{"id":3596,"date":"2019-06-23T20:00:42","date_gmt":"2019-06-24T03:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/?p=3596"},"modified":"2019-06-11T21:43:45","modified_gmt":"2019-06-12T04:43:45","slug":"1chronicles_2_1-55","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/1chronicles_2_1-55\/","title":{"rendered":"God Loves to Use the Least Likely"},"content":{"rendered":"

1 Chronicles 2:1-55 \u00a0Click here for Bible Verses<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Hi GAMErs,<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s passage is 1 Chronicles 2:1-55. Let\u2019s go!<\/p>\n

1 Chronicles 2:1-4 (NIV)\u00a0<\/strong>
\n1\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0These were the sons of Israel: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun,
\n2\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Dan, Joseph, Benjamin, Naphtali, Gad and Asher.
\n3\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0The sons of Judah: Er, Onan and Shelah. These three were born to him by a Canaanite woman, the daughter of Shua. Er, Judah’s firstborn, was wicked in the\u00a0LORD’s sight; so the\u00a0LORD\u00a0put him to death.
\n4\u00a0<\/sup>\u00a0Tamar, Judah’s daughter-in-law, bore him Perez and Zerah. Judah had five sons in all.<\/em><\/p>\n

On verses 1-55:\u00a0 Here the Chronicler continues to list the ancestors of King David, and eventually, of Jesus Christ, starting with Israel\u2019s sons in verse 1 all the way to David in verse 15.<\/p>\n

When I read these verses, it strikes me how the family that gave rise to David King of Judah and eventually Jesus Christ was, from a human perspective, the type of family that no one would expect to give birth to a king.<\/p>\n

First, you have Abraham and Sarah, the grandparents of Israel, who were not supposed to have children in their old age.\u00a0 Both Abraham and Sarah wavered in their faith.\u00a0 Abraham lied.\u00a0 Sarah doubted.\u00a0 Both of them even agreed to execute a sinful strategy to \u201chelp God accomplish His plan\u201d by having Abraham sleep with their maidservant Hagar.\u00a0 Yet, even when they were faithless, God was faithful to His promise to give them a son of their own called Isaac.<\/p>\n

Then, in the next generation, Isaac and his wife Rebekah are barren and not able to have children.\u00a0 Yet God miraculously blessed them with a child.<\/p>\n

Then, in the next generation, between Esau and Jacob, naturally one would think that God would choose Esau, who had all the rights, privileges and power as the firstborn of Isaac.\u00a0 Yet God chose the younger brother Jacob to be the one whom through whom He would bring forth His chosen family.<\/p>\n

Then, in the next generation, among Jacob\u2019s 12 sons, Judah (v1) is the one who sleeps with his own daughter-in-law Tamar while she is pretending to be a prostitute.\u00a0 Judah would probably be the last of all Jacob\u2019s sons whom you would pick to be the ancestor of King David and Jesus, and yet God chose one of the twin babies that came from Judah and Tamar\u2019s incestuous relations, Perez, to be the ancestor of King David and Jesus (v4-5).<\/p>\n

Then, in the next generations, Perez\u2019s son Hezron would have three sons called Jerahmeel, Ram and Caleb (v9).\u00a0 One would think that the king of Judah would come through Jerahmeel, Hezron\u2019s firstborn son, or Caleb, the most outstanding of Hezron\u2019s three sons.\u00a0 In fact I believe the reason why the Chronicler goes out of his way to list the descendants of Jerahmeel and Caleb in verses 18 to 55 is to show how much more outstanding they were as compared to Ram.\u00a0 And yet Ram would be the one God chose to ultimately bring forth Nahshon (the eventual leader of the people of Judah \u2013 v10), Boaz (the famous hero in the book of Ruth – v11-12), King David (v15) and ultimately Jesus Christ our Saviour.<\/p>\n

Thus, given the odds and the oddities inherent within each generation from Abraham to Ram, it seems that God chose the most unlikely of families to bring forth Judah\u2019s greatest king and our Saviour Jesus Christ.\u00a0 \u00a0David himself becoming king of Judah was unlikely given that he was the youngest of his brothers (v13-16).\u00a0 Jesus being born in a little town like Bethlehem and growing up in a small town of Nazareth as a carpenter\u2019s son \u2013 none of this was the pedigree you would expect for the King of kings.\u00a0 And yet that\u2019s what God chose \u2013 the least likely.<\/p>\n

What can we learn from this?\u00a0 Here are two lessons we can learn:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. God chooses us as His family not because we earned that status by our righteous deeds, and not because from a human perspective it makes sense that He would pick us.\u00a0 Rather, God chose us strictly as a matter of His sovereignty and grace.<\/strong>\u00a0 It\u2019s a matter of His sovereignty because in choosing the least likely of families to bear a king, God showed His power to do the impossible.\u00a0 It\u2019s a matter of His grace because here God was showing undeserved kindness to a broken, sometimes faithful though often unfaithful family.\u00a0\u00a0God loves to use and choose the least likely of people.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
      \n
    1. Do not discount what God can do in and through you simply because of (1) your background, including the mistakes of someone else in your family; (2) your own mistakes; or (3) what you have or don\u2019t have humanly speaking. The greatest story God wants to write in and through your life has to do with Him working His power through your weakness.\u00a0 Your weakness or problem is a story of God\u2019s strength and power just waiting to happen.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Heavenly Father, thank You for showing us through these genealogies that You love to use the weak to shame the strong, the foolish to shame the wise.\u00a0 You love to make Your power known in our weakness.\u00a0 Though I might be tempted to think that my background, my past, my family or my resume disqualify me, You show that You can use anyone.\u00a0 Just like You showed undeserved grace to people like Judah, use me, Lord, to make Your Son Jesus known in this world.\u00a0\u00a0 In Jesus\u2019 name, AMEN!<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      Hi GAMErs,<\/p>\n

      Today\u2019s passage is 1 Chronicles 2:1-55. Let\u2019s go!<\/p>\n

      1 Chronicles 2:1-4 (NIV)\u00a0
      \n1\u00a0\u00a0These were the sons of Israel: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Zebulun,\u00a0
      \n2\u00a0\u00a0Dan, Joseph, Benjamin, Naphtali, Gad and Asher.\u00a0
      \n3\u00a0\u00a0The sons of Judah: Er, Onan and Shelah. These three were born to him by a Canaanite woman, the daughter of Shua. Er, Judah’s firstborn, was wicked in the\u00a0LORD’s sight; so the\u00a0LORD\u00a0put him to death.\u00a0
      \n4\u00a0\u00a0Tamar, Judah’s daughter-in-law, bore him Perez and Zerah. Judah had five sons in all.<\/p>\n

      On verses 1-55:\u00a0 Here the Chronicler continues to list the ancestors of King David, and eventually, of Jesus Christ, starting with Israel\u2019s sons in verse 1 all the way to David in verse 15.\u00a0<\/p>\n

      When I read these verses, it strikes me how the family that gave rise to David King of Judah and eventually Jesus Christ was, from a human perspective, the type of family that no one would expect to give birth to a king.\u00a0<\/p>\n

      First, you have Abraham and Sarah, the grandparents of Israel, who were not supposed to have children in their old age.\u00a0 Both Abraham and Sarah wavered in their faith.\u00a0 Abraham lied.\u00a0 Sarah doubted.\u00a0 Both of them even agreed to execute a sinful strategy to \u201chelp God accomplish His plan\u201d by having Abraham sleep with their maidservant Hagar.\u00a0 Yet, even when they were faithless, God was faithful to His promise to give them a son of their own called Isaac.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3597,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gametime-sharing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3596"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3596\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3598,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3596\/revisions\/3598"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ocbf.ca\/2019\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}