Encountering Jesus in Four Scandalous Stories

Encountering Jesus – Gospel of Matthew

Allen Snapp

Grace Community Church

Mar 1, 2026

Encountering Jesus in Four Scandalous Stories

Turn in your Bibles with me to Matthew chapter one. For the next several months we will be working our way through the gospel of Matthew and it is my prayer and hope that as we study Matthew we encounter Jesus. Not just that we learn information about Jesus, though we will. Not just hear the teachings of Jesus or read about the miracles he did, though we will. My hope is that as we read this gospel that we encounter the risen and living Jesus who is the Lord of all, the King of kings, the Savior of the world, and the friend of sinners and that through these encounters our lives are changed. So let’s pray.

The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Matt 1:1

When I was about ten years old I joined a book of the month club and every month I’d get a different book, books like Call of the Wild, and White Fang, and other classics. But these books were abridged, which means they cut out a lot of the boring details and got right to the story line. That’s what Matthew does in verse one: Jesus was the son of David, David was the son of Abraham. Boom! Genealogy abridged!

Except that then Matthew traces out 42 generations of Jesus’ ancestry. Genealogy unabridged! I don’t know about you, but often when I come across a genealogy I often speed read because while they are important, they are kinda boring. We’re not going to read through all of Jesus’ genealogy this morning but I do want to point something out that is more than surprising it is shocking and even a bit scandalous. We begin in verse 2:

² Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, ³ and Judah the father of Perez and Zerah by Tamar…Matt 1:2

Jumping a few generations later in verse 5 the genealogy continues:

Salmon the father of Boaz by Rahab, and Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, and Obed the father of Jesse, ⁶ and Jesse the father of David the king.And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah… Matt. 1:5-6

Genealogies were very important to the Jews because they documented the purity and legitimacy of a person’s heritage and lineage. By tracing Jesus' lineage through King David, Matthew establishes that Jesus was to be qualified to be the Messiah and to sit on the throne of David. By tracing it back to Abraham, Matthew establishes that Jesus is the offspring of Abraham through whom all nations of the earth would be blessed.

But if we read through all the genealogy we’d notice that there are a lot of dad’s mentioned and not a lot of moms. That is how Jewish genealogies worked. Rarely is the mother mentioned in a genealogy. Sorry moms, you’re super important just not in Jewish genealogies.

Matthew traces 42 generations and other than Mary only mentions four women. What surprises us is

that each of these women are only in Jesus’ lineage because of scandal. Tamar was left childless after her husband (who was a wicked dude) died and her brother-in-law refused to give her a child. The only one left who could give her a child was her father-in-law Judah, so she disguised herself as a prostitute, tricked Judah into lying with her, and conceived twins, one of whom was Perez who is in Jesus’ lineage. It’s pretty messy.

Then there’s Rahab. Rahab didn’t just dress up like a prostitute, she was one! Even more scandalous is that she was a Gentile – a Canaanite. We know she helped hide the two spies from Israel when they came to scope out Jericho before Israel was to attack it. But as a prostitute and Gentile, how did she make it in Jesus’ lineage?

Next we have Ruth. Ruth herself is by all accounts a woman of good character, her scandal is a scandal of association. She’s a Moabite. God detested the Moabites and told the Jews: "No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord. Even to the tenth generation, none of them may enter the assembly of the Lord forever,Deut. 23:3 (ESV)

No Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord, but here’s Ruth the Moabite in Jesus’ ancestry.

The last woman Matthew highlights isn’t actually identified by name, she’s identified by her scandal (vs 6):

And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah…vs. 6

Solomon, who is in Jesus’ line, was born of David and the wife of another man. Solomon was the product of adultery and murder.

In a genealogy full of dads and rarely moms it would have been easy for God to hide these four women. Instead God highlights them! It’s no accident these are the four women God mentions and by mentioning them, underlines their importance to Jesus’ lineage. Why?

The answer is because in their stories we encounter Jesus. We encounter grace. Scandal isn’t the last word in their lives – Jesus is! We can’t understand why their in this genealogy unless we acknowledge the scandal that put them here, but we can’t stop at their scandal – we need to move on to their faith.

These women trusted God against all odds! Tamar hatched a crazy plan to have a child and make right the wrongs committed against her. Rahab believed in the power of Israel’s God to destroy the wicked city of Jericho. Ruth longing for a relationship with God, said to her mother-in-law, “your people will be my people and your God will be my God.” And Bathsheba kept going when circumstances made it hard for her to see what God was doing. When her son Solomon was in danger of losing the throne and his life, Bathsheba with faith took matters into her hands and secured the throne for her son.

God looked down at all these women and said I want to honor them because each of them honored Me. They believed My promises when all seemed to be lost. They chose Me over the world. They trusted Me over their surroundings and they believed that My grace was stronger than their sin. In each of their stories, we encounter Jesus.

1. Jesus doesn’t insulate himself from sinners, he identifies with sinners

We would be right to say these four women’s lives were marked with scandal, it’s a big part of their identity. But here’s what’s crazy: it’s a big part of Jesus’ identity too! In the natural if not for their scandal, Jesus wouldn’t have been born. Their scandal isn’t tangential to Jesus, his bloodline runs down from their scandal. If Tamar hadn’t lain with her father in law – no Jesus! If Salmon and Boaz hadn’t married Gentile women – no Jesus! If not for David committing adultery with Bathsheba and murdering her husband Uriah to hide his sin, no Jesus! Jesus wasn’t born in spite of their scandals – he was born because of it!

By weaving their scandal into Jesus’ lineage, their scandal becomes inseparable from Jesus’ identity. And that reminds us that Jesus didn’t come to insulate himself from sinners but to identify with sinners. He identifies with our temptations.

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Heb 4:15

Jesus sympathizes with our weakness because he faced what we face! He got close to sinners, walked with them, ate with them, touched them. The Pharisees hated him for it because they worked hard to avoid sinners. They didn’t want to be dirtied by associating with the great unwashed. Jesus was known as the friend of sinners.

Jesus didn’t get dirty by touching the great unwashed, they got clean by his touch! He came to forgive us, cleanse us, and make us righteous by his touch.

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. 2 Cor. 5:21

Talk about a close identification: God made Jesus to be sin for us. God doesn’t hide sin in secrecy. One day every sin done in secret will be shouted from the housetops. There are people who are named in the Epstein files who once believed that what they did under the cover of secrecy would never be known. They’re sweating now. They’re explaining. Some are resigning from high positions. Secrecy can’t cleanse us from sin or save us from exposure. God doesn’t hide sin in secrecy – and maybe that’s another reason God chose to highlight these four women. He doesn’t hide sin with secrecy, but when we come to Jesus in faith, He covers our sin with mercy. Mercy that gives us forgiveness, cleansing, righteousness that we don’t deserve. That’s why Jesus came! To seek and to save the lost. That’s every one of us!

2. Jesus turns those who don’t belong into those who do belong

Rahab and Ruth especially don’t belong in Jesus’ lineage. They had no place among God’s people. They

didn’t belong. That was us once too. We were, as Eph. 2 says, “without hope and without God.” But it goes on to say in Eph. 2:13

But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ. Eph. 2:13

In Hosea 2;23 God promises:

I will have mercy on her who had not obtained mercy; Then I will say to those who were not My people, 'You are My people!' And they shall say, 'You are my God!' " Hos 2:23 NKJV

I think we underestimate the power of belonging. We want to belong. To a family, to a community, to a people, to a loving God. I left home when I was 18 years old and I remember times when I felt very unrooted. Like I didn’t know where I belonged – or like I didn’t have a place where I truly belonged. My family upbringing didn’t have deep roots, especially after my father died. There were moments among friends and in Christian circles where I felt a sense of belonging, but it was short-lived.

Loneliness is a symptom of not belonging. We long for a family in which we belong. We long for a community in which we belong. We long for friends with whom we belong. That’s being lost today as more and more people have little connectedness in a loving community. Families are scattered and even when together are often not together, with everyone doing their thing and glued to their screens.

Jesus came to turn those who don’t belong into those who do belong. None of these women belong in Jesus’ ancestry, especially Rahab and Ruth. And that’s why they do belong. In Christ we belong to God, we are His people, we are His family, which makes us family to one another.

3. Jesus uses unusable people for the glory of God

No one reading this would have believed that God used these four women in such an incredible way. They played a part in the coming of the Savior of the world. Their part was a small one – all our parts are small – but every believer has a part. Never believe the enemy when he tells you that God can’t use you. God loves to use the unusable for His glory.

You don’t need ability, you just need availability. And openness for God to use you. When Satan says you’re trash, believe that God says you’re treasure. God doesn’t need the impressive or the highly gifted or the socially connected. He looks for the one who trusts Him and is willing.

Three brief application take-homes for Christians from this message:

1. If you’re struggling with a sin that has a grip on you, don’t run from God. Run to God. Run to Jesus, confess that sin, ask him to forgive you and cleanse you from it. Jesus gives the power to break the chains of sin that bind our lives. Run to Jesus!
2. God made us with a strong need to belong. Belonging is all about relationships. Believe that you belong to God’s family and get connected if you’re not already! It’s not healthy to live disconnected. Find contexts to grow friendships, have fun conversations and deep conversations, pursue relationships that will encourage you to grow and challenge you to grow.
3. Jesus came to seek and save the lost. We are saved to serve. Serving others is an important part of a healthy diet. It doesn’t need to be big or impressive. You may not even see much in the way of results. Leave that to God! These women had no idea that God would use them to bring for the Savior and Lord of all the earth, they just did their part and left it to God.

Look for regular ways to serve in the church. Community. Ministries like the Potter’s Hands. They are always needing volunteers! Serve with time, talent, with your money. Jesus said the person who buried their talent instead of investing it had even that one talent taken away. Use what God has given you or you will lose it.