While Matthew 1:16 identifies Jesus as the one who is called Christ,
Matthew 1:17 simply speaks of the Christ
at the end of the genealogy. There is a greater stress on who Jesus truly is, and his coming is shown as the point of the genealogy. He does not depend on Abraham and David; rather, they depend on him for salvation. Each of the three sections shows a rise (Abraham to David) or fall (David to deportation). The final section does not show a rise again. Only Christ can lift up his fallen people
While Matthew 1:16 still speaks of Jesus…who is called Christ,
Matthew 1:17 says, and from the deportation to Babylon to the Christ (the Messiah) fourteen generations.
The contrast with Matthew 1:16 highlights this formulation. Jesus, who is called Christ, is the Messiah, for whom the history of Abraham and David waited, because under God’s judgment, that history stranded in the deportation to Babylon. Jesus came not because of Abraham and David, but for the sake of Abraham and David.
The necessity of his coming is apparent from the fact that an equal time period has now elapsed three times. In the first period, the history developed from a clan governed by a shepherd-ruler to a nation under a king. In the second period it progressed from glory to judgment. Meanwhile, another long period has elapsed and the house of David continues to be washed up. The glory of Abraham and David could not be replicated during the third period1
12 And after the deportation to Babylon: Jechoniah was the father of Shealtiel, and Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel,