I'm struggling finding where you're going, but lyrically, this is not in the right order, is all I'm saying. Song select sucks, as far as putting stuff in order, because Mark used to go through and he would rearrange and put it the way we're singing it, going down the page. So we wouldn't have to go over to this page, back to this page. Okay, so after the verse three and that grace into the chorus, so here I stand, it'll go, and then the ones I was broken, it'll go into still up, healed and forgiven.

So healed and forgiven.

Good morning, church. Good to see all your lovely faces. But I'm Grace. I'm his daughter. If you don't. Know me. My last name is Davis. I'll show you the birth certificate, but good to see you all. It's been a while. It's just our crew right here. This is really fun, actually. So I have the, huh? You talking smack over there? I have the wonderful blessing and opportunity to be able to lead you guys in worship this morning.

And with that, I wanted to open up with a psalm. It's Psalm 100. Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth. Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before him with joyful singing. Know that the Lord himself is God. It is he who has made us and not we ourselves. We are his people and the sheep of his pasture. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise.

Give thanks to him. Bless his name for the Lord is good. His loving kindness is everlasting and his faithfulness to all generations. Amen. Amen. So let's all stand this morning and let's worship. Of the good men in darkest night. You are close like no other. I've known you as a father in the goodness of the goodness. Be seated.

Jesus Christ, my Lord, the grave has no.

While we sing of our Jesus being risen from the dead. Came the more. Sealed the problem.

Praise the Lord this morning. Give him a hand so that we can put our trust in him. Amen. He's so faithful. Even when we are faithless. Praise the Lord for it.

Jesus is mine.

So this is mine.

Trust him. That's why I trust him. I sought the Lord. Thank you that we can trust you. God, thank you that you are able. Able more than able. Father, thank you that you have made us completely new. God, in you. Lord, only that our identity is in you. That you have your spirit in us. Father, that we are able to live, move, have our being. God, who are we that you are mindful of us?

God, so may this. Time just be a response of you as we sing one more song to you, Lord, this morning. May we just worship you, honor you, and glorify you in gratitude and thankfulness for everything that you've done. Jesus name. You're welcome to sit, stand, kneel, worship however you please.

Lord, the strength to form just our pieces, our broken pieces, Lord. Putting us back on the potter's wheel. We don't know what it's going to be. We don't know what our life's going to look like, God. But we're so grateful that you are. We're so grateful that you are. We're so grateful that you are. We're so grateful that you are. We're so grateful that you are.

And you are the only one with the plan. And you are the only one with the strength to complete it, God. So as we prepare our hearts to hear from your word this morning, I pray that you fill Pastor Ryan, God, we just thank you for his gifting, Lord, to teach the word with such power, God. We ask that you humble us before you, God. Fill us with your spirit. Fill him with your spirit, Lord, as we go before our morning.

In Jesus' name, amen. Go ahead and turn and greet those that are worshiping around you.

Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. As you begin to find your seat, grab your bulletin. We'll get ready to go over some announcements.

Welcome to Calvary Chapel. I'm glad that you have joined us this morning. It's, of course, the week of Christmas. So really the only announcements to tell you is that, first of all, everything's canceled this week, except for one thing, and that's the Christmas Eve service at 6.30 on Christmas Eve. So come join us for that. And other than that, take some time to really enjoy your families.

And your friends. And hopefully you're going to have some great Christmas celebrations together. So those are the things that are going on, or not, if you will. If you would, make sure that your mobile device is silenced. And then for our responsive reading this morning, we are going to be in Luke 2. Luke chapter 2. We're going to be looking at verses 1 through 20 for our responsive reading.

Looking at the New American Standard so that we sound the same. If you need a copy, there should be one around you. And as you are... Wait. Oh, I totally forgot. I screwed up. We're supposed to do a video about Operation Christmas Child. And your shirt should have clued me in, and I forgot. Wait. Hang tight. I totally forgot that we had a little video clip for the trip that we took to Operation Christmas Child.

So play the film.

All right. Pretty cool. Now, how many boxes altogether did you guys ship off from there? Do you remember the number? No, that's okay. Somebody posted, it was a bunch. Whatever it was, you guys shipped off. Okay. It was a bunch of boxes. So pretty cool ministry that they were able to take part in down there. So now for our responsive reading, we're going to be in Luke chapter 2.

So if you would please stand in the honor of the reading of God's Word, if you are able.

I will read the odd verses, if you will follow along with Pastor Allen, and the even verses, and we will read down through verse 20. Now, in those days, a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth. This was the first census. And everyone was on his way to register for the census, each to his own city. Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David,

which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David. In order to register along with Mary, who was engaged to him and was with child. While they were there, the days were completed for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.

In the same region, there were some shepherds staying out in the fields and keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord suddenly stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terribly frightened. But the angel said to them, Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy, which will be for all the world. For today, in the city of David, there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.

This will be a sign for you. You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. And suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men, with whom he is pleased. When the angels had gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds began saying to one another, Let us go straight to Bethlehem, then, and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.

So they came in a hurry, and found their way to Mary and Joseph, and the baby as he lay in the manger. And when they had seen this, they made known the statement which had been told them about this child. And all who heard it wondered at the things which were told them by the shepherds. But Mary treasured all these things, pondering them in her heart. The shepherds went back, glorified.

And praising God for all that they had heard and seen, just as they had been told them. And so, Father, we come to you now, and we praise you, Lord, for this story that reminds us of why we're here, of what this time of year means for us. And so, Lord, keep our hearts and our minds focused upon you. In Jesus' name, amen. You may be seated. And if you would, open up in your Bibles to the book of Matthew, chapter 1.

Matthew, chapter 1. Amen. It conveniently got a little bit of a cold earlier this week. And it has done what it always does to me, and it tries to rob me of my voice. So please bear with me. I'm well, no sore throat, none of those kinds of things. I just, every time I get something like this, I can barely talk. So hang with me. You're just going to have to listen really, really, really carefully.

Okay? So. Well, today we come to part four in our series of the gifts of Christmas. And as we come to part four, I want to look at the theme of restoration. I kind of changed this midstream. Earlier this week, the theme that I was going to go off of was redemption. And so I started studying and looking at it. And as I have done, I've tried to come up with, like,

what's the opposite of this word to show how God has brought it to us? And so I thought, well, what's the opposite of redemption? And I started thinking of words, and I thought of the word brokenness. And I thought, no, brokenness isn't the opposite of redemption. Brokenness is the opposite of restoration. And I was like, restoration. Now, that's a beautiful word.

I was literally sitting in the Starbucks, and I almost burst into tears because God was just like, that's exactly what I want you to do. That's what I want you to talk about. So that became the theme for the morning. And so I want to look at three things. I want to look at restoration. I want to look at brokenness. And I want to look at Jesus. When I first moved back to Ark City about almost 15 years ago now,

as an adult, it sort of struck me that every man in this town has two different cars. One of them runs, and one of them doesn't. One is a car that they drive. And the other is a car that they drive. And the other one is what they call a project car. And usually that project car is something that they're trying to restore. And so I thought restoration really kind of goes with what we do in Ark City, right?

Like always, I now have a truck that just sits in my driveway that doesn't do anything. I don't work on it, but I call it my project truck because it makes me fit in here, right? It doesn't go anywhere. It doesn't do anything. It would run if I'd put a battery in it. But I have to have it because it makes me a man in Ark City, right? And so that's what we do here.

We restore things. And I thought, isn't that beautiful? It's a beautiful picture of what Jesus wants to do with us. And so restoration is defined this way. Restoration is defined as the act of returning something to its original state or its former condition. The act of returning something to its original state or its former condition. And that's exactly what Jesus does with us.

That is the hope of the gospel. The hope of the gospel is that we will be returned. Restored to our original state or our former condition. And the hope for the world is that they can find something to bring about that restoration in their lives. And people are searching for that. People can't find that because they're looking for it in the wrong place. The problem that we face in the world now is that so much of the world is broken.

Because what we really see in the world today is we see all of the people and we see all of the brokenness that affects all of the people around us. And so brokenness, which is the second part that we'll look at here this morning, is defined this way. Brokenness is defined as fractured or damaged and no longer in working order. Fractured or damaged or no longer in working order.

Now that describes the world. And that describes most people, apart from Jesus Christ, living in the world. It is the result of sin in the world. It is that people are now fractured. They are damaged and they are no longer in working order. And because of that, we see broken people trying to run a broken world and solve broken problems with broken promises.

And they can't do anything about it. And we keep going back to the exact same things over and over and over again to try to solve problems. And we forget that there's one thing at the heart of every problem and that's sin. Because sin is what brought brokenness into the world. And so I thought about this and I thought about the three areas where we really see brokenness in the world.

Number one, we see that people are broken. People are fractured. They're damaged. And they don't work like they're supposed to. And the reason why is because of sin. Because sin has fallen into the world. The second thing that we see is we see families that are broken. Because broken people create other broken people. And we see families that are broken. And then the last thing that I thought of when I was going through this is people feel like they're broken.

They feel like their story is broken. You look at your history. You look at your past. You look at your story. And they think it's broken and God can never use me again. Because I'm a broken person who comes from a broken family. And now my story is broken. When my girls were little, they liked me to sing to them. That has since changed. But they both had favorite songs that they really liked to sing.

Nora's favorite song was one that my dad actually helped write. And it's out of the book of Micah. He has shown me, oh man, what is good and what the Lord requires of thee. So that was Violet's favorite song. Nora's favorite song is something that she simply termed as broken people. And it's called I Will Serve You Because I Love You. I just want to read the lyrics to you.

It says, I will serve you because I love you. You have given life to me. Heartache, broken people, ruined lives. Are why you died on Calvary. That was Nora's favorite song. And so she'd want me to sing it to her over. Dad, sing to me broken people. And I thought, isn't that a beautiful thing that she knows that that's the most important thing that we need to know about is how broken people are healed.

And the story that we find in Matthew chapter 1 of the genealogy of Jesus Christ is the story of broken people who are restored by Jesus. And so we look at Matthew. Matthew chapter 1. And it says, This is the record of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Abraham was the father of Isaac. Isaac the father of Jacob. Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers.

Judah was the father of Perez and Zerah by Tamar. Perez was the father of Hezron and Hezron the father of Ram. Ram was the father of Amminadab. And Amminadab the father of Judah. Ram was the father of Nashon. Nashon was the father of Salmon. Salmon was the father of Boaz by Rahab. Boaz was the father of Obed by Ruth. And Obed the father of Jesse. Jesse was the father of David the king.

David was the father of Solomon by Bathsheba who had been the wife of Uriah. Solomon was the father of Rehoboam. Rehoboam the father of Abijah. Abijah the father of Asa. Asa. Asa. The father of Jehoshaphat which is a great name by the way. Jehoshaphat was the father of Joram. Joram was the father of Uzziah. Uzziah was the father of Jotham. And Jotham the father of Ahaz.

Ahaz the father of Hezekiah. Hezekiah the father of Manasseh. Manasseh the father of Ammon. Ammon the father of Josiah. And Josiah became the father of Jeconiah and his brothers at the time of the deportation. And after the deportation to Babylon. Jeconiah became. The father of Sheltiel. Sheltiel the father of Zerubbabel. Another great name. Zerubbabel was the father of Abihud.

Abihud the father of Eliakim. Eliakim the father of Azor. Azor the father of Zadok. Zadok the father of Achim. Achim the father of Eliud. Eliud the father of Eliezer. Eliezer the father of Matan. Matan the father of Jacob. Jacob was the father of Joseph. Husband of Mary. By whom Jesus was born. Who is called. The Messiah. Now at just face value it's just a genealogy of names.

Some of them hard to pronounce. Some of them really fun to say. But it's just a genealogy full of names. But that genealogy full of names. Believe it or not. Is actually a story of the grace of God. And a story of how God heals broken people. Through the coming of Jesus. The first name I would like to give you. Is not listed in this genealogy. His name is actually listed probably at the top of your page.

Because he's the guy that wrote the book. The first name I would like to give you. Is not listed in this genealogy. His name is actually listed probably at the top of your page. Because he's the guy that wrote the book. The first name I would like to tell you about is the name Matthew, because Matthew is the writer of the very first gospel account, and was one of Jesus' apostles.

And the fascinating thing about Matthew is that Matthew was not always a follower of the things of God. When Matthew was called to be a follower of Jesus Christ, Matthew was one of the most unlikely followers of Jesus Christ that you could have ever imagined, because Matthew was a tax collector. And as a tax collector, that made him a liar, it made him a thief, it made him untrustworthy, it made him someone who was rebellious against the things of God and a traitor to his own people, someone who had put making money over just about everything else in the world. He was, if you will, the guy that ran Enron.

And at his worst time, Jesus looked at Matthew and said, You. You, follow me. And so Matthew left his tax collecting booth, he left behind all of his wealth, left behind all of his money, and he simply followed Jesus. And if anybody knew what it was like to have your story restored by Jesus, it was Matthew. Because he was hated by his countrymen, probably hated by the other apostles, apart from the

work of Jesus Christ. And quite frankly, someone that no one knew. Someone that no one trusted. And yet, because of the grace of God in his life, because of the work of Jesus in his life, he not only became a follower of Jesus, he not only became a disciple of Jesus Christ, but he became one of the four men who would write a gospel account of the work of Jesus Christ among the nation of Israel, focused specifically on the Jewish people who would have originally seen him as a traitor.

Because that's what the grace of God does in our lives. And so the first story that we look at is that of Matthew. The second stories that I want to point out to you, and I've just kind of gone through and had her put these on here, is the stories of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And basically, I'm not going to have you turn to any places in Scripture, but if you want to mark in the margin of your Bible or in your notes, you might just write Genesis chapters 12 through 50.

Because Genesis chapters 12 through 50 cover the stories of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. Right? And so... Those guys are considered the patriarchs. Those are the ones everybody looked back to and said, those are the guys that started the nation. Abraham was the one that was called by faith. Isaac was the child of promise. Jacob was named Israel, which is why they're called the children of Israel.

And yet, as we look at those three individuals, known for their faith, known for their promise, known for their leadership, known for being the patriarchs of the nation, they all shared a similar problem. You know what the similar problem that they shared was? They were very dishonest. They were very dishonest people. Abraham struggled with lying. He apparently had the hottest wife known to man.

And so everywhere he went, he got really concerned that someone was going to steal his wife. And so he said, hey, babe, would you do me a solid and tell everybody that you're my sister? That way they don't kill me for you. Right? Nothing says happy Valentine's Day like, hey, don't tell anybody you're my wife. But that's what he did. He did it more than once.

And actually, when you get further into the Genesis account, you find out that this was something that he always did everywhere they went. We only read of two main accounts. This is a struggle that he had. And he struggled with really trusting God's promises. But you know what's fascinating is that eventually he believed God. And when he believed God, it was accounted to him for righteousness.

Therefore, a child of promise came through him whose name was Isaac. Isaac had the exact same struggle. He apparently had the second hottest wife on the face of the earth because he had to say, hey, babe, tell them you're my sister. I wonder where he got that from. Tell them you're my sister. So they don't kill me for you. And she's like, all right, that's fine.

Well, he got found out as well. Not only that, he played favorites with his kids. He struggled with playing favorites with Jacob and Esau. Esau was his favorite. His wife's favorite was Jacob. And because of that, he had a broken family. All because he dealt with dishonesty. And yet, he's known as a man of faith. And then, of course, there's Jacob, who according to Gail Irwin, his name means dirty, rotten

thief. Right? Like, that's what Gail Irwin says. His name. His name means supplanter, which no one in the world knows what that means, which is why Gail Irwin gave him the name Dirty, Rotten, Sneaky Thief. Until one day, he wrestled with God. And when he wrestled with God, he was overcome. And he forever walked with a limp in his hip because of the work of brokenness that God

had brought into his life. And the three patriarchs, the ones who the entire nation looked to, all struggled with sin. And they all struggled with dishonesty. And they all struggled with really being surrendered to God until God really got a hold of their hearts. And that's how the nation started. The next significant set of names that we come up with is one of Jacob's sons.

His name was Judah. But that's not the name we pay close attention to. The name that we pay close attention to is Tamar. Because Judah and Tamar have this fascinating story. Again, you might just write Genesis 38 in the margin of your Bible. Judah had three sons. Two of them were absolutes. Two of them were absolute morons. The oldest one, I think, was Onan.

And we're just told the guy was evil in the sight of God. And he had taken a wife for his oldest son, Onan, and his wife's name was Tamar. And Tamar, or Onan, was such an evil guy that before they could have kids, God killed him. And so there's Tamar, this widow who isn't able to carry on the line of Judah. And according to the custom, according to the law, the next youngest son was supposed

to take her as wife to carry on the family name. And so then it comes, I think his name was Ur. And he comes along, only he's sort of an immoral guy. He wants to have all the fun without any of the responsibility. I know we don't hear about that in today's culture. But that's exactly what he does. He doesn't carry on the family name. I'll spare you the ugly details.

Read Genesis 38. And so God strikes him dead. And so Judah's kind of going, whoa, what in the poison ivy is going on here, right? Like, let's just, don't marry my youngest son. Wait till he gets a little bit older. That way, he's ready for marriage. But what he really intended to do was to never marry his son to Tamar, period. Well, Tamar knew that. The youngest son got old enough to where he could be married.

And Tamar knew she was never going to be married, which meant she would never be able to have a son, which meant she would never be able to provide for herself. And so one day, Judah's wife had passed away. And a little time goes by. And it was time to shear the sheep, which was usually a big, timeless celebration. So he went up to the threshing floor to have a big party for the sheep shearing.

That took place. And as he was on his way up there, Tamar was told, hey, your father-in-law is on his way up to the threshing floor for a celebration. And so she says, I know what I'll do. So she laid aside her widow's garments, and she put on the garments of a prostitute. And she went out, and she stood by the road. And Judah asked her, what's the price? And she said, well, you need to give me like a goat or something like that.

And he goes, well, I don't have that with me. What will I give you as pledge? She said, give me your staff. And give me your signet ring. Two things that were very specific to an individual, a staff and a signet ring. And he said, that's fine. So he gives those to her. And they do their business. And he goes on to the threshing floor. And in the meantime, she gets pregnant.

And he finds out that she gets pregnant. Only he was never able to make the payment. So she still has his staff and signet ring. He finds out that Tamar gets pregnant. And they say, hey, you know that girl that was married to your, to your two boys? She's pregnant. And Judah goes, let's bring her out and burn her. Like, oh my gosh, that is so aggressive. So they bring her out and put her on trial.

And she says, the man that got me pregnant owns this staff and the signet ring. And Judah goes, oh, you're way more holy than me. And that's how Judah and Tamar have twins named Perez. And I can't think of the other kid's name right now. Sarah. It's amazing. First of all, this woman, Tamar, I didn't include this in the story, but she was a Gentile. Second of all, she was a prostitute at the time of the birth of her son.

And yet through Perez is going to come the line of Jesus. Well, the next set of names that we really pay attention to, or the next name that we really pay attention to, is the name Rahab. So Perez has Hezron. Hezron has Ram. Ram has Amenadab. Amenadab has Nashon. Nashon has Salmon. Down in verse 5 it says, Rahab's another very interesting name because during the time of Jacob,

the children of Israel, of course, went down to Egypt in order to survive a famine. And while they were there, they ended up staying there a lot longer than they intended. And while they were there, there arose a pharaoh that didn't know anything about Jacob or any of the rest of his family. He just knew there was this large group of Hebrew people, and he thought they would be great for forced labor.

So he put them into slavery. And in their time of slavery, they cried out to God to be set free. So God gave them Moses, who delivered them and brought them out of the land of Egypt and took them to the edge of the promised land. And at the edge of the promised land, Moses dies, and Joshua takes them into the promised land. Well, the first city that they come to is a city called Jericho.

And so Joshua wants to spy out Jericho to find out exactly what they need to do. So he sends two spies into Jericho in order to spy out the land. They find a hiding spot while they're in Jericho. And they find a hiding spot at the home of a lady named Rahab. And we're told very specifically in Scripture that this woman Rahab is a prostitute. Isn't it amazing how God uses the most unlikely people from the most broken backgrounds

to be in the line of the Messiah? And so this woman Rahab says, I'll hide you, but I know something that's true. I know that your God is about to take over this land. I know that. This is a foregone conclusion, and so I want you to protect me. I want you to save me. What must I do to be saved? And, of course, they give her the instructions about hanging the scarlet rope out of her window.

And anybody that's in the house will be saved, and anybody that's outside the house will not be saved. And so she does that, and her and her entire family are saved from the destruction, saved from the judgment of God on the city of Jericho. And this prostitute, who is a Gentile, marries into the family of God, and ends up having a child whose name is Boaz. And Boaz is the next name that we want to pay attention to, because Boaz married a woman named Ruth.

Now, Ruth is a fascinating story as well. And I just had her put up there, Ruth. I didn't just write Ruth twice. Ruth, because it's the book of Ruth, so if you want to know a little bit about it, I could have written Ruth 1 through 4, but that's all of the book of Ruth. But then also Deuteronomy 23.3. And I debated on sharing this, but I'm going to go ahead and do it.

So Ruth was a Moabitess. That's the, her, she was a descendant of a guy by the name of Moab. Now, if you don't know anything about Moab, let me tell you a little bit of a story that'll kind of make your toes curl just a little bit, okay? So if you go all the way back into Genesis, all the way back to Abraham, Abraham had a nephew named Lot. And Lot was living in the city of Sodom and Gomorrah,

a place he never should have been. And it was time for God to destroy the city of Sodom and Gomorrah because of their sin. And so God sent angels to deliver Lot and his family. And they're getting ready to run out of the city. And the angels tell Lot, you need to run as far from this city as you possibly can, you and your entire family, which by this point in time is just his two virgin daughters.

You guys need to get out of this city. Go up to the mountains. And so he runs from the city and they go to the mountains. And his daughters have this idea. As far as they know, the entire world just got destroyed. And so they don't know how they're going to continue on the line. And so they come up with this plan. Let's get dad drunk. And then each of us will take a turn sleeping with dad

so that we can continue on the line. And that's what they do. One of those children that was born through that incestuous relationship was a guy by the name of Moab. Well, if you follow, Moab all the way down through. So a pretty sordid, dirty family history for Moab anyway. So if you follow that all the way down through, you come to the book of Deuteronomy chapter 23, verse three.

When you find that because of the way the Moabites treated the children of Israel on their wilderness journey, according to the law, no member of the people of the Moabites was ever allowed to enter the sanctuary of God. So not only does Ruth have behind her the fact that she's a Moabite, but she also has the fact that she's a Moabite. She's a Gentile. Not only does she have behind her the fact that she comes from a pretty broken line of people, but the law has excluded her from the nation of Israel.

And yet Ruth finds herself in the land of Israel and there's a man by the name of Boaz who sort of takes a liking to her. And Boaz, of course, is in the line of David. And Boaz becomes her kinsman redeemer and marries her. And now what the law, had said could not happen because of her background, God restored through his line of Boaz. And so Boaz marries Ruth, another Gentile woman.

So, so far we've got three Gentile women listed in this, listed in this genealogy. And so Boaz and Ruth, they have a son. His name was Obed. Obed has a son and his name is Jesse. And Jesse has a son and his name is David. And now we think, oh, finally, we're done with sad stories, right? We're at David, the man after God's own heart. The man who does everything God wants for him to do,

except for one problem. It says in verse six, Jesse was the father of David, the king. And David was the father of Solomon by Bathsheba, who had been the wife of Uriah. Now, the New American, the American Standard, it includes the name Bathsheba. But if you read it literally in the Old King James and the New King James, both have this, the name Bathsheba is not included in there.

What it literally says is, David was the father of Solomon by her who had been the wife of Uriah. And I think it's kind of interesting that that's what the original actually says. It doesn't include her name in it. So that's the story that we've been covering, of course, on Wednesday nights. David was everything the king was supposed to be. He wasn't perfect.

But man, as far as worldly standards were going, he was on it. He was overcoming other cities. He was the golden child, but everything he touched went great. And he's established as the king. And the nation is experiencing greater peace than it's ever experienced, greater wealth than it's ever experienced, greater power than it's ever experienced, more expansion than it's ever experienced

until one, one fateful day. It says it was the time when the kings go out to war, but David stayed in Jerusalem. And he saw Bathsheba, and he wanted her, and he took her, and he lay with her, and she became pregnant. And there was one big glaring issue. She was already married. And so he had to figure out what he was going to do to cover his sin. Because Uriah wasn't,

Uriah wasn't just any guy. Uriah wasn't just any man. He was one of David's mighty men and an incredibly honorable, mighty man of David. And so David set up a plan where Joab would put Uriah into the very front of the hottest battle and then everyone else would pull back and no one would tell Uriah it was time to flee. And Uriah was killed in battle. And it says the thing greatly displeased,

the Lord. And that first child that they had together did not survive. It died shortly after birth. But then David and Bathsheba had, after David's repentance, after David owned up to his sin and was restored, David and Bathsheba had another son together whose name was Solomon. And now another Gentile woman is listed in the genealogy of Jesus. And though not a prostitute,

was absolutely taken advantage of by a man. And God still used it for his glory. And so David and Bathsheba have a son by the name of Solomon. And of course we work our way down. And there's some good kings and there's some bad kings here because there was a promise that was made to David that there would always be one of his descendants on the throne. And so we see that Solomon

was the father of Rehoboam who was a bad king, who was the father of Abijah who was not a good king. Abijah was the father of Asa. Asa, the father of Jehoshaphat, a good king. Jehoshaphat, the father of Joram, I don't remember. Joram was the father of Uzziah, a good king. Uzziah was the father of Jotham. Jotham, the father of Ahaz. Ahaz, the father of Hezekiah, a great king.

And then it says, Hezekiah was the father of Manasseh. And that's the next name that I want us to pay attention to. Because Manasseh was not just a bad king, he was the worst king. And it's always fascinating to me how this happens. Hezekiah was arguably one of the greatest kings Israel had. There was really only one mistake that's recorded of his. And that's that about 10 years before his death,

he was on his deathbed with an illness. And he refused to die, basically. And so he begged God for more time. And so God gave him 10 more years. And in those 10 years, a caravan from Babylon showed up and he showed them everything in his kingdom, all of the wealth. And that was probably the biggest mistake that Hezekiah made, is that perhaps he got a little carried away

with showing off the wealth of the nation because ultimately it would be Babylon who would take over the southern kingdom of Israel. But Hezekiah, arguably one of the greatest reforming kings in Israel, has this son named Manasseh. And Manasseh was one of the most evil kings Israel had ever had. As a matter of fact, I think I had her put up there. Yeah, 2 Kings chapter 21.

1 verse 11 has an interesting commentary on Manasseh. It says that Manasseh sinned greatly before the Lord. He built altars to idols. He even caused his son to pass through the fire. In other words, one of his sons was sacrificed as a human sacrifice to an idol. And he set up idolatrous altars inside of the temple in Jerusalem where God had established that his name would be glorified.

And this is the commentary that's given. It says, He sinned greater than the Ammonites whom God had driven out of the land. The whole reason that God did what He did with Joshua and the children of Israel and driving the inhabitants out of the land is because the Ammonites were such horrifically sinful people. And so it says that He actually sinned worse than the people that God judged when He brought Israel into the land.

And when you read Manasseh's story, you're like, that is just so heartbreaking. It is so sad to see what happens. It is so sad to see what happens with someone. And apart from this next verse that I'm going to give you, it leaves you with a little bit of a hopeless feeling. But I actually want you to turn here. Go over to 2 Chronicles. 2 Chronicles 33.

And I want you to start in verse 10.

2 Chronicles 33.

It says, The Lord spoke to Manasseh and his people, but they paid no attention. Therefore the Lord brought the commanders of the army of the king of Assyria against them, and they captured Manasseh. And they, with hooks, and bound him with bronze chains and took him to Babylon. And when he was in distress, he entreated the Lord, his God. And he humbled himself greatly

before the God of his fathers. And when he prayed to him, he was moved by his entreating. And he heard his supplication, and he brought him again to Jerusalem, to his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the Lord was God. And after this, he built the outer walls, the outer wall of the city of David, on the west of Gihon and the gate. And he encircled the Ophel with it,

and he made it very high. And he put army commanders in all the fortified cities of Judah. He also removed the foreign gods and the idol from the house of the Lord, as well as all the altars which he had built on the mountain of the house of the Lord in Jerusalem. And he threw them outside the city. And he set up the altar of the Lord. And he sacrificed peace offerings

and thank offerings on it. And he ordered Judah to serve the Lord God of Israel. There are very few sections of the Bible that make me as happy as this one. While he could not undo completely the damage that he had done to the nation of Israel, as a matter of fact, in just a minute, I'll tell you about Josiah and how God told Josiah that because of the sins of Manasseh, he had to deal with the nation of Israel.

While he could not undo all of the consequences of what he had done, he could make his heart right with the Lord. He could still be restored. Because in that time of captivity, he cried out to the Lord and he humbled himself before the Lord and the Lord forgave him. It says God heard his injury. He heard his prayer because he had humbled himself before the Lord.

And I just love that because no matter how far someone has fallen, even if it's worse than anybody else in the world has ever done, you are never beyond the grace. You are never too broken to be restored by God because that's what happens with Manasseh. Well, back to Matthew chapter one.

I at least want to tell you about one good king who was very happy, very happy story. After Manasseh came Josiah. And again, 2 Kings 22 and 23 tell the story of Josiah. Josiah, of course, was a descendant of Manasseh. He was not the one that was king right after him. He was two kings after him. But Josiah came king when he was eight years old. But around the age of, I think it was 18,

it might have been 26, somewhere around that age, he started having the temple restored. When the temple started being restored, somebody found a copy of the law. They came and they said, hey, so this is what the builders are doing. This is kind of where they are with some things. Oh, by the way, they found the law. They found God's holy written law for us.

So he unrolls the scroll and he starts to read the law. And as he reads God's righteous standard, and as he reads the punishment for what's supposed to come upon a person for violating God's righteous standard, it says that his heart was broken. And he wept before the Lord and he tore his clothes because he realized the grievous nature of the sin of the children of Israel. And in this one moment, there was a small pocket of revival that took place within the nation of Israel.

And this small pocket of revival, God said, I will not bring judgment during your lifetime because of the way that you have reacted to my law, because of your broken heart over what took place. Judgment still has to come because the sins of the people are great because of the sins of Manasseh. But it won't happen in your lifetime. And there's this great story of Josiah getting up in front of the people.

He takes the law and he reads it. And as he reads the law to the people, all of the people just weep. And there's this national repentance. It's short-lived, but it's a repentance that takes place within the nation of Israel. And it was a beautiful moment because I think even though the line of Jesus is full of so many broken people, that remnant of grace is always there.

That reality, that remembrance, that reminder of the restoration of God, is always there. And so we see that, I turned to 1 Thessalonians, that's the wrong book. And so we see that Josiah has this great national revival that takes place amongst the people. And so even though there's a lot of sadness in there, there's also some joy. There's one last name that I want to tell you about.

If you keep going down, Josiah became the father of Jeconiah, verse 11. Now, it doesn't say this in here, but I'm going to give my own commentary. Jeconiah was an idiot. And that's just all that there is to it. He just was. If you don't believe me, let me tell you about Jeremiah, chapter 22, verse 30. Jeremiah, chapter 22, verse 30, God says, no one of your descendants

will ever sit on the throne. No one of your descendants will sit on the throne any longer. I don't know if you've thought about this, but that's a problem. Because remember, Jeconiah is in the room of God. Jeconiah is in the royal line of David, who God had told, there will always be one of your descendants who's going to sit on the throne. That's it, Ryan.

Someone finally did something too big for God to restore. Someone's story was too broken for God to restore. How was God able to keep his promise and still bring about the Messiah, keep everything that he said in scripture, if this guy, Jeconiah, is cursed? Well, let me tell you a little bit of a story. David had more than one son. David had another son named after the prophet

who confronted him with his sin. And that other son's name was Nathan. And Nathan had a whole line of descendants as well. But if we were to go over to Luke, we would read the entire line of descendants of Nathan. And we would find that Jeconiah, of course, is not in that line. But we would find one other person that is in that line. And her name was Mary. Mary was a descendant of David

through the line of Nathan. Now, why is that significant? Well, if you think about and go back to Isaiah chapter nine, it says, Unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given. Those are two very different Hebrew words. Born speaks of natural birth. Given speaks of adoption. Well, Jesus had to be of the royal line of David, which he was through adoption in Joseph

because unto us a son is given. But he also had to be naturally of the line of David, which he was through Mary because unto us a son is born. Friends, there is no story too broken for God to restore. And so you follow this all the way down through and you come down to verse 16. It says, And Jacob was the father of Joseph, the husband of David, and the son of Mary,

by whom Jesus was born, who is called the Messiah. And that story of the genealogy of Jesus Christ is one of the greatest stories of grace, in my opinion, in all of the Bible. It's full of some of the worst sinners. It's full of some of the worst rejects. It's full of some of the worst outcasts. It's full of some of the worst people that you can imagine. And yet, those people all have one thing in common.

All of their brokenness is restored by one thing, the coming of Jesus. Because in all of those stories, you think, how on earth can anything good come out of that story? How on earth can anything good come from that line? And yet, from that line came Jesus. You know what's kind of fascinating? Of all of those people I just told you the story about, do you know,

when we stop reading about any of their sins in the New Testament, we don't read the stories of any of those people's sins in the New Testament, do you realize that? We're told about it in the Old, because we need to know it. But you see, their stories were restored through Jesus. And so, in the New Testament, we don't read about their sin. As a matter of fact, some of them,

when you go to Hebrews chapter 11, you simply read about their faith. Because that's what restoration does. And so, let's kind of wrap this up. Wrap this thing up, and put a nice little bow on it, like a nice little Christmas gift. Number one, God restores broken people, kind of like Matthew and kind of like Manasseh. Maybe you can relate to their stories. Maybe you can relate to their stories

because you feel like your sin is pretty great, and you're not sure if Jesus can ever restore it. You feel like you have fallen pretty far, and you're not sure if Jesus can ever bring you back. Maybe, like Matthew, you feel like you have fallen pretty far, and you're not sure if Jesus can ever bring you back. Matthew, you're the one who has abandoned people or you have hurt people or you have taken advantage of people and now you think Jesus is calling me to be one of his, but I don't know if I can ever do that because you don't understand how far I've fallen.

I wanna tell you that Jesus restores broken people. Maybe your story's like Manasseh and you go, Matthew's got nothing on me. My story's worse than anybody's ever heard before, at least in my opinion, at least the way I feel about myself. My story's worse than anybody else's. And I don't know if there's even room for repentance anymore. I'm here to tell you right now,

your story is not beyond the restorative power of Jesus Christ because like Matthew and like Manasseh, Jesus takes the worst of sinners and he makes them the greatest of saints. Number two, God restores broken families, kind of like Tamar and kind of like Ruth and kind of like Rahab and kind of like Bathsheba. All of them taken advantage of by men. All of them coming from pretty sordid backgrounds.

Some of them growing up in families that nobody ever really talks about the family history. As a matter of fact, the family tree doesn't tree out as much as maybe it should. It's a little bit more of a straight line than it should be. And they think, no one can ever restore my broken family because you don't understand the family that I came from. You don't understand the family history that I have.

You don't understand the addiction that's in my family. You don't understand the abuse that's taken place in my family. You don't understand the things that have happened in the past. And I don't know if anybody can ever restore that. I don't know if anybody can ever make anything good out of that. Jesus did. Because Jesus took Tamar and Jesus took Ruth and Jesus took Rahab

and Jesus took Bathsheba and he made them a part of the story of redemption because God even restores the most broken of families. And so if you're looking at your family right now, maybe it's your close family, maybe it's your distant family, and maybe you feel tainted by all of the things of your family. God takes all of those things and with one move, with one person, he brings restoration. And that's through Jesus.

Number three, God restores broken stories. Kind of like the entire genealogy of Jesus. Sometimes we look at our story and go, man, it's just so bad. It's gone off track so much. I thought I had a plan. I thought I knew where I was going. I thought I knew what I was doing and I've gotten so far off track of grace. I've gotten so far off track of God's word. I've gotten so far off track of anything

that God would ever want for me. I don't know if God can ever make anything beautiful out of this story again. Well, I would like to introduce you to Matthew chapter one because God took one of the most broken stories that you can ever imagine and he made it the most broken story ever. The most beautiful story in the history of humanity because God restores broken stories.

Now, I don't know where anybody is with yourselves in your life here this morning. I don't know if you're dealing with a certain amount of brokenness in your life, but I want you to know that Christmas is the right time to get things back on track with where you're supposed to be with the Lord. So I'd like to ask you to do something. I'd like to invite the worship team to come up and I'd like everybody to stand.

And as they sing this last song, I just want you to think about something. Actually, just bow with me.

If you're here this morning and you're gonna relate to any part of that story, whether you feel it in your own life, whether you feel it in your family, whether you feel it in your story, if you sense that brokenness in yourself and you want to see healing, you want to see restoration, you want to see God take you and bring you back to where you were supposed to be, then I just want you to do me a favor this morning. I just want you to put your hand up so I can pray for you.

Praise the Lord. Father, I just lift up those that have their hand up here this morning. And Father, as we come to a holiday, it always causes us to be reflective. We think about things and life and family. Or sometimes brokenness just is thrown right in our face. And Lord, I know that by your grace, you want to bring restoration. So I lift up the heart of each individual

that's got their hand up here this morning. And Lord, they want to see you move. They want to see you restore. They want to see you heal. And Lord, it can only come through Jesus. And so Lord, I pray for that this morning. I pray that you would begin that work of restoration in their hearts and lives. And Lord, move as your Holy Spirit sees fit. And Father, we just pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen. Yes, God, we just thank you, Father, that you restore, that has us in your hand. Lord, we thank you that we are chosen. Lord, we are adopted. God, and that we are free. Lord, so we love you. We praise you. We ask that you just continue to go before us this morning. Lord, in this week, this busy week, Lord, fill us with your spirit. God, help us to walk forward in boldness.

Lord, walk from a place of victory. Knowing that you have won. In Jesus' name, amen. Have a great week.