RBWords

     The period from December 17 to 24 begins a countdown of sorts in the lectionary and in the missal.  The countdown begins with the "genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham."  This genealogy, with its tongue-twisting names, is not like one that Ancestry.com offers.  It is carefully crafted to establish what is said in the opening line.  The Gospel According to Matthew is determined to make sure we understand that Jesus is the fulfillment of the promises made to Abraham and to David.  This would mean that Jesus has what mattered to Matthew's audience - the equivalent of the ancestral DNA!

     The promises made to Abraham and to David speak of a tribal as well as a royal connection.  Jesus was from the tribe of Judah and the "son" of Joseph, "son of David" [Matt. 1:20, Luke 2:4].  All of this would be of great importance to any Middle-Eastern family because the birth of a son meant the continuance of the family line.  But in the case of Jesus, it meant the continuance of God's plan and accompaniment of God's people in the person of the child born in Bethlehem, the city of David.

     When we set up that nativity scene, perhaps we can pause for a moment to realize that more than the birth of a child occurred there.  That child is the reason for the season and bears the history of God's eternal plan in which we participate every day!  AMEN