Jesus, What a Friend for Sinners!

 

The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham ... Judas begat Phares and Zara of Thamar. (St. Matthew 1:1, 3)

 

 

          We all have them in our ancestries – those relatives to whom we wish we weren’t related.

          It’s difficult to erase their names from our genealogical records, but if asked, you and I will say, “Oh, we don’t really have any contact with that side of the family.” We think their presence in our family tree will bring us down.

          Take a look, then, at Jesus’ genealogy as St. Matthew records it. Note those four women, whom we are going to study this Advent. Especially note the mention of Judah and Tamar in verse 3. Judah, as we’ll see this morning from Genesis 38, was an unlikely ancestor of Jesus. Tamar, though she tried to keep the covenant, was sinfully confused in her efforts. But the Lord remained sovereign in His grace despite the sinful conduct of Jesus’ ancestors.

          Far from detracting from the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ, the presence of Tamar and Judah in his genealogy actually exalts him – because only Christ can use man’s evil for the church’s salvation.

 

          We first encounter Judah, an unlikely ancestor of our Lord Jesus.

          In Genesis 37, Judah – along with his jealous brothers – helped orchestrate a plan to sell their brother Joseph into slavery. The next chapter offers a close-up look at Judah, and there you and I meet a man who, for the first part of his life, didn’t look much like his holy Descendant.

          In his early years, Judah clearly valued pleasure over purity. He fell in with a heathen friend named Hirah and clearly adopted a pagan view of self and of the world. It’s no surprise that Judah married a Canaanite; as commentators have observed, we’re not even told her name, because the pressing fact was that Judah saw a woman her liked and married her – regardless of her national or religious background. Of course, God’s people, whether under the old or the new covenant, have been commanded not to marry unbelievers.

          Judah didn’t care. His flesh dictated his choices.

          Judah displayed equal spiritual callousness in choosing a Gentile wife (Tamar) for his first son, Er. Although Tamar eventually shines through as one allied to the Lord, we aren’t told that Judah was spiritually selective in choosing her for Er.

          Perhaps the most-vivid evidence of Judah’s fleshliness came in his illicit sexual interaction with Tamar. After his wife died, Judah grieved for a time but traded his mourning clothes for party clothes at sheep-shearing time. (Sheep-shearing time, scholars tell us, usually turned into a drinking festival). En route to the party, Judah saw a woman (his daughter-in-law Tamar) dressed as a prostitute and solicited her services.

          As you would expect, Judah’s pleasure-driven choices bore him bitter fruit. His sons showed no evidence of believing in the Lord, and Moses actually tells us that the holy Lord struck down Er in his younger days due to his evil. Judah’s second son, Onan, refused to fulfill his covenantal duty to marry Tamar and have sons with her, which was supposed to continue his deceased brother’s legacy. Onan instead used Tamar for his own pleasure, and the Lord struck him down. And certainly, Judah’s sin with Tamar brought shame on him.

          In addition to valuing pleasure over purity, Judah also thought in humanistic, not Heavenly, terms. His man-centered worldview came to the surface not only in his dealings with women but also in his lack of concern for the covenant of God. Remember, the Lord had promised that the scepter of Israel would pass down through Judah’s line; this actually was a promise that the Messiah would come from Judah’s loins. Judah, however, withheld his youngest son from Tamar, foolishly supposing that she was the cause of his sons’ deaths! He trusted his own superstitions rather than the sure promises of God. In doing so, Judah adopted man’s favorite line of thinking when it comes to pain and suffering: It’s never my fault. This happened to me because of someone else’s sin. Judah focused on the speck in Tamar’s eye instead of on the beam in his and his sons’ eyes.

          Only after his public humiliation do we see a changed Judah, a man whom God has humbled for his sin. Even so, you and I ask, “Did Jesus really descend from this kind of man?”

 

          Second, we meet Tamar, who tried to maintain the covenant – but whose efforts were stained by the sin of deception.

          You and I don’t know much about Tamar’s background, but she evidently has a concern for what is just and right according to God’s law. Legally, she knew her deceased husband’s brothers were to raise up seed through her to promote Er’s legacy. We safely might assume she knew the promise of God (that the Messiah would come through Judah). Such a concern for justice, and for the fulfillment of God’s covenantal promises, must have emboldened Tamar to act as she did.

          It’s also important to mark her obedience to her elders. When Judah instructed her to go and live in her father’s house, Tamar didn’t quarrel with him. She might well have realized the fleshliness of her in-laws by this point, but she still obeyed her father-in-law. Tamar clearly honored the Lord by honoring father and mother.

          Yet the fact remains: Tamar lied.

          In light of her other actions in this chapter, you and I should expect this covenant-keeper to deal honestly with her father-in-law’s sin. She could, and should, have confronted Judah with his worldliness and with his obstinacy toward the revealed will of God.

          Yet just as the apostle Paul observed centuries later, “When I would do good (God’s will), evil is present with me.” She tricked Judah into having intercourse with her, which showed disrespect for God’s law on a number of levels (impurity, deception, disrespect for her elder ...) and betrayed a lack of trust in the Lord’s power to work justice.

As Judah himself said when confronted with the unmistakable evidence of his sin with Tamar, “She has been more righteous than I.” But “more righteous” does not equal “perfect.” And God demands perfection from you if you are to dwell with Him eternally.

 

          So why would St. Matthew include Judah and Tamar in Jesus’ lineage? Because only as you appreciate their sinfulness can you appreciate our almighty Savior, who is sovereign in grace.

          The Word of God is honest, and it deals with this world as it truly is – thank the Lord. This is God’s Truth, and it speaks to you and me directly even now in 2008. That said, the Word does not approve of every action of God’s people! The fact that Jesus came from such self-interested and conniving sinners is proof that our Sovereign Lord can turn the evil of men into good for his church.

          It is popular, but terribly misguided, to read this account and think the Lord is saying, “Thanks, Tamar – I really needed that!” Rather, the Lord is saying, “I can use Tamar’s illegitimate actions with a heretofore rebellious sinner to convert him and, through their descendants, to bring about the salvation of the church.” Isn’t that the same message you and I see at the cross and at the empty tomb? As St. Peter preached, we wicked sinners willingly crucified the Lord of Glory, who nonetheless was appointed to such a death. The Lord used your and my evil in nailing Jesus to the tree to bring about our greatest good: the salvation of our souls from the Hell we deserved.

          The hero of this story isn’t Tamar, nor is it humble and repentant Judah.

          The Hero is Jesus, who worked the worst evil you and I could contrive for greater blessing than we could imagine.

 

          Thank the Lord for this portion of Jesus’ lineage.

          The presence of Judah and Tamar in the Savior’s genealogy demonstrates that Jesus really does identify with you and me. He truly was, and remains, a human being. And thankfully, he truly is the Friend of sinners. Even he said he didn’t come to heal the “well” but the sick – sinners like Judah and Tamar, like you and me.

          Yet Jesus wasn’t born by ordinary generation, so he did not have original sin. In his life, he never committed sin. As true, yet sinless, man, he is perfectly and uniquely qualified to bear your sins at Calvary, and to cleanse you forever.

          You might not be proud of some aspects of your family history. More important, you might not be proud of some aspects of your personal history. You might not think you’re “good enough” to be a follower of Jesus or a child of God.

          Well, his own family wasn’t “good enough!”

          Jesus came to save sinners, not the self-righteous. He knows what it means to have shame in the family. He knows sinners, even though he is perfectly free from personal sin.

          If you know him as Savior, the Father declares you “good” on Jesus’ account. And that’s all that matters.