The purpose of this devotional is to help prepare you for the celebration of the birth of Jesus. You may do this as your own quiet time, but we would encourage you to gather some family or loved ones to go through it together.

Before you read this passage I would recommend that you read this with a group of family or loved ones. Pass the Bible around and let everyone take a verse. Have fun with it. Let yourselves laugh when you stumble over some of the names. You may have heard of Jehoshaphat, but how do you say Shealtiel or Elihud?

Whew! How did it go? Did you get a good laugh? Which name is your favorite? Does anyone remember any of the Bible stories that come with the names you just read?

Now, some of that may have seemed kind of boring, and let’s be honest, most of the time when you’re doing your own Bible reading, you probably skip that section. But today we’re going to look at it. Obviously, there is a reason for all those names. You may not be jewish or a Bible scholar, so a lot of those names don't have very much significance to you. But let's look past all the specific names and let's just look at how many names there are. If you want you can go back and count them up. The author seems to make a point about how many names are there. Here is what is magnificent in the Christmas story. These are actual names of actual people that lived and who God knew and loved and used for His purposes. Whether or not the author of Matthew remembered and wrote down these names, God knew. He has used these people as part of His big plan to bring us Jesus. In His infinite wisdom, God knew that all these people needed to live and die not just before, but in the process of bringing Jesus at just the right time.

That’s the God we continue to know and love and serve today. He knows exactly what needs to happen to get to where He wants you to be. So as you prepare for Christmas, with whatever else is going on in your life, don't forget that God has a plan for how to get you to where He wants you to be. Just like he did with Jesus.

-Dan Baker, Family and High School Pastor