Genesis 38 – March 28

Today we are going to wade into the murky darkness of the sinful life of the fourth son of Israel. The events described in this chapter are disturbing and repulsive, revealing the hard heart of a rebel. If you examine the internal components of any finely crafted machine, you are going to see that every last element exists for a very significant reason. I know nothing about the internal components of my car, but just imagine if I were to open the hood and begin looking around at all of the mechanisms inside. I would recognize the battery and the motor and maybe some belts. But, what if I saw something that I couldn’t quickly identify and I decided to simply grab a wrench and remove it? That is a good recipe for disaster. 

The text before us this morning is challenging, and often when people preach or teach through Genesis, they skip over this chapter entirely. One commentator named H. C. Leupold said that this chapter is “entirely unsuited to homiletical use.” However, the Bible is a book that was crafted very precisely by the Holy Spirit and this chapter is not placed here by accident. I believe that this is truly one of the most powerful gospel messages in the book of Genesis. This story is full of sin. Nobody comes out of this chapter looking clean. We can learn many lessons about how to live just by seeing their mistakes. But if I were to leave you with a simple list of do’s and don’ts, it would ultimately do nothing for you. It would only have the ability to produce legalism and stoke the natural propensity in the human heart toward moralistic therapeutic deism. 

But Genesis 38 carries with it really great news. Judah is not like Joseph. He does not trust God, he does not honor God, and he does not live a moral life. Yet, God takes this great sinner, and God redeems him. Many people have asked the question, “why is this chapter placed here in the middle of the Joseph story?” I think part of the reason is to show that while Joseph was being trained by God in Egypt, God was doing a sanctifying work in Judah as well. Later in the Joseph story, Judah is going to become a respectable, honorable man. When does that transition take place? It seems to begin right here in chapter 38. 

When Judah discovered that Tamar had been immoral, he was very quick to declare that she deserved to die. I think he was happy to have found a way to be rid of her. But before she was burned at the stake, she outed Judah as the father of her illegitimate pregnancy. Imagine Judah’s shocked realization. He has made it clear to all who were present that this kind of infidelity is worthy of the death penalty, and then, in the presence of everyone in his family, his sins are made public. 

When you sin, you know what you are doing is wrong. You know that you are intentionally pursuing the opposite of what God has called you to do. Yet, you justify it in your mind. You think that it really isn’t that bad. The sin looks like an innocent, small thing while it is hidden in the darkness, but when it is brought into the light it is shown for what it really is. 

When Judah saw his sin, and when he realized that he had been tricked, he does not respond with anger at her lie. Rather, he simply says, “She is more righteous than I, since I did not give her to my son Shelah.” And I think that the fact that he did not know her from then on is an indication that there was a change that day in Judah. God was merciful to Judah. The next time that we see him, he is with his father’s house once again. 

Joseph was an honest, hardworking, obedient, pure man of integrity. Judah was a dishonest, disobedient, dishonorable, impure man of the world. But they have this in common - they were both sinners, and they were both saved by grace. There is nobody you know who is exempt from needing the grace of God: prisoners and presidents, people who run cults and people who run non-profits for the poor. God has called out His people from every sort under the sun. It is our duty to give the gospel call to all people, and God will draw His people to Himself.