St. Matthew includes the names of four women in Jesus’ genealogy before mentioning Mary, his mother: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba. These women illustrate some of the bumps in the family tree. Tamar slept with her father-in-law, Rahab was a Canaanite madam in Jericho, Ruth was a Moabite )and the Book of Deuteronomy instructs the Jewish people to have nothing to do with Moabites), and Bathsheba is infamous for adultery with King David. Mary was, of course, a pregnant, unmarried teen-ager. All of which is to say that God uses everything, even the twists and turns of a family story, in order to bring about salvation. When we look at our own story we can see the hand of God at work in all things.
