Title: JUDAH’S DISREPUTE—GOD’S GRIP

Focus: In spite of Judah’s recklessness, the Lord preserves and secures his covenant promises to the house of Judah.

Function: To emphasize that our messes do not stop God from realizing his purposes and promises.

Text: Genesis 37:26-36; 38:1-30

Each one of us may have moments of despair when our messes and foolish or sinful actions make us realize that we are disappointing God or working against his influence and rule in our lives.

Consider, for example, Judas, who betrayed the Lord Jesus. Judas had such a horrible moment of despair. It led him to commit suicide. Or take the apostle Peter. Peter, one of Jesus’ best friends, fearing for his safety denied that he belonged to Jesus’ followers. A rooster forced Peter to face his rashness and to feel deep shame. Yet, God used Judas’ folly and Peter’s failure to realize his purpose of salvation.

Sometimes, we make a mess out of our relationships with people around us; we fail to teach our children the ways of the Lord, for example, or we do not dare to go against the crowd or culture for the sake of Christ; and thus we undermine the cause of Christ. So often we realize that we made a “mess out of our witness for Jesus.” Yet, in spite of our messes, God will realize his promises and purposes.

The same is true for Judah, the fourth-born son of Leah and Jacob. Let me tell you about Judah’s disrepute or mess and recklessness and God’s grip on Judah and the house of Jacob.

When we read the story of Jacob’s sons, we notice that the spotlight in Genesis 37 falls on these sons of Jacob dealing with their sibling Joseph—the dreamer, the favorite son of Jacob. First they throw him into a cistern or pit, plotting to kill him. Then, in the absence of Reuben, the eldest of the brothers, Judah persuaded his brothers to sell Joseph as a slave into Egypt.

Though he was reluctant to kill his brother, Judah was reckless enough to discard his brother as a slave. He also brought a great sadness to their father Jacob. In fact, Judah and his brothers were breaking up the family by selling Joseph. What a mess! What now would become of God’s promise to the house or family of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob?

Now you would expect to see the story of Joseph being sold in Egypt to unfold in chapter 38. But no, the spotlight of attention turns on Judah. Why? It is to show that just as God will not let go of Joseph in Egypt, so God will not let go of Judah. God’s grip on the house of Jacob is firm. And Judah’s recklessness will not stop God from securing and unfolding his covenant promises and salvation to his people.

Look at Judah’s recklessness; He sells Joseph and breaks up the house or family of Jacob; Judah himself decides to leave his father’s house. What does he do? Does he marry someone from his own clan? Someone who knows and serves the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? No. Judah marries a Canaanite; he adopts their culture, participates in their ways. And Judah raises his sons in a pagan environment.

Judah gives his oldest son, Er, a Canaanite wife by the name of Tamar. But Er was a wicked son; and God took his life. Now Tamar is a widow. In order to secure the family line of Er, it is customary for Er’s brother (Onan) to produce a child with Er’s widow. That child born of Tamar would then secure the future of Tamar and the family line of Er and Judah and Jacob.

But Judah’s son, Onan, is like his brother Er-- also wicked at heart. He does not mind copulating with Tamar, but he refuses inseminating her. Onan does not mind the pleasure of sex, but refuses the responsibility of producing and raising a son for the sake of Tamar and for the sake of the family line of Er and Judah and Jacob. Thus God is displeased with Onan, and God puts him to death.

Now Judah somehow blames Tamar for Er’s and Onan’s death. And Judah deals harshly and unjustly with Tamar. Though Judah pledges his youngest son Shelah to Tamar, Judah is not of a mind to risk Shelah to Tamar. Oh no, he lets Tamar fend for herself without any regard for her future or her family line.

Now in all of this, Judah and Er and Onan disregard God’s covenant promises to the house of Jacob. They do not live by God’s promises. They simply do their own thing and thus Judah risks destroying the house of Jacob. First, Judah throws his brother Joseph before the wolves of Egypt; then he secularizes himself and marries a Canaanite without blinking an eye toward God’s covenant with his father’s house. And now Judah acts unjustly toward Tamar, his daughter-in-law. In other words, Judah’s family is falling apart, and the larger house of Jacob is crumbling. What will become of God’s covenant promises and purpose for the house of Jacob? Will God let go of Jacob’s house as Judah is making a mess of his own family’s life?

No! God’s grip is firmly on Jacob’s house. We’ll see that clearly in the story of Joseph as told in Genesis 39-48. We see it also clearly in the story of Judah as told in Genesis 38. What happened? God makes use of Tamar’s wit and sense of justice to teach Judah a powerful lesson.

It starts when Judah loses his Canaanite wife. She dies. Judah is now a widower. He’s a male, strong, esteemed in the community, and Judah’s words are like a command. Judah is in control. Tamar is at Judah’s mercy. Will Judah secure Tamar’s future by giving his son Shelah in marriage to Tamar? Will Tamar have children to carry on the family name and line of Jacob, and Judah, and her own husband, Er?

Judah the widower is on a mission and he goes to town. On his way to town he discovers a prostitute at the side of the road. Her face is covered. Judah is ready for a diversion, and he negotiates a deal with the prostitute: I’ll give you a goat; you give me a good time. The prostitute did not settle for the promise of a goat; she wanted some valuable pledge—some personal items from Judah: his ring with the family seal hanging on a cord around Judah’s neck, for example, and Judah’s staff. That will do.

In his recklessness, Judah agrees to the deal and he sleeps with the prostitute. The next day, Judah sends his friend with a goat to retrieve the personal items from the prostitute. But the prostitute cannot be found. Judah is ready to accept his loss of personal belongings. After all, life goes on.

But three months later it turns out that Tamar is pregnant. Judah’s sense of justice and morality kicks into high gear and he condemns Tamar to death—a horrible death of incineration. But Tamar douses the flames of Judah’s “righteous” indignation with Judah’s personal belongings.

First, she sends a messenger to Judah with the message: “I am pregnant by the man who owns these (things).” That must have shocked Judah. Then pregnant Tamar shows up herself and says to Judah: “See if you recognize whose seal and cord and staff these are.”

Tamar’s actions and words become the turning point in Judah’s life. He acknowledges that Tamar sense of wit and justice was right: “She is more righteous than I, since I wouldn’t give her to my son Shelah.”

Judah had lost grip of his father’s house, his father’s God; Judah had lost sight of God’s covenant promises and purposes to his father’s house. But God has not: Through Tamar’s wit and sense of justice, God brings about his covenant blessings in the midst of Judah’s family messes. God blesses Tamar with twins. Their names are Zerah and Perez.

And it is through them that God sends his one and only Son, the Lord Jesus. For this is the genealogy or family tree of Jesus as found in the gospel of Matthew 1 “A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham: Abraham was the father of Isaac, Isaac the father of Jacob, Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, Judah the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar….”

All of this goes to show that our messes do not stop God from realizing his purposes and promise of salvation. Thank God for his grip!