't, "the birth of Jesus the Messiah" won't make much sense to you.

PRAY for the Diocese of Yokohama (Japan)

Ps 45, 46; Baruch 4:36-5:9; Galatians 3:23-4:7

View the daily Lectionary Readings at Satucket.com.
Or view the Bible passages at Biblegateway.com.

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Dec 24, 2009 at 7:36 am

Written by Mary E. Macnaughtan Bonnet,

Exactly!! So many people I've talked to, think the Old Testament is not relavent today. How sadly mistaken they are!! All people should read the Bible!!! That is: read,study,ponder,and pray over God's Word-- for all their lives even!! It should be an ongoing daily happening for all of our life on this earth........I wish only that I had come to that conclusion earlier in my own life. I often felt something missing...With prayer, God showed me what that missing force was in my life

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Dec 24, 2009 at 8:55 am

Written by Andrea,

I'm a little confused about today's writing. Could you possibly go a little farther along this line of thought? OK, we need to understand Jesus's birth as being the product of a very specific historic and cultural context.... But WHY? Is your point that we need to understand and embrace the idea that Jesus was a historical figure? (That seems to put the story into the realm of 'mere facts', to use your phrase from a few weeks ago. Not saying it didn't happen, just that I think it's way bigger than that.) Or is it that we need to understand that this story and all of the Bible represents particular human responses to God at particular times in particular contexts, and needs to be understood that way? Or is it something else? In any case, Merry Christmas to all Forward Day by Day readers and writers!

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Dec 24, 2009 at 10:38 am

Written by Steve Doutt,

I am here now. I talk to, and pray to, Jesus -- an adult Jesus who was executed on a cross by people like me, made in the image of God, a couple of thousand years ago. Jesus who died, descended to the dead, offered the dead salvation (I believe). Jesus who rose from the dead and ascended to heaven to join God and intercede for me. Jesus who is full of faith and set an example for me, who said that if I have faith I can follow him to God. Jesus never said that he was God when he was here on Earth before we executed him. Jesus prayed to God regularly, probably continually, during his walk on Earth. It's important to read the "begats" and set the historical context because Mary's baby is wholly human; although, conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit so that in him human beings might be adopted as children of God, and be made heirs of God's kingdom. The context of Jesus human ancestry gives me hope here and now that this great mystery is close enough for me to touch.

Rev. Carolyn Y. Staley

Dec 24, 2009 at 11:26 am

Written by carolyn staley,

To Andrea---my thoughts....The historical lineage of Jesus is important to read and marvel at for lots of reasons. First, it shows us how God has been at work since creation to prepare the way for Christ's coming. 14 generations from Abraham to David, 14 to the Babylonian exile, 14 to the birth of Jesus. How perfect is God's plan! The list also includes some less than perfect characters (David, Rahab the harlot), and some other women too! For me it is a wonderful look at how God has been working since the beginning to send a Savior for my life and for all humankind. We, as later generations of creation, may have no idea how God is working through us, using us for God's purposes to bring about God's Kingdom to the world. Exciting! Merry Christmas!

Editor, Forward Day by Day

Dec 24, 2009 at 2:50 pm

Written by Richard H. Schmidt,

Thanks to all four of you for your thoughtful questions and comments. I'll try to elaborate a bit on what I meant when I wrote today's meditation, in response to Andrea's question. To me, it's important that Jesus was an actual figure in history, identifiable by place and time, because without that, it wouldn't have been a true incarnation. "Incarnate" means "in the flesh." When God disclosed himself to us in the fullest and final way, it wasn't as a principle, a vision in the middle of the night, a code of conduct, a volcano, tornado, or a rite of worship (important though those things are). It was---and is---in the flesh that God comes to us. God, the Creator of all that is, chose to become one of us, to "walk the walk," as 12-steppers like to put it. God is with us. In time. In space. In the flesh. If we would know God, we must encounter him here, in our daily lives. This has lots of implications for religion, politics, economics, social relations, prayer, and other things. Maybe we can talk about this some more on another day. Anyway, I appreciate all four of your remarks today.

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