Son of Faithfulness
Notes
Transcript
A Mess of Unfaithfulness
A Mess of Unfaithfulness
In this first verse giving us the details of this geneaology, we already have scandal! Abraham was the father of Isaac… But that wasn’t his firstborn was it? Isaac was the firstborn according to promise but because of their unbelief, Sarah allowed Abraham to father a child with her handmaiden. But okay, it started off rocky but then how did it go.. well Isaac was the father of Jacob… wait… just Jacob? NO, there were twins and Jacob wasn’t the firstborn Essau was… And while the Lord promised that Jacob was the one through whom the promise would flow, again because of their doubt and assumed wisdom, Jacob with his mother’s help tricked Isaac into giving him the blessing...
So now Jacob is the one through whom the promise goes, as we are tracking this promise - the promised seed of the woman Eve… the promised seed of Abraham through whom all the nations will be blessed… so Jacob fathers… a bunch of kids like 12 - including Joseph, Benjamin and Judah. And when we turn to Genesis chapter 37 we read of the betrayal of Joseph by his brothers and how Reuben speaks up to spare his life and then Judah speaks up suggesting they sell Joseph into slavery and the chapter ends with Jacob mourning his son for the brothers told him that wild animals killed Joseph.
AND THEN THERE IS CHAPTER 38… NOT about JOSEPH… the story of Joseph will pick back up in chapter 39 and continue through the end of the book!
And in chapter 49 when Jacob is dying he blesses each of his sons.. and listen to the blessing of Judah:
“Judah, your brothers shall praise you; your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies; your father’s sons shall bow down before you. Judah is a lion’s cub; from the prey, my son, you have gone up. He stooped down; he crouched as a lion and as a lioness; who dares rouse him? The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples.
David is of the tribe of Judah… and this is why it is important for Matthew to trace the lineage back through Judah.. but wait a minute… what about that chapter 38 that kind of interrupts the story of Joseph and how the Lord moved His people to Egypt where they could flourish and multiply… It sticks out of the narrative like a sore thumb…
AND so we look to Judah in chapter 38 - after Joseph was gone, Judah leaves his brothers and “turns aside” to the Adullamites and found amongst them a wife. These are Canaanites… they are not supposed to intermarry with them, nonetheless, Judah has 3 sons. Now in keeping with tradition and expectation, Judah finds a wife for Er, his firstborn - her name was Tamar. But Er dies, so Judah sends his second son to Tamar to perform his duties to provide for her an heir. But Onan wasn’t faithful and he too died. THen, perhaps wondering if she was the cause of his sons deaths, Judah sent Tamar to live with her father to wait until his third son was old enough…
As time went by, it seemed Judah would not give her the third son, and Judah’s own wife died… so he goes off with his Canaanite buddies to shear his sheep - and Tamar finds out about it so she removes her widows garments and dresses like a temple prostitute and goes to a place she knows Judah will pass. Sure enough he came along and not knowing it was her - she was wearing a veil - he asked to go in with her and promised a goat for her price. But she asked for a pledge to assure he would send the goat as promised and she takes his signet and cord and his staff. Then they conceive and she goes her way. When he sends a friend with the goat she could not be found. 3 months later Judah hears that his daughter-n-law is pregnant and he is furious, and wants to burn her for her adultery. As she is brought out she produces the signet and cord and staff as belonging to the one that got her pregnant.
Judah repented - acknowledging that she was more righteous than he. She actually was carrying twins - Perez and Zerah… and while Zerah stuck his hand out first, it was Perez that came out first and was treated as the firstborn.
AND THEN, the story goes right back to Joseph in Egypt in chapter 39.
The text doesn’t speak to the morals of either Tamar or Judah. Yet the event is another example of Judah’s failure to be faithful to his calling and several threats to the promise. First with his compromise by marrying a Canaanite, secondly by raising sons who were evil, and thirdly by ignoring Tamar and his responsibility in providing a son… It is a scandalous mess… A mess following a short pattern of messes all from lack of trust and faithfulness. Through fear, greed, lust, rebellion from Abraham to Judah these Patriarchs had really made a mess.
A Son of Faithfulness
A Son of Faithfulness
Matthew doesn’t hide the mess! I can imagine the embarrassing faithlessness of the patriarchs was the secret everyone knew but they maintained a silent agreement never to bring it up… like those things you know not to talk about when certain family members are around… Everybody knows about it - its just not talked about…
SO here is Matthew - dragging it out in the open… Look again at the verse -
Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, and Judah the father of Perez and Zerah by Tamar, and Perez the father of Hezron, and Hezron the father of Ram,
Matthew is writing to show that Jesus is the Messiah, the fulfillment to all of the Lord’s promises — God’s unyielding, unrelenting, unstoppable, invincible promises.. God is faithful… the SON IS FAITHFUL! GOD’S PROMISES ARE NOT DEPENDENT ON YOUR FAITHFULNESS, GOD’S PROMISES ARE DETERMINED BY HIS FAITHFULNESS!
God promised Abraham… yet he doubted.. his circumstances, his age and Sarah’s age seemingly threatened the promise and their selfish attempt to bring the promise made a mess...
God promised Isaac that the covenant blessings would be his and his offspring… but like his father, in fear he lied about his wife and then foolishly thought to bless Essau instead of Jacob… While his wife knowing the Lord promised that Jacob was the son of promise, in fear and worry she helped con Isaac to bless Jacob...
AND JACOB - what a mess that guy was. A schemer from the start… His life is like a soap opera. His family was a big mess… Can you imagine the sideways glances at the dinner table once they were all reunited at the end of the book of Genesis!
And then there is Judah - following the lust of his eyes and the desires of his flesh, he too introduces a threat to the seed, to the promise, by going outside of the covenant people for marriage… and the threat is increased as his first and then second son are both killed because of their wickedness… and Tamar - motivated by anger, hurt… worry - self-preservation even, has to play on Judah’s sexual desires by playing a temple prostitute. Over and over again the promise, the seed is threatened… Over and over again in our feeble attempts toward synthetic blessings and autonomous prosperity we create one mess after another… and yet the Lord’s promise moves on!
Jesus is the SON of PROMISE - the SON OF FAITHFULNESS… not a promise from man - even an outstanding man of strong constitution and full of integrity can fail to keep his promise… NO, this is the promise of the LORD that has moved relentlessly through redemptive history - though opposed, though disbelieved, though forgotten… the Lord’s promise has not failed - for Jesus has been born!
We live in a messy world - full of unintended consequences and the fallout from failed human endeavors at progress. This is not to say that there are no successes and that we do not greatly profit from progress… but as we look over history - our own histories - we can see how often in pursuit of our own pleasures and what think will bring prosperity and blessing we have simply made things worse...
Or we can just look around… if we are not wading through our own mess we are trying to escape and survive the tsunami of someone else’s mess… 2020 is almost over and many people can’t wait.. .but what if 2021 is worse? In December 2019 no one was expecting a worldwide pandemic - the closing of businesses the new normal of wearing a mask and no one thought that in Dec 2020 NJ would have over 17k deaths from this disease… and Covid aside, our own nation is still in a bigger mess than usual and don’t forget you have family coming over for Christmas!
NO matter how bad it gets… no matter how big our mess becomes… it is no match for the faithfulness of our king. Our messes are no match for His grace and promise… Through our failings, our fear, unbelief, greed, lust, rebellion we too live in a mess… we argue, hurt one another, our celebrations are often colored with fear, anger, and resentment as much as they are with red, green, and tinsel… OUr lives are messy.. but...
But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.