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God's Grace is Bigger Than Wickedness | Genesis 38 · Saint City Chapel

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Well, I don't have the pleasure of knowing you.
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My name is Brandon Delage. I'm I'm the teaching team here
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at Saint City. We're going to be teaching from
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the Bible today in Genesis chapter 38.
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So you have a Bible. Go ahead and turn.
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There's the first book of the Bible.
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I think it's on page 32 of 1 of the Bibles in front of you, Remy
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in Genesis chapter 38. I'll meet you there in just a
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moment. Now there's a story in the Bible
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that if I were to ask you to read of people, you would not
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want to do it. It is a story of betrayal, a
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story of lies, of cheating, sex, death.
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That is not like the tagline, no, no, no.
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That is Genesis 38. That is Jesus's family tree.
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Matthew chapter one verse one when describing Jesus, his
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genealogy says this, that the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the
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son of David, the son of Abraham.
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Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob,
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and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, and Judah the
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father of Perez and Zerah. By Tamar.
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At Christmas, we celebrate the arrival of Jesus through that
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family line, through that family tree.
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But for us to understand why Jesus came for Christmas, we
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must understand whose family he came from.
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And in Matthew chapter one, we just read a few names.
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We read the name of Jesus, David, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob
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and Judah. And then there's a woman there
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by the name of Tamar that's curious.
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You see, Matthew didn't list I, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob's
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wives, Rebecca, Rachel and Sarah.
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No, no, no, he listed, the first woman he listed was Tamar.
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This month we're looking at the women in the genealogy of Jesus,
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the five mothers of Jesus going back up his family tree.
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We're kind of going to ancestry.com up in Saint City
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for the next month, looking deep, deep into Jesus's family
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line and story. What we'll find in Jesus family
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tree is what you might find in many of our lives.
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A broken family, a redeeming God.
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And you'll discover that it was a sovereign Christmas.
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Christmas changed everything because there might be some
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skeletons in your or your family's closet today.
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And how is it that you go about life?
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How is he going to go through this Christmas season cleaning
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up the wickedness that you've experienced or the wickedness
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you've done in your life? How are you going to clean that
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up? And I want to share with the
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story of a woman in Genesis, Tamar Jesus is 35 times great
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grandmother, by the way. That's how far back in the
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family tree we went. We're here in Genesis.
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We're right smack dab in the beginning of the story of
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Joseph, the guy who you might know is the guy with the big
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colorful coat that they made a Broadway play after.
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We're two chapters in and this guy, Judah, is the fourth born
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son of Joseph's dad, Jacob. His name is Judah.
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It's about 500 years before Moses.
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And as much as this is a sermon about Tamar, we can't miss that
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before this chapter ends, Judah becomes the most morally
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compromised person, the most morally compromised character in
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the story. I want to read the stories for
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you once, and then I'm going to help you understand what it
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means for your life. Genesis 38 says this.
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It happened at that time, at that time that Judah went down
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from his brothers and turned aside to a certain, a dolomite
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whose name was Hira. There Judah saw the daughter of
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a certain Canaanite whose name was Shua, and he took her and
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went into her and she conceived and Boris son and he called his
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name, uh, she conceived again and Boris son, and she called
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his name Onan. Yet again she bore a son and she
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called his name Shayla. Judah was in Chezib when she
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bore him. And Judah took a wife for uh,
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his first born and her name was Tamar.
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There's our main character, but uh, Judah's first born was
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wicked in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord put him to death.
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Then Judah said to Onan, go into your brother's wife and perform
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the duty of a brother-in-law to her, and raise up offspring for
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your brother. But Onan knew that the offspring
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would not be his. So whenever he went into his
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brother's wife, he would waste the seaman on the ground so as
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not to give offspring to his brother.
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And what he did was wicked in the sight of the Lord, and he
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put him to death also. Then Judah said to Tamar, his
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daughter-in-law, remain a widow in your father's house till
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Shayla, my son, grows up. For he feared that he would die
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like his brothers. So Tamar went and remained in
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her father's house. In the course of time the wife
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of Judah, Shua, Shua's daughter died.
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And when Judah was comforted, he went up to Timna to his sheep
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shearers, he and his friend Hira the Dolomite.
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And when Tamar was told, your father-in-law is going up to
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Timna to shear his sheep, she took off her widows garments and
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covered herself with a veil, wrapping herself up, and sat at
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the entrance to Anayam, which is on the road to Timna.
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For she saw that Shayla was grown up, and she had not been
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given to him in marriage. When Judah saw her, he thought
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she was a prostitute, for she had covered her face.
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She turned to her. He turned to her at the roadside
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and said, Come, let me come in to you.
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For he did not know that she was his daughter-in-law.
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She said, What will you give me, that you may come in to me.
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He answered, I will send you a young goat from the flock.
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And she said, If you give me a pledge until you send it.
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He said, What pledge shall I give to you?
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She replied, Your signet and your cord, and your staff, that
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is in your hand. So he gave them to her and went
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into her, and she conceived by him.
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Then she arose, and she went away, taking off her veil.
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She put on the garments of her widowhood.
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When Judah sent the young goat by his friend to the Adolamite
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to take back the pledge from the woman's hand, he did not find
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her. And he asked the men at the
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place, hey, where's the cult prostitute who's at?
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And I am at the roadside and they said there's no cult
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prostitute that's been here. So he returned to Judah and said
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I have not found her. Also the men in the place said
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there was no cult prostitute that's been here.
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And Judah replied, let her keep the things as her own or we
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shall be laughed at. You see, I sent this young goat
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and you did not find her. About three months later, Judah
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was told, Tamar, your daughter-in-law has been
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immoral. Moreover, she is pregnant by
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immorality. And Judah said bring her out and
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let her be burned. And as she was being brought
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out, she sent word to her father-in-law by the man to whom
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these belong, I am pregnant. And she said please identify
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whose these are, the signet and the cord and the staff.
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And then Judah identified them and said, She is more righteous
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than I, since I did not give her to my son Shayla, and he did not
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know her. Again, when the time of her
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labor came, there were twins in her womb.
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And when she was in labor, one put out a hand, and the midwife
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took and tied a scarlet thread on his hand, saying this one
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came out first. But as he drew back his hand,
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behold, his brother came out. And she said, What a breach you
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have made for yourself. Therefore, his name was called
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Perez. Afterward, his brother came out
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with the scarlet thread on his hand, and his name was called
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Zarah. These are God's words for us
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today. That is a crazy story.
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I know. You're like you're preaching
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that Christmas time. That's a crazy story, dude.
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Yeah, I know. It's in Jesus family tree.
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I want to help you understand what it means for life in the
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form of a big idea. Write this down if you'd like to
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take notes. That Christmas reminds me that
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God's grace is bigger than wickedness.
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Christmas, Jesus coming to earth from heaven to earth as a baby,
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reminds me that God's grace is bigger than wickedness.
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His grace is bigger than injustice.
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It is bigger than evil. God's grace is bigger than it.
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Grace, if you're unfamiliar with the word or I haven't thought
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about its definition, is just getting something that you don't
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deserve. Grace is getting something you
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don't deserve. It's when you rage punch
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somebody in the face and they give you a gift card to your
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favorite restaurant. That's how ridiculous and
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radical grace is. You get something you don't
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deserve. And that's who God is in this
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story, gracious. And God's grace is the best
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thing going on planet earth. And I want to help you believe.
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Embrace your life, what do it mean?
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So what does God's grace help me believe?
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I think it helps you believe two things amidst wickedness in your
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life. The 1st is this, that when life
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feels unfair, God still sees me. God's grace helps me believe
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that when life feels unfair, God still sees me.
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Look back at the text with me. If you could verse one, it
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happened at that time that Judah went down from his brothers.
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Now Judah is disobeying God here.
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He is not supposed to be in the he's not supposed to be there.
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He's not supposed to be in Canaan.
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Judah is supposed to be with his father and his brothers, but
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he's not. This is about 800 years before
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King David, 1800 years before Jesus.
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Yet even in Genesis chapter 38, God is quietly and subtly
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shaping the line of the Messiah and Judah's disobeying him.
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And in verse 2, he does something that a lot of people
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in Genesis do. He sees something that he wants
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and he takes it. That's always code for sin.
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He saw the daughter of a certain Canaanite woman and he took her
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and went into her. And so begins his family tree.
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We don't even know this woman's name, but they have three sons,
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Ur, Onan, and Shayla. I want to help you make sense of
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this crazy Jerry Springer like moment happening in the Bible.
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OK? They have three kids.
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Uh, the first one, this dude is so terrible, so wicked that God
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puts him to death. He's so awful.
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It's on site. God puts him to death.
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That's how bad of a husband Tamar's first marriage is.
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That, uh, received God's judgement then and there.
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I shudder to think about what was happening inside of that
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marriage. And that's her first one.
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We get a little closer look, though, at her second marriage.
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You see, there's a marriage custom at this time that would
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preserve the deceased brother's family line and help protect the
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widow socially and financially. So she goes from ER to his
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brother Onan. And Onan is understanding of the
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reality that the baby that she's going to have will not be his.
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He might be the one to have made it, but in no sense will be his
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child. It will be his brother ER.
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And so he does something also wicked and terrible and awful.
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He does something horrible in secret that he thought only
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Tamar would know. But God sees Tamar, and he sees
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the wickedness of Onan, something he thought that he
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could hide, God saw. So you have Judah with three
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sons, ER, Onan, and now Shayla. And Tamar is told by Judah, hey,
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when he grows up, he's yours. She's owed a husband legally,
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and Judah does not deliver. So if you're Tamar, here's where
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you're at in life. You've had not one horrible
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husband, but two. You've been used, abused, and
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completely neglected, completely written off, forgotten,
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justified in your anger because you've been treated unjustly in
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your marriage. And I wonder just how alone and
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how hurt and how abused she felt, how deep her longing was
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for justice. And that level of injustice
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might feel unrelatable to you. It might feel extreme until you
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realize that you relate to it Every time you say that is not
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fair. Maddie and I, we take turns like
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being the responsible one at bedtime, OK?
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And Maddie will go through the routine that we always do.
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This is teeth brush, pajamas on, go to the bathroom, get your
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water bottle ready, say your prayers, read a book, light the
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candles. I mean, there's so many things
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that happen at bedtime. And thankfully, we have a list
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that we go through on our wall and Maddie will go through those
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things and she'll run the system and it goes great.
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Now the next night, it'll be my turn.
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I will do the same prayers. I will do the same order of the
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routine. I will tuck the kids in
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precisely how she just did. And suddenly the kids are very
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upset about that. It is just not fair.
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I would do the same thing Maddie does, and I don't get the same
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result. Kids are awake, they're crying,
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they're negotiating, they're asking questions that they
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didn't even have until now. It's it's just not fair,
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frankly, that I would give the same level of effort and they
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don't respond in the exact same way.
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And when this isn't fair, turns from like confusion into anger,
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is where it actually becomes painful.
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When the this isn't fair that this thing happened to me, that
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I'm experiencing this suffering, this injustice, this wickedness
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and this evil. When that happens to you and you
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look out at other people's life and you go, this is not fair.
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It's a cry for justice in the human heart.
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It's your heart's way of telling you that you're longing for
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something deeper. Because we get angry when we
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don't get what we expected. We when we don't receive what we
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thought we earned, when life doesn't pay us back the way we
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assumed it would. We get angry and upset at the
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lack of justice in our life and injustice.
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That statement of this isn't fair, says the quiet part out
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loud. That we believe that if we do
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the right things, we get the right results with our life.
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We can avoid the suffering, we can avoid the injustice or the
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evil in our life. So we can't help but say it,
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this isn't fair. Did you know something that God
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put that there in your heart? That longing for justice, that
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cry for things being right and fair.
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God put that there. That's what justice is.
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Now, there's two sides to the justice coin.
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There's the first, which I think many of you would thinking of as
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justice, and that's why you feel justified in saying this isn't
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fair, is that you think justice is punishing evil doers.
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That's how our courtroom sees it.
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You do something wrong, you go to prison.
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That's how justice works. But there's a deeper kind of
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justice that is real justice. Yes, according to the Bible, we
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do punish evil doers. That's a good thing.
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But there's a deeper level to justice.
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God's ultimate justice is restoring everything to, as it
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should be said, simpler, putting things right.
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That's ultimate justice. And in the Garden of Eden, when
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God created the world, there was only justice, there was only
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peace. There was no need even for
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justice, really, because everything was already put
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right. But then sin enters the world
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and it goes haywire. There is suddenly a need for
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punishing justice in the world, and there's a need for peace
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everywhere. And it doesn't take long in the
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book of Genesis to discover just how bad and how dark and how
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wicked and how consequential sin is.
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You see, socially, there's immediately injustice.
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I mean, there's murder within the first family.
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There's hatred internally, physically, their bodies already
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begin to bear the consequences of sin with sickness and death
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and decay. We need justice and for God to
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be just, He must punish evildoer sinful people, bringing in the
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punishing justice that is required.
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But for God to be loving, He must bring ultimate justice,
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putting things as they should be, putting things right.
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And what will happen is, is as we await the Savior's arrival on
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planet earth, you will see across the Bible people trying
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to self justify trying to make things right in their life
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without God. In fact, every major religion in
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the world, you know what they're trying to do, telling you that
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you can earn it, that you deserve it, that you're entitled
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to the justice. But do you know how God solves
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the problem of justice in the world?
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Do you know the mystery of the gospel is that Jesus took on
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punishing justice for you and for me so that we could receive
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God's ultimate justice fully and finally.
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That's what the wonder of Jesus is.
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He took on punishing justice so we could have the ultimate
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justice that our life, that our eternity we be put right by
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himself and his offering for us. He made peace by the blood of
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his cross. And that is the great wonder of
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the Gospel, that the cross is where God is perfectly loving
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and perfectly just, where his punishing justice and ultimate
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justice collide. And the most beautiful and
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horrific act in human history, that the God man Jesus would die
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for sinners like you and I ultimately just in paying for
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the evil, paying for the sin, paying for the wickedness,
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loving, and that he took it upon himself.
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And the most unfair moment in human history is not what you
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are experiencing. The most unfair moment in human
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history was the moment that Jesus Christ paid for a sin that
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wasn't his for he who knew no sin.
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He made him who knew no sin tibisin on our behalf that we
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might become the righteousness of God.
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God sees you, He sees the wickedness, He sees the
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injustice you've experienced, and he sees you to the point
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that He cared enough to die for you and your sins.
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Now listen to me. There are going to be moments in
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your life when people go back on their word to you that your
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parent said they were going to be there for you in a certain
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way and they were not. God sees that and He will not go
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back on His word. There will be moments when
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people cheat you, but God does not.
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One of the greatest acts of betrayal that exists is cheating
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on your spouse. And listen to me.
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God sees you in the midst of that injustice, when people
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forget you, that that friendship just disintegrated overnight and
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that they abandoned you. God has not.
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God still sees you when people cheat you, when they forget
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about you, when they go back on their word, God sees you.
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When life feels unfair, God sees you.
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God's grace is on the way. And God's grace helps me believe
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that justice is coming either in this life at the cross, or in
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eternity. We filter it through the life of
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Jesus, the one who'd come way later through Tamar.
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And that's what every Tamar needs is the hope of Jesus.
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Second, God's grace doesn't just help me believe that when life
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is unfair, God still sees me. But second, when I fail, God can
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still redeem. When I fail, when I sin, when
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I'm the screw up in the story, God can still redeem.
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The temptation is to read a story like this, and it's a
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story, right? So you're going to see yourself
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as a character, and the natural inclination might be to see
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yourself as the victim, Tamar, in this story.
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But there's a wisdom in seeing yourself as Judah, ER, and Onan
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as well. And in our world today, Judah
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would be Chris Harrison style cancelled for what just happened
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in this Bible. OK, that's a bachelor reference
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for those of you who don't know what I just talked about.
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OK, I got you. So what happened in the story?
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What happens next? Well look back at the text of me
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verse 11. Judah said to his to Tamar his
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daughter-in-law, remain a widow in your father's house till my
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son grows up. And what stops him from actually
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doing it? Look at the next part of the
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verse. For he feared that his son
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Shayla would die. Fear stops Judah from giving
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Tamar his third son. He is not trusting God, he is
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trusting the pattern. Not only is he trusting in the
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pattern, he's trusting in his sexual desire.
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So what does he do? He predictably responds to the
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death of his wife in a way Tamar was totally expecting.
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That says a lot about Judah, by the way.
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Hey, how's this guy going to grieve?
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He's going to go on a hook up with a prostitute.
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So she dresses herself up shrewdly.
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She goes to where he's going to be.
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He's got no only fans or Tinder to mess with.
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This is his only option. So what does he do?
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He goes there and he sleeps with his daughter-in-law, not
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knowingly that it was his daughter-in-law.
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And he pays her off wallet keys, gives them to her and goes, hey,
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this is this is security balance just in case the GOAT doesn't
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come to you. But the joke's on him.
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He was doing the wrong thing. He was disobeying God.
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He was dishonouring his daughter-in-law, and this should
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cost him everything. This decision should cost Judah
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everything. He is now the most morally
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compromised person in the story. He's the villain.
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He's a moral deadbeat. And Genesis 38 teaches us that
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God advances his promises not through a moral resume, not
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through the people who look like they have it all figured out.
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They're all together. But he also does not abandon
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people because of moral failure, that all he has to work with are
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broken, messed up, sinful people.
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So that's who he uses. That's it.
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And Judah, by all accounts, should be labeled a failure.
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His kids are a disaster. His marriage couldn't have been
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good. He should not be a character
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that we know of or even preach about on a Sunday morning.
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He should be written off. And you'd be surprised at what
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the world would be willing to write off.
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Here's a picture of Times Square in the 1970s.
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It is not the Times Square that you know.
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This is not a street where good things happen.
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It was filled with porn theaters, with peep shows, with
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prostitutes calling out in broad daylight, drug deals in broad
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daylight. Rolling Stone called 42nd St.
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the sleaziest block in America, not a back alley, the center of
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New York City, which is, according to Hamilton, is the
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greatest city in the world. By every measure, Times Square
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had failed. Businesses left.
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Investors walked away. Parents warned their kids to
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stay away from it. City leaders were debating
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whether or not they should tear it down.
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Not save this thing. I mean, this was a place that
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was known as unsafe, undisciplined and embarrassing
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to the city of New York. It was a place you would have
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written off, a place you'd forget.
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And Despite that, with a little intentionality, a little vision,
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a little effort, Times Square was transformed into one of the
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most visited locations in the world.
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Families, tourist, global clouds, global crowds.
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Excuse me? It's a place to travel to, not a
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place to run from. Reminding us that what the world
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cancels, redemption can still reclaim.
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Now, if you only judge Times Square by what it was in the 70s
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and 80s, you'd never believe what it became.
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And I wonder, if someone were to judge your life by its worst
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season, would they assume what your future would be?
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The world's definition of grace labels people as unredeemable.
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Here's the amazing news of Christmas.
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God's grace is Wilder and more radical than you can imagine.
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Genesis 38 is more than just a story of injustice.
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It is a story of Judah's transformation.
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Let me give you a high level view of his story arc.
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The chapter before 37. He's the guy who sells his
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brother Joseph into slavery. That's his idea.
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Now in 38, he does some bad things, but he recognizes, Do
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you see that in the text that she is more righteous than I?
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He says that in the text. That's his conversion moment.
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And look what changes. You see in 39, we get the
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contrast between Judah and Joseph, his brother.
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Where Judah is sexually immoral, Joseph is sexually pure when
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tempted with Potiphar's wife in chapter 44, Judah, where he was
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once the brother who sold Joseph into slavery, that he actually
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offers himself to be enslaved for his other brother Benjamin
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in his place. And in Genesis 49, his
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repentance brings about the ultimate blessing and redemption
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that the King of Kings would come from Judah's lineage.
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It is a story of transformation. And there are two people here in
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this room today, those who like Judah, see their need for God's
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grace, and a second person, those who are still blind to
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their need for the same grace to enter their life.
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Now, you may not have sinned the way Judah did here, but you are
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in need of the same grace. You don't deserve it.
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You couldn't earn it, but your unrighteousness needs the
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righteousness of God. You have the same problem as
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Him. And the invitation of Christmas
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is not to clean yourself up, but rather to come clean before a
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holy God. That is the call of Christmas to
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you. It is the reminder that God's
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grace is bigger than your wickedness.
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St. City, listen to me.
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You may have a broken family, but you serve a redeeming God.
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You may have a broken story, but you worship a sovereign
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Redeemer. There is no mess that Jesus
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can't make a message. There is no test that he can't
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turn into a testimony. There is no trial that he can't
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turn into His triumph. Christmas proves to you once and
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for all that God's grace is bigger than any wickedness that
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you have committed. That is God's love for you
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through Jesus Christ. It proves that once and for all
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that the lion of the tribe of Judah has come to save you from
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your sin. His grace has scandalously
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changed many lives, and it can change yours too.
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It sounds scandalous, doesn't it, that God could love Judah
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and Tamar all the same, and yet that's His redeeming power.
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That's what God can do. God can redeem it not because
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you deserve it, not because you could earn it, but His
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redemption payment is 1 you couldn't make.
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It is a check you could not cash.
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His redemption came through His perfect blood on a cross for
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you, for every Judah who would ever live.
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It's God's grace, and it helps you believe that when you fail,
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God can still redeem it. This is the story of Scripture,
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the story of God, that God with us, his radical love for us.
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It can save ridiculously sinful people, messed up people.
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It's the story of God with us. Judah's life proves that
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redemption is possible, and Christmas proves that it's
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personal. One last thing before I close.
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The story of Tamar is a personal story, and nothing is more
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personal than a name, right? When somebody knows your name,
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you're like, man, we're on a personal level now.
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Feels great. The name Tamar means something.
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It means palm tree. That's what it means.
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It means palm tree, which is a symbol in the Bible of
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uprightness and fruitfulness. Whenever a palm tree is talked
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about, that's what's symbolizing uprightness, meaning you live a
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life of character and integrity, but also of fruitfulness.
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And if you stopped reading the Bible in Genesis, you'd only
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know that she got some earthly justice.
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She got to have the baby, she got to have twins, right?
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If you were an Israelite who got Genesis at the mount at Mount
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Sinai when Moses came down the mountain with it, you would know
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that Judah's line is going on through some crazy story.
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That's what you'd know. But if you're here today and
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you're hearing this and you're hearing the names, you're
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hearing the story, you're hearing God at work and you're
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thinking back to the beginning and you're like, man, my family
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tree is messed up and I still feel ashamed.
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Tamar, the mother of Jesus, has good news.
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She has good news for you. Your family will affect you, but
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by God's grace, it does not have to define you.
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Your family and its dysfunction does not have to define you.
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You can repeat it the same dysfunction, or you can rebel
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against it, or you can receive the same grace every mother of
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Jesus needed. It is a wonderful spiritual
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advantage to be on this side of Jesus because we can know that
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Tamar is a woman known for uprightness and fruitfulness,
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that that justice was coming. And you know something that she
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didn't that one day, thousands of years later, that justice
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would wear skin. It would be Jesus Christ of
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Nazareth, the Savior of the world, The story that is one of
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the craziest stories in all the Bible.
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God can redeem for good, the good of bringing His Son into
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the world. Her story did not end in Genesis
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because the most upright man, the most fruitful man to ever
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live, Jesus Christ, would come through her line, and he can
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bear the same fruit in yours. God can use your story.
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He can use your life for great things.
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Jesus Christ of Nazareth, His grace has come for the
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wickedness of this world. He would come to save it.
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His grace is bigger than wickedness.
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Can you believe it? I'm so thankful for His word.
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Would you join me as I pray and thank Him for it too?
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Lord, would we be reminded this Christmas that Your grace is
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enough and it is bigger, it is louder, and God, it is better
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than anything else going on planet earth.
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And so, God, I pray for every person here who is stuck in the
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injustice right now, that their mind is trapped on what happened
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to them. Lord, the thing that makes them
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cry out, life is not fair. I pray God, for a sense of your
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peace and your justice to sweep over their soul.
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It's not fair. I have this condition.
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It's not fair. They have the things.
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It's not fair. I was born into this family.
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It's not fair about my financial picture.
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It's not fair. God, would that be flipped and
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say, God, you, it's not fair that you've provided for me,
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Jesus Christ. It's not fair that you can heal
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what has been broken by the world.
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But I don't deserve it. I couldn't earn it.
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But God, you've given it and I receive it, Lord, for every
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person here who has a sense of their inner Judah, the person
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who's done terrible things that they wish they could clean up
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like a stain they could wash away from their life, that there
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is so much pain from it, so much hurt, so much shame and
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embarrassment. God, would they let the grace of
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God wash over them and flood their life?
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That they would believe that your grace is bigger than their
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wickedness, that it can redeem what the world calls lost and
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broken. What the world would write off.
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God, you would write in to the story of what you're doing in
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the world. Oh God, would you do what only
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you can do? And would you remind us that
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your grace is bigger than our wickedness?
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In Jesus name, Amen.