The Curse of Coniah

Technology often spawns new concepts.  I was listening to my daughter one day as she was venting some anger about a co-worker.  She finished her rant by exclaiming, "Well, I unfriended her!"  "Unfriended," I inquired?  She replied, "Yes, she was one of my friends on Facebook, but I UNFRIENDED her."  How symbolic.   Reflecting on that recently, I thought, what would it be like to be unfriended by God?  

Reading through the book of Kings, you can follow the decline of the kingdom of Judah.  With few exceptions, each king became progressively worse than the previous.  In Jeremiah 22:24,25, God ends the decline.  Using a symbolic statement, He pronounces a curse on Coniah , King of Judah.  “As I live,” declares the LORD, “even though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah were a signet ring on my right hand, yet I would pull you off; and I shall give you over into the hand of those who are seeking your life, yes, into the hand of those whom you dread, even into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of the Chaldeans.  In this pronouncement, God did two things that are much worse than unfriending. He "pulled off the signet ring" symbolizing the removal of Jeconiah from power and at the same time "nicked" his name to Coniah.

(Coniah is a nick name for Jeconiah who was also called Jehoiachen.)  The meat of the curse continues in verse 30,  Thus says the LORD, ‘Write this man down childless, A man who will not prosper in his days; For no man of his descendants will prosper sitting on the throne of David or ruling again in Judah.’  With this curse, the genealogical bloodline of David through Solomon abruptly ended.  No physical son of Coniah, could sit upon the throne.  I'm sure the devil must have thought that he had won a great victory.

Jump ahead now to the birth of Christ and notice in the genealogy of Joseph in Matthew 1:11,12 and to Josiah were born Jeconiah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon. And after the deportation to Babylon, to Jeconiah was born Shealtiel; and to Shealtiel, Zerubbabel;

The bloodline of Joseph had a double curse.  If Jesus were born of Joseph, he would not only inherit the sin nature as a son of Adam, but he would also be under the Curse of Coniah and thus could not sit upon the throne of David.  He could neither save us nor reign over us.

God had another plan.  In  Genesis 3:15 He promised that a "seed of a woman" would arise victorious over Satan.  When God chose Mary to be the mother of our Lord, it was not only because of her virtue, but also because of her lineage.  She could trace her bloodline back to David through Nathan instead of Solomon.  Thus Jesus had the legal claim to the throne of David through Joseph, but it was through Mary that the double curse was broken so that Jesus could be both Savior and King.

*Note - the name Shealtiel appears in both genealogical lines.  In Matt 1:12 he is said to be the son of Jeconiah but in Luke 3:27 he is called the son of Neri (meaning an Israelite.)  Although some think that Neri was another name for Jeconiah , this bump in the geneaology probably indicates that Shealtiel was legally adopted by Jeconiah (who was written childless) to continue the line of David.