Student handbook Lesson sample
Sinners and saints LESSON 2
Tamar and Judah
LESSON 2
Sinners and saints
FAMILY SKELETONS
Some people like to explore their genealogy. Below are some famous people. Try to match the person with the family history fact:
Mother’s ancestors were Jewish and lived in Poland—many of her relatives were killed in the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II.
A distant relative of Abraham Lincoln’s mother, Nancy. Therefore, a distant cousin of the 16th President of the United States.
Allegedly has a distant relative who was sent to Australia due to sheep theft.
A distant royal descendant of King Henry II of England.
Many of history’s most famous and respected figures have mixed family backgrounds, and Jesus is no exception. Jesus—arguably the most well known person in history—has his genealogy laid out in the Bible. It is a complex mix of individuals, to say the least. We live in a time when having a criminal in your family line doesn’t really a ect how people view you. In fact, it can be kind of fun to think you might have a convict in your ancestry. But it wasn’t always like this. Even just 100 years ago, your genealogy could impact who you could marry, the jobs you could obtain and how much respect you were shown.
Royal or rogue?
Back in Jesus’ time, genealogy was a big deal—it could bring you honour or serious shame. That’s why it’s so surprising that Jesus’ family tree includes three great, great, great ... grandmothers who had been famously mixed up in messy or sinful circumstances.
Jesus was not sexist, but the culture around him definitely treated men and women di erently. One clear example is that women were usually left out of genealogies. So, when they are included, you know it’s a big deal.
GOD’S WORD
Read Matthew Chapter 1 and note down the names of, or references to, any women.
Granny 1,2,3
Now let’s zoom in on the lives of the first three great, great, great … grandmas of Jesus that get mentioned. After you’ve heard each blurb, write a few words about each granny.
Tamar Rahab Bathsheba
Kate Middleton
Tom Hanks
Beyoncé
Scarlett Johansson
A KING LIKE NO OTHER
David is the only one in the genealogy given the title ‘king’, and it was to David that God gave the promise that one of his descendants would be a forever King (2 Samuel 7).
In the very first verse of Matthew’s Gospel, the phrase ‘Son of David’ is used to describe Jesus. This shows that Jesus was that promised forever King.
In this genealogy, Matthew refers to David as ‘the father of Solomon whose mother had been Uriah’s wife’. This phrase would have stood out—even more than the mention of the other women.
GOD’S WORD Why do you think Matthew refers to Bathsheba (Solomon’s mother) as ‘Uriah’s wife’ instead of using her name? What does this force readers to remember?
Matthew spent three years travelling with Jesus. He believed wholeheartedly that Jesus was the King from David’s family line—the Messiah. He watched the way Jesus treated women with dignity and respect, and he heard Jesus teach about humility and servant leadership.
REFLECT By including this short phrase that drew attention to King David’s darkest failures, what might Matthew be saying about what to expect from the ‘Son of David’ in the coming chapters?
NO SHAME
Matthew Chapter 1 is the kind of family history that a first century Jew both would and would not want people to know about. It does contain some very famous people—including kings regarded as heroes—which showed that Jesus came from the line of royalty. However, by including Tamar, Rahab and Bathsheba, it also draws attention to how messy families can be, regardless of their fame. Wouldn’t it have been better to just leave the women o the list completely, hoping people would forget any shameful circumstances and focus on the positive parts of the royal line?
Discuss
Why do you think God’s word includes these women in the opening sentences of the New Testament? What might this suggest about God’s attitude to these women?
The inclusion of these women right at the start of the New Testament—by a Jewish author writing to a mostly Jewish audience— is like a hint about what’s coming. Even before Jesus’ birth is described, we’re shown that his story is for everyone, both men and women. And it’s not only interesting that women are included, but that it’s these women. Their stories are complicated, painful, messy, sometimes even scandalous. Yet their names are honoured here. We see here in God’s word that no-one is beyond his reach. No situation is too messy. No-one—then or now—needs to stay stuck in shame.
Less mess
Not every woman in Jesus’ family history had a messy backstory. Ruth, the great-grandmother of King David (and so one of Jesus’ many-times-great grandmothers), is a good example. She gets her own book in the Old Testament, and it’s a positive one. But Ruth wasn’t born Jewish. She was an outsider, a widowed foreigner who chose to follow God with her whole heart. She wasn’t exactly typical royal family -line material. But her reputation stands out. Words like loyal, hardworking, courageous, respectable and honoured all describe her well.
Reflect: God’s saving plan started with the nation of Israel, but how does Ruth’s inclusion remind us of what God’s long term plan involves? What do we have in common with Ruth?
From the grandmothers to the mother
After moving through the grandmothers and grandfathers, we reach Jesus’ mother. There is another oddity about the way the genealogy is written here, one that would have caught the attention of every first century reader.
Matthew 1:16, the final verse of the genealogy reads, ‘…Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, and Mary was the mother of Jesus who is called the Messiah.’
Discuss
What is the pivot here? Why doesn’t Matthew simply write, ‘…Jacob the father of Joseph, the father of Jesus, who is called the Messiah’?
We’ll spend more time with Mary in the next chapter, but for now it’s hard to understate that Jesus’ genealogy—and especially this final verse—gives us a clear indication that Jesus is ushering in an entirely new kind of family.
Daughter of the king
Imagine being invited to be a child of the King, the perfect King Jesus. Early in Mark’s Gospel, we see just how di erent his family would be.
In Mark 5:25–34, we meet a woman who had been bleeding for twelve years. More than just making her physically sick, the bleeding made her religiously unclean under Jewish law (Leviticus 15:25–27). This meant she was likely cut o from worshipping God with others at the temple, cut o from close friends or family, and treated as someone to avoid. Her life would have been one of isolation, poverty (she’d spent all she had on doctors), and quiet su ering.
When she heard about Jesus’ presence, she approached him in a crowd, risking shame and harsh judgement. She didn’t even have the courage to speak; she believed that just touching the edge of his cloak would heal her. She was right. But, before she could sneak away, Jesus asked who it was that touched him. She came trembling before him, likely expecting rebuke, but he said something astounding:
‘Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your su ering.’
Jesus calls her, ‘daughter’. She is the only person that Jesus ever addresses in this way.
In that moment, Jesus didn’t just heal her body—he drew her into God’s family.
In front of the crowd, he restored her dignity, publicly a rmed her faith, and showed she was welcome to be a beloved child of the King. This was only the start. As we shall see, women (and others) with stories that involved shame, pain, loss, mistreatment and outsider status were openly welcomed into the mixed bag of Jesus’ family.
Why do you think it was easier for this woman to seek healing in secret rather than publicly?
What do you think the woman expected Jesus to say when she admit it was her?
REFLECT: In what ways might publicly turning to Jesus still take courage today?
Ju the art
The opening chapter of Matthew’s Gospel is just one early indication that Jesus will treat women with a very di erent attitude to what was common in his day.
GOD’S WORD – The surprise factor of the women included is not just their gender–what other forms of diversity are represented? What does that show about the kind of diversity that Jesus’ plan might involve?
LACEY STURMʼS STORMY STORY
Lacey Sturm grew up in a broken home and faced deep emotional struggles. She became an outspoken atheist as a teenager, rejecting the idea of God due to the pain and suffering she saw in the world. She battled severe depression and anger. At 16, she decided she was sick of living.
God changed everything
On the day she was at her lowest, Lacey skipped school. As a punishment, her grandmother made her go to church. She spent the whole time angry, but after church a man spoke directly to her, saying, ‘God knows the pain in your heart’. He told her God would love her like no father ever had. She broke down and says she felt like God was saying, ‘Yes, I know you. I know all the things you have done. I am not shocked by any of it. Come close to me, my love, just like you are. I have already forgiven your past and future. And, if you let me, I will make you new. I will make you into all that I have planned for you’.1 From there she began to trust Jesus as her loving, saving King, accepting his ‘embrace of grace’.
Her impact
In the early 2000s, Lacey became the lead singer of a band called Flyleaf. Their music often reflected themes of struggle, faith and hope. Later she focused on solo music, speaking engagements and writing books like The Reason: How I Discovered a Life Worth Living She shares her story and she advocates for mental health awareness, helping people understand that there is hope in Christ. She’s living proof that God can take a broken life and use it for something powerful.
Discuss
Why do you think God seems to choose unlikely people—like Lacey Sturm or the women in Jesus’ family tree—to accomplish his plans?
Have you ever felt like you don’t deserve God’s love? How does today’s lesson show you that no-one is too ‘messy’ for God to love?
1 Sturm L(2014), The Reason: How I Discovered a Life Worth Living, Baker Books, p. 113.
Take a quick flashback to the days you did crosswords. Flashback through this lesson in order to find five key women’s names to add to this puzzle below.
