All right, brethren, if you will,
let's turn to Genesis chapter 38. Genesis 38. We've been looking at the life
of Jacob for quite some time, and then now Joseph. We'll be
looking at Joseph's life for even longer. But then we have
this kind of intermission. We have this break here in chapter
38 that's all about Judah. Now we could read from chapter
37 and pick right up in chapter 39 and never miss a beat. The
story of Joseph keeps on going, doesn't it? But we have this
inserted here. The story of Judah and Tamar.
And it's on purpose. It's on purpose. The Lord gave
this by inspiration to Moses to pin what he wanted him to
write. And this is for us, isn't it? Paul wrote in Romans 15,
he said, Learning. There's some implied
tasks there. That means you don't know everything.
You guys will have to teach yourself. And fitly frame you together,
and there's gonna be some stones that's gonna rub on some other
stones until no man's touched it by hand, and y'all gonna squeeze
right in together. That's what it is. And this has given us
to learn that we threw patience. I'm not a patient person. I want
it done. The two R's, I want it done right,
and I want it done right now, whatever it is. Do it right,
do it right now. The Lord gives us these things. It's for our
learning that through patience and through comfort of the scriptures.
If this is just cold dead doctrine, we ain't got nothing. Go watch
a football game. That's all it is. Go down and get your season
tickets to the Padres. You'll be better at judgment
than sitting down and acting like we know God. And that goes
for me too. If I don't put my money where my mouth is, It's a show, isn't it? The Lord
could use me. He's done that in the past. He
can take stones and talk to you. He can take the jawbone of an
ass. Through patience and comfort
of the scriptures, we might have hope. Hope in our unwavering
confidence, absolutely not hope in a person. That's why he gave us a story
of Judah and Tamor, so we could hope in Christ. Isn't that something? This is concerning those two,
that's the characters Judah and Tamar, and it's a horrible story.
It's a horrible story with a wonderful ending. You're looking at a horrible
story, and I can tell you right now, I have a wonderful ending.
Judah's that fourth born son, yet this is the one, the son
of Jacob, that Christ would come through. It's gonna come through
the lineage of Judah. He's the lion of the tribe of
Judah, isn't it? And this Tamar is who's gonna come through.
We read there in Matthew one, that's our, the Lord's genealogy.
It's here's my family tree. If I was gonna tell you my family
tree, do you think I'm gonna tell you about all the drunks and
the mean people and the murderers and the violence? And no, I tell
you, oh, I have statesmen in my family tree and governors
or whatever, generals or something. We tell the good things, wouldn't
we? What's our Lord do? There's at least five women there
in Matthew one. It says, these are the books
of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of
Abraham. Abraham begat Isaac, Isaac begat Jacob, Jacob begat
Judas, that's Judah, and his brethren, and Judah begat Phares
and Zerar of Tamar. He had twins with Tamar. That's
the first one the Lord lists. Tamar, she's gonna play the harlot.
That's how she's gonna have these twins put in her. First one listed. Rahab's the next one listed there,
Matthew 1, the harlot. Ruth, that's the Moabitess. That's the one that came from
Moab. That's the incestuous relationship a lot, isn't it? Next one's Bathsheba,
the adulterer. And then Mary. That's scandalous, isn't it?
Is that a scandalous history? Does that offend you? Do you
find offense in that? Our Lord said, blessed is he
who shall not be offended in me. Some people, that's too much. That can't be. That's what it
says. It's what the Lord recorded. He eats with and eats with and
is friends with publicans and sinners and harlots. People of
no reputation. That's good news if you're of
no reputation. And he breaks the bold and he
breaks the strong. It's so. Tell you more, she's
going to play the harlot in this portion of scripture. The scriptures
either testify the person of our Lord, his person, who he
is or his work. And in this text, in this chapter,
we can learn a whole lot of things. We can learn about our merciful
King. We can learn about our gracious God. We can learn about
our wretchedness, what we are. You know, there's some places
now they're changing the words of amazing grace to, he saved
a soul like me instead of a wretch like me. We're taking wretches
to the south, ain't we? People don't want to talk about
that. We're going to see God taking a situation that's just evil
and making something good of it. Only he can do that. I can't do it. You can't do it.
Your words can't do it. My words can't do it. He can.
I've watched it happen over and over and over and over again. It's him. And at the end of it,
you're going to say he did it. I'm telling you through experience,
I'm decades of it. Decades of it. It's so it's so
he did it. It says in verse one, it came
to pass at that time that Judah went down from his brethren and
turned into a certain Adulamite whose name was Hira. He went
down instead of going up. to the house of the Lord, instead
of encouraging his brethren, that they just sold off Joseph,
didn't they? Boys, what we did was wrong.
We need to go tell daddy, and on our way there, we need to
stop and tell the Lord what we did. We sinned against him and him
alone, didn't we? And we done it in the presence
of everybody else. And we've hurt other ones for that. But
he went down, down to Judah, down to Egypt. Judah went down.
And Judah saw that their daughter of a certain Canaanite, whose
name was Shua, The Canaanite was named Shua,
not the daughter. He saw a daughter of a certain Canaanite, the Canaanite
was named Shua, and he took her and went into her. It was wrong
for him to leave his brethren. It was wrong what he did to Joseph.
It was wrong for him to be best friends and unequally yoked with
Herod. And it was wrong to marry a Canaanite
woman. Every time a child of Abraham married a Canaanite,
there was trouble coming. And Judah did it anyway. He did
it anyway. Verse three, and she conceived
and bear a son. And he called his name Ur, and
she conceived again and bear a son, and she called his name
Onan. And she yet again conceived and bear a son, and called his
name Shelah. And he was in Shebez when she bear him. He was out
of town when that son was born. And Judah took a wife for Ur,
his firstborn, whose name was Tamar. How fast that happened
in six verses? He left, and now he's finding
a wife for his son. So that's 20 years? That fast, didn't I? We saw that
with Jacob, didn't we? We all think he's a young, strapping
22-year-old. No, he was grown when he left.
He's up in his 70s, wasn't he? There's a whole lot of days that
take place. And one moment in a child of
God's life doesn't dictate, doesn't paint the picture of the whole
thing. It's the tenor of the entire thing, isn't it? The overall. He took a wife for his firstborn
son, Ur. His name was Tamar. He'd be down
there long enough to get married, long enough to have three sons.
Ur was old enough to get married himself, and Judah picked Tamar,
a woman, a certain woman. That was the one that the Lord
was gonna come through. It had to be her. It couldn't be anybody
else, would it? Verse seven, and Ur, Judah's
firstborn, was wicked in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord
slew him. We don't know what Ur did, but
we know what the Lord did. He was wicked in the sight of
the Lord, and the Lord slew him. Look what his brother had happened
to him. Verse 8, And Judah said unto Onan, Go unto thy brother's
wife, and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother. That
was common practice. We'll read that in Deuteronomy
25 when we get there. But this was someone of kin,
a family member. If the person died, the brother
died, a family member would come in, and give seed to that, they'd
have a child with them, and that way that child would get what
the one that died had. It would be someone to have an
inheritance. That's where we get a kinsman redeemer. That's
gonna be precious down the road to us, isn't it? We're gonna
need that. A kinsman redeemer. And so in
verse nine, it says, and Onan knew that this seed should not
be his. What does that mean? Well, it's gonna be in the name
of my brother. It's gonna be in the name of
earth. Who's that? The firstborn. What's that mean? This kid's gonna have preeminence.
That's like you start seeing who's in the line of succession
for the queen or for the crown over in England, and somebody
has a baby and everybody gets shifted, don't they? Next thing
you know, you're 800th in line. You ain't important. And he said,
why don't, if I do this, he's gonna get all the things. Maybe
it'll be a bigger inheritance for me. Maybe I can take the place
of the firstborn. if we don't have a child. And
Oda knew that his seed would not be his. And it came to pass
when he went into his brother's wife that he spilled it on the
ground, lest he should give the seed to his brother. And the
thing which he did displeased the Lord. Therefore he slew him
also. There are times when the Lord
deals with wickedness and offense right then, right then. I know some men that died very
young, and people said, oh, they died too soon. No, they did not.
They died when it was appointed for them to die. Why was Ur and
Onan doing wickedly? What example did they have? Who
raised them? Judah, didn't it? I bet his wife said, you know
what? We raised our boys underneath the sound of the gospel. Hogwash. He didn't. The scriptures do
not tell us if we raise our children as the Lord clearly says for
us to, that they're going to grow up and they're going to
be wonderful and they're going to be believers. That's not guaranteed, but he
tells us how to raise them. And he said, how you raise them,
they won't depart from it. But the Lord's long suffering in
this. I'm thankful when I do wickedly. And when I'm a spool
in the eye, the Lord doesn't slay me immediately. Are you
shocked by that? That's what we looked at Wednesday
night. The first thing the Holy Spirit does is convict of sin,
right? And then that's only one third of threes. There's two
thirds left. If we stop there, you come short.
But whenever the Lord does that, if it's true Holy Spirit conviction,
it's not that I've done some things wrong. It's if God Almighty
shows up right now left to myself, I deserve to go to hell and he's
right in doing so. He's just whenever he speaks. He's just
whenever he judges. But because of another. who he put me in. That's our hope, isn't it? The
Lord's long suffering. Verse 11. Then said Judah to
Tamar, his daughter-in-law, remain a widow at thy father's house
until Shelah, my son, be grown. You stay over there, my youngest
one, he ain't old enough yet, but you stay at your daddy's
house and you act like a widow and you wear the widow's clothes
and as soon as he's old enough, I'll marry you to him. Why'd
he say that? Why'd he separate them? For he
said, Lest per adventure he die also, as his brethren did. And Tamar went and dwelt in her
father's house. Judah had no intention of giving
Shelah to Tamar, to joining those two together in marriage. And
he saw Tamar as the problem. Isn't that the case? If everywhere
you go, you had 45 jobs and every boss you had was a bad boss and
that is mean to me. Maybe you're the problem, maybe
you're a bad employee. Did you ever consider that? Well, that's
what he said. He has human logic. He has a
human brain, doesn't he? And he said, every son I marry
to this woman dies. God kills them swiftly. I got
one son left. I can't do that. Judah was looking out for his
son, wasn't he? Verse 12. And in the process of time, the daughter
of Shua, Judah's wife, died. spouse, the mother of these children,
she died. And Judah was comforted. He went through a mourning time,
and at the end of that he went up to his sheep shearers in Timnath,
he and his friend Hira the Adulamite. And it was told Tamar, saying,
Behold thy father in the law goeth up to Timmar to shear his
sheep. and she put her widow's garments
off from her. She was doing as she told, wasn't
she? She had those widow garments on and she was in her father's
house as she was told to do. She's holding up her end. Now
she take those widow garments off and she covered her face
with a veil and she wrapped herself and she sat in an open place,
which is by the way to Timnath. four, she saw that Sheila was
grown, and she was not given unto him to wife. They said,
hey, Judas went up to, he's done mourning, he's gonna go shear
the sheep. And she said, well, Sheila's plenty old enough now.
She wasn't gonna bother him while he's mourning. He's plenty old
enough now, you said you was gonna give me to be his wife.
I said, it's time for me to have children. And she saw that he
was grown. And she saw that she wasn't gonna
be given to be wife. And so did she wait on the Lord?
Did she already learn that patience and was grounded and grown and
had good hope? No, she took the matters in her own hands. She
wanted to have a child and she came up with her own plan and
her own devices. Has that happened before in Genesis?
Remember when Sarah, she said, well, the Lord says, it must
be through Hagar. Well, it's obvious is what the
Lord wants, isn't it? Sometimes the things that seem so obvious
to us are so painful. Oh, Jonah, the Lord said, you
can go over here and preach. And he said, well, I got a ticket
to Tarsus. If the Lord didn't want me to
go, that's fatalism, isn't it? If the Lord didn't want me to go
to Tarsus, he wouldn't have had a ticket there. So Tamar, using her human logic,
said, well, this has gotta be what's gonna happen. I have to
have a child. Verse 15, and when Judas saw her, he thought her
to be a harlot because she had covered her face. She dressed
like it, she went right to the right spot. And he turned unto
her by the way and said, go to, I pray thee, let me come in unto
thee. For he knew not that she was
his daughter-in-law. And she said, what wilt thou give me?
that thou mayest come unto me. What's the price? What are you
gonna pay? If I'm the harlot, what are you
gonna give me? What's in it for me? And he said, I will send
a kid from the flock. And she said, wilt thou give
me a pledge till thou send it? He said, I'm gonna give you a
lamb. There's a whole lot of pictures here in this chapter.
He said, I'm gonna give you a lamb. I'm gonna give you a kid, a baby
lamb from the flock. And she said, I need something
now. I need earnest, I need something, you to pledge something to me
now. I'm not going to walk out of this empty handed. Yeah, give
me something. He said, what shall, and he said,
what pledge shall I give thee? I'll give you the kid, but what
do you want to hold on to? What earnest, what down payment do
you need right now? In lieu of that, what collateral? And she said, thy signet and
thy bracelets and thy staff that is in thy hand. He gave it to
her, and it came unto her, and she conceived by him. What was
the cost? What was the price here? This,
this pledge that she needed. A signet, a bracelet, and my
staff. And we read this and we think, oh, just give me your
clothing. You know what? I like that watch. Give me watch.
And I'll take him shoes. And you got an, that's a nice
cane. Let me borrow that cane too. We just think of this as
items, isn't it? That signet, you know what that is? That's
what a signature ring. You ever seen them movies? Them
old kings in England had a ring and they'd put a wax on it and
they'd put their knuckle down. And that was the seal. That was
a signature, wasn't it? It was his name. She'd go sign
checks, whatever, in his name. She could act on his name. The
bracelets, this isn't just jewelry. Women wore what we call bracelets
nowadays. But this was a twine. It was bound together as a piece
of garment went around the neck and it held the signet. So he
didn't have to have it on his hand. It's what bound it to him.
It wasn't just somebody could steal that. This is what bound
it to him too. And the staff, that's the branch
or the rod, isn't it? That's what he ruled with. That's
what he went to war with, he threw it, used it to hit, strike,
and that's what he walked with. That was his will and his power.
That's what she asked for. That's a big ask, isn't it? That's
not just a cheap dime store ring or some cubic zirconium. I want
your name. I want that name bound, that
binds it to you, and I want your staff with it. All your will,
all you do and everything. I want that to be mine. I want
to be a part of that. I want to be union with that. Old Brother
Norbert said, that's like having someone's social security card,
their birth certificate, and their passport. You know what
that means? You have their identity. You have their identity, the
whole of them, isn't it? Tamar wanted the identity of
Judah, and he gave it to her. He gave it to her. Verse 19 says,
and she arose and went away, and laid by her veil from her,
and put on garments of her widowhood. She took off those garments she
had on to trick him, and now she went back to looking like
a widow. And Judah sent the kid by the hand of his friend, the
Adulamite, to receive his pledge from the woman's hand, but he
found her not. Here come the original payment,
and he wants his pledge back. Those things come back to me.
But the Dulomite Hera couldn't find her. She wasn't there. And
he asked, verse 21, he asked the men of that place saying,
where's the harlot that was openly by the wayside? She was sitting
right out here. And they said, there is no harlot in this place.
There's no harlot. This is all confusing things,
isn't it? You know what the first thing that came to my mind when they
said that? That woman was caught in adultery. And they brought
her to the Lord to test him and to try him, to tangle him in
his words and his actions and everything else they could get
him on, whatever angle they could. And they said, what do we do with
her? He bent down underground, didn't he? And he wrote and sang.
Didn't say what he wrote, but he started with the oldest one.
We'll see that at the end here. And he worked his way down and
one by one, they saw what he wrote and they said, ah, buddy,
I'm out of here. That's convictions, what that is. Whatever it was,
whatever he wrote, that's between him and them, it was effectual,
wasn't it? It was effectual. And that woman who was caught,
She was caught in adultery, red-handed. He said, woman, where are thine
accusers? Hath no man condemned thee? And she said, no, Lord. Where's that harlot at? Ain't
no harlots here. And Jesus said unto her, neither do I condemn
thee. Go and sin no more. Verse 22, and he returned to
Judah. That's the Dolomite. and said,
I cannot find her. And also the men of this place
said that there's no harlot in this place. And Judah said, let
her take it to her, lest we be shamed. I said, just cut that
kid loose and let that go. And if it comes back, she let
it go. It's her business. Let her take
it to her, lest we be ashamed. Behold, I sent this kid and thou
hast not found her. I don't want my sin exposed,
what's taking place. All those horrible things happened.
And then there was a downtime. You ever had that? Oh, it's a
calm between the storms. We're thankful, ain't we? I did
some bad stuff and Lord didn't strike me dead right then. And
we thank because God doesn't punish sin immediately that we
got away with it. Don't we? That's human nature,
isn't it? And it came to pass, verse 24,
and it came to pass about three months after, it was told to
Judah saying, Tamar, thy daughter-in-law hath played the harlot. And also,
not that she did the act with him, but she's out running around. And also behold, she is with
child by whoredom. And Judah said, bring her forth
and let her be burnt. I was going to give her to Sheila.
And I already gave her to Odin. And now she's went out and got
pregnant, kill her. Burn her. He was so mad she didn't
stay true to his youngest son, those other two, he wanted her
to burn for it. And it was right to do so, wasn't
it? How quick we forget. Paul said
in Romans 2, therefore thou art inexcusable, old man. Whosoever
thou art that judgest, for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest
thyself, for thou that judgest doeth the same things. And that's
so, isn't it? Has that been your experience
in this life? You see somebody judging and say, that's wrong.
And then they turn right around to the exact same thing. I would
never. And then they get to never, don't
they? Let me explain something to you. This is the classroom.
You understand that? It's like going to college and
you take a class and you read about this and how to do surgery
and what a heart is. And then when you go out that
door, that's when you have your practicum. That's when you go
out and you do it and you feel the heart and you see the things.
Do you understand that? When we read these things, but the
Lord's gonna apply this to us and teach us this on Tuesdays
and Wednesdays and Thursdays and Fridays and Saturdays and
as we're going out through this world, not just for two and a half hours
a week in this place. And that's gonna take a lifetime,
a lifetime. It's so, I read that before when
I was a kid and I thought, that's gotta be right, the Lord said
it, but I hadn't experienced that. And so then I bow. Like there are some things I
judge people as stuff I've never done, and I don't know how I'm
guilty of it, but I am, not because I think something, because he
says so, and I know him to be true. Judah judged her. He said, bring
her forth and let her be burnt. Just like me, Judah's quick to
see the sins of other people and swift to justify himself until we're convicted. until
we're convicted. Verse 25. When she was brought
forth, she sent to her father-in-law saying, by the man whose these
are, am I with child? She said, I have something. She
goes, and the daddy is the one that owns these. And she said,
discern, I pray thee, whose are these? The signet and the bracelets
and the staff. That life that's in me, the man
responsible, these are his. That's what she's saying. Now
you discern them. You judge it. You sort out, you
declare right from wrong. You see what it is. Verse 26.
And Judah acknowledged them and said, she hath been more righteous
than I, because that I gave her not to Sheila, my son, and he
knew her again no more. He saw that. He saw his sin.
The Lord used that to convict him. And what happened? He said, you're more righteous
than I. That's what Saul told David, wasn't it? He said, thou
art more righteous than I, for thou hast rewarded me good, whereas
I have rewarded the evil. I was getting ready to burn you,
Tamar. And I was the problem. It'd do us real good if the Lord
shows us in this lifetime that I'm the problem and not somebody
else. Where does contention come from? Only by pride. Only by pride. If we'd find our
guilt on this earth first, that's a grace of God. That's Him being
generous to us. Where's the gospel in all this?
Where's the gospel? We saw some bits and pieces,
didn't we? The gospel's in the seed. In the seed, inside a table. Through that lineage, that's
where our Lord's coming from. That promised seed, singular
as of one, Christ, is in her. That's the good news. There's
incest and lying and deceiving and trickery and everything else
on all sides. Who's wrong? Everybody. Has anything changed? The first trial we go through
right now and things are so hard. Who's at fault? Everybody. Everybody. Every man's a liar.
God's true. Isn't it? That promised seed
with all that scandal going on here, the disobedience of Judah,
him being a fraud and selfish and, and, and finding comfort
in worldly people and going into a harlot. And then three months
later, he was so self-righteous and proud. He was going to burn
his daughter-in-law who he thought deceived him. But God. in spite of our sin and our rebellion,
in total grace and mercy that is only revealed to us in fragments.
If we saw the magnitude of it, we'd just worship him all day
long. That'd be glory. And we see things dimly. This
is the very lineage of our kinsman redeemer, the one who was related
to us, a man like I am, and was rightfully so and able to purchase
me. He's gonna come through her.
We see the gospel in her child, don't we? Then we see the gospel
in Tamal. You who are the Lord's, and anybody
else who's listening, the only way you will not be burned for
all of our deception and all of our whoring about with Babylon,
getting drunk on her wine, is if we come to the Father identified
only by another's name, another's bonding, and another's power.
The only way we can approach the Holy God is being in. That's
what we saw with Jacob and Esau, wasn't it? When Jacob deceived
his father. So what we saw was bad. He didn't know the Lord
then. He didn't know what he was doing, but he went in and
he smelled like the son. He dressed like the son. He felt
like the son. And he didn't say anything of
his doing, did he? They said, where'd you get the
deer meat? Where'd that venison come from? Lord gave it to me.
Lord gave it to me. Our only hope To stand before
a holy God that we've offended is to have the name of Christ,
to be bound to him, and it's all by his power and his doing.
And we see in Judah, what a grace the Lord has granted him. He
saw his unrighteousness, and he esteemed Tamar higher than
himself. That is just culturally, that
is not acceptable. You understand that? A father-in-law to esteem
his daughter-in-law? Like, you're not even my child,
you're my child's bride. I ain't listen to you. You want
to do what I say. He esteemed her higher than himself.
That's the Lord's doing, isn't it? He has to do that. We can't humble ourselves. You
can't do it. We'll be the ones that go through
it. God doesn't. He's the one that bows us down. We can't esteem
someone higher than ourselves. I love that fellow that shaves
me. Do you know that? He doesn't do much wrong. I can
justify anything that somebody else might think he does wrong.
I love self, don't I? The Lord can reveal us to what
we are and our pride and our self-righteousness. That's what
Paul's right there in the church at Philippi. He said, let nothing
be done through strife or vainglory, but in lowliness of mind, let
each esteem other better than themselves. I've experienced that. There's
people, I haven't went through the grief like as other people
go through over sin and just every day just down and weeping
and crying and I know what I am. I have lived that. I know what
it's like to not get out of bed because of the wretch that I
am. I understand that. But I see people that have no
assurance, and they don't seem like they have any joy in the
Lord and the gospel, what he has done for them, and he hath
saved us. He has saved us. I need him today,
and then if I'm alive tomorrow, he's gonna have to be with me
then, too, right? And I talked to my pastor, I
said, maybe there's something wrong with me. You know what
I mean? I was already, I thought I was
okay and then now I'm not okay. Maybe I'm the problem and I ought
to be feeling this grief all the time and wearing hair shirts
or something, I don't know. But the Lord gave me a job to
do and I'm gonna go do it. I understand that, don't I? Arise, get ye
up, gird yourself like me and get to it. That's that day. And then another day I'll be
down in the dumps and crying and not be able to get out of bed. And then the
next day I'll be high, happy and joyful. The Lord did this,
it's fine. Calm down. We esteem others better than
ourselves if the Lord does it. And he said in Psalm 51, the
sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. He's gave that sacrifice
in you. If your spirit's broke, he's
the one that broke it. A horse don't break itself. You understand that?
It has to be broken. I asked that he wrote it. No
man had ever broke it. No man had ever rode it. He did it,
because that's what he does in us, isn't it? And a broken and
contrite heart, oh God, will thou not despise when he does
this? When we come to passages, if
y'all read that last night or this morning, there in Genesis
38, if we don't see the Lord in it, either who He is or what
He has done for us and shall do, we've missed it. You understand? And not everything's revealed
to us. We can't know it all. But I'll
tell you one thing, there'll be a day when we're brought out
because of His mercies. We're brought from this sin-cursed
world out of this body of death, and we stand before him holy
and unapproved without blame and love. And he'll say, look
here, let me show you something. In the beginning God, old Gabe
says, will take 10,000 years and explain to us what that means.
That'd be precious, wouldn't it? Show me again, that's Christ
in there? Show me what he did. Tell me
one more time. Talkin' about grace and mercy,
undeserved. There ain't nothin' but a bunch of sinners in this,
is there? Nothin' but debauchery and horribleness, but God. But
God. He's rich in mercy, isn't he? Brother Mark.