Most folks familiar with the "Christmas story" know the detail from Luke's gospel that there was no room for Mary and Joseph in the inn. So Jesus was born on the outside, just like he carried on his ministry--outside the established religious expectations and structures.


Matthew makes the same point in the genealogy of Jesus in the opening chapter of the gospel that bears his name, but he does it in a different way. Matthew 1:5,6 reads: . . . Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab, Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth, Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of King David. Matthew here highlights the names of two women, Rahab and Ruth; most mothers in the ancestry of Jesus are not mentioned. Why these two?



Both are outsiders. Neither of these two women who were great-great-great-etc-grandmothers of Jesus on Joseph's side were Israelites. Rahab was a Canaanite, a "working woman" of Jericho when the Israelites came out of the wilderness to possess the promised land. She came to believe in the God of Israel and attached herself to the community of Israel by faith. Ruth was a Moabitess, a foreigner who attached herself to the God of Israel in an act of covenant loyalty that resulted in her marriage to Boaz.



Matthew is telling us by highlighting these two women that Jesus came to be among not just those on the inside. In fact, some of his ancestry came from completely outside the community of God's chosen people, Israel.



Point? God is always for those on the outside. Those who aren't part of the "in crowd;" those who aren't part of the establishment; those who aren't the ones we would expect him to hang out with. In fact, the "in crowd" is only "in" with the Lord as long as they realize they are called to be for those who have yet to make their way into the flow of God's grace and love.


Jesus was born outside the inn. Rahab and Ruth were his grannys. Feeling distant from the Lord? On the outside looking in? Look again. He may be closer than you think.



See you this weekend. We will be checking out Solomon in Jesus' ancestry and celebrating the Lord's table. Remember, Jesus said, "Whomsoever will may come."