The Light in the Lineage: Tamar

An Advent series exploring the courage and light of the women woven into Jesus’ family line—and what their stories mean for us today.

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SPEAKER_00 0:07

Welcome back to Women Under Construction. This is where we have the conversations we can't always have anywhere else. You know, the ones about identity, calling, formation, and the everyday holy work of becoming. If you're hungry for depth, ready for change, and longing for a faith that reaches into real life, you're in the right place.

SPEAKER_01 0:28

Welcome back to Women Under Construction. I'm your host, Katie, and I'm so glad that you're here. This week we are stepping into our Advent series called The Light in the Lineage. Through this series, we're going to step into the stories of the women who were woven into Jesus' genealogy: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba, and Mary. These are women who carried light through darkness, who clung to God in moments of injustice and uncertainty, and who remind us that God writes redemption into the most unexpected corners of our stories. So, in order to understand why we're studying these women, I want for you all to turn with me to Matthew 1. And maybe you've looked at this before. It is the genealogy of Jesus. There's a lot of names, there's a lot of generations, and quite frankly, it is mostly men. It speaks to Matthew's character and his life before he became a believer and follower of Christ. So we have to remember that Matthew is writing his gospel to establish Jesus as King. So this genealogy, the first thing that you read in his gospel is this genealogy, and it traces Jesus' family line all the way back to the Davidic family line. And while doing that, we're all he's also trying to persuade his Jewish audience that Christ was the Messiah. So this genealogy in the front of Matthew's gospel is intended to tackle quite a few things. But most importantly, I think from a theological standpoint, those things are easily understood. But what we forget is that Matthew is also a man. And when he is writing his gospel, he is going to write in the way that he knows best. And in order to do that, he was going to place high importance on accurate and detailed driven information because of his former identity as a tax collector. Matthew was used to keeping very detailed logs and notes and ledgers. So when we look through his gospel, sometimes we're gonna see these genealogies and we're gonna go, oh wow, that's a lot of names, it's a little overwhelming. But for Matthew, this was of utter importance to establish who Jesus was and where his lineage came from. Additionally, I think underneath it all, Matthew is also announcing something about the heart of God before Jesus even utters a word by including these women in his genealogy. So what do I mean by that? These women weren't safe choices for a royal genealogy, quite frankly. They were outsiders, they're gentiles, they're widows, they're women who are shaped by trauma and scandal and courage. And yet, God places them front and center in the lineage of Christ. And I have a couple of reasons why I think he does that. First, God's kingdom also often comes through unlikely people. We read this in the New Testament, we read it in the Old Testament, that the ones who are overlooked by society are often the ones God trusts with holy work. We also know that redemption doesn't start with perfection. These lives of these women illustrate exactly what Jesus came to do to redeem the messy and hard, painful life stories. It also proves that women are central to God's redemptive mission. They're not afterthoughts, they're not side characters. The women that are included in the Old Testament and the New Testament and forward are essential participants to his redemptive mission. And then finally, his genealogy, the genealogy of Jesus Christ, prepares us for his ministry. He came for outsiders because he came from outsiders. He stepped into brokenness because brokenness was woven into his family line. These women show us that God has always worked through real lives, real wounds, and real courage. Their stories aren't purely ornamental, feel goods. They are foundational. I think part of why this matters so deeply to me is because I hold a quiet reverence for the women in my own lineage. And maybe you do too. I think of the women in my family whose strength that I didn't understand until I was older, like my grandmother and my great-grandmother. The women who prayed through suffering, who held their families together, who lived faithful, steady, unseen, obedient lives. These women, like my grandmother and my great-grandmother, taught me that faith is often not in the spotlight moments, but more about the everyday endurance. I remember as a kid, my great-grandmother came to live with my grandmother when I was fairly young. I'd say like eight or nine. And during that time, I had the really unique opportunity and blessing. Truly, it's it was a blessing to get to know my great-grandmother and get to know her life story, but also to see her living out a life of daily unseen obedience. This is a woman who would get up in the morning, and the first thing that she would do is pray and read her scriptures. She was going to church multiple times a week. She was constantly worrying and helping those who needed assistance, whether it be with food, with donations to her local church, um, spending time. I remember like even thinking of the fact that she growing up was one of my primary caregivers, is such an obedient life. Um, she has just it had instilled in me so many wonderful qualities and such a deep and rich faith that I don't know that I would have had if I hadn't had that time with her as a young child. And so when I think about Tamar, Rahab, Bathsheba, and Mary, I feel the same sense of sacredness. These women weren't perfect, they weren't polished, but they were faithful in the midst of complexity. And God wove their obedience small and large into the lineage of Christ. We don't just come from their lineage as daughters of the Most High, we come from their light. And part of our discipleship is learning to recognize the lineage and to live in it. So today we're gonna start with Tamar, a woman whose story sits in Genesis 38, tucked between chapters about Joseph. I think a lot of people skip over her story because they're not sure what to do with her. But scripture doesn't skip her, Matthew doesn't skip her, and Jesus carries his her story into his own genealogy. So let's step into her world. If you have your Bibles, go ahead and open with me to Genesis 38. If you don't have your Bibles, um, what I would suggest is pausing and coming back to listen because we're gonna dig into some really theologically deep things that are going to transform the way you look at Tamar. And I want you to be able to have the opportunity to take these notes. So let's set the stage. Tamar's story begins when she is married to Judah's oldest son, heir. Scripture tells us that he was wicked and God put him to death. So, according then to Levite custom that was designed to protect widows, Judah's next son, Onan, was supposed to give Tamar a child so she would have legal security in a future. But he refuses. And he uses Tamar for his own purposes without honoring her, and God puts him to death as well. We see this in Genesis 38:9 when scripture says, But Onan knew the offspring would not be his. So whenever he went to his brother's wife, he would waste the semen on the ground so as not to give offering to his brother. Okay. Um, so not great. Now we see after that in verse 11, we see that Judah has one son left, Shalah, and he tells Tamar to remain a widow in his house until Shalah grows up. Instead of standing in righteousness, Judah sends Tamar back to her father's house, which essentially places her in limbo. So she doesn't have any protection, any provision, any future because truthfully he's afraid of what would happen to him. Um, Tamar then becomes the picture of a woman abandoned by the very system that was designed to protect her. She's been faithful. She has done everything that's asked of her. When her husband died, she laid with his brother. But she's left without justice, support, or dignity. And I think this is where we start to see her courage. She's not passive in her suffering. She acts not out of manipulation, but out of a desire for justice and covenant faithfulness. So, what do I mean? Later in Genesis 38, we hear that um Judah is going up to be with his sheepbearers, sheep shearers. And he told his friend, and his friend told somebody else, and Tamar found out. And so she says in verse 13, Your father-in-law is going up to Timnah to shear his sheep. So she took off her widow's garment and she covered herself with a veil, wrapping herself up, and sat at the entrance to Eniom, which is the road to Timna. For she knew that Shalah had grown up and she had not been given to him in marriage. So when she learns that Judah, who is now a widower, is traveling, she disguises herself not to deceive for selfish gain, but to confront Judah's failure head on. She's asking him for one payment, which is not money or goods, but she asks him later in scripture for three personal items his signet, his cord, and his staff. So she says in verse 17, when she goes, What will you give me that you may come in to me? And Judah says to her in verse 17, I will send you a young goat from the flock. And she says, Yeah, that's not good enough, dude. And he says, Well, what pledge shall I give you then? And she goes, Your signet, your cord, and your staff that is in your hand. Which to us as modern women, these things seem kind of random. Um, like, why are you asking for a signet, a cord, and a staff? But in the first century, these things carry deep symbolic and legal weight. So the signet was essentially Judah's signature, like his legal identity and authority. It was stamped into clay and it validated contracts and decisions. So to give someone your signet was to entrust them with your name. Essentially, it's like the modern-day equivalent of giving somebody your social security card, which we all know we shouldn't do. Um, but it was Judah's legal identity and authority in the same way that our legal identity and authority rests in our social security cards. Like you can't get a car, you can't buy a house, you can't get a credit card. There's like very few things you can do without a social security card. So for her to ask for this was basically asking Judah for his identity. Then she asks for the cord. And this is what the signet hung from as the marker of his clan identity and belonging. So it symbolizes the continuity of lineage, which something Judah was withholding from Tamar from the beginning. I don't know that there's a modern-day equivalent of this. Maybe it's your married name. Actually, that's probably a pretty good one. Is the marker of clan identity. So it would be like Judah saying to Tamar, hey, when you married my first son heir, you got the last, the family name. And then when you went back to your father's house, it was taken away. And now I still have it. So she's going, okay, well, give me that name back. Interesting, makes sense. The third thing that she asks for is the shepherd's staff, which is a shepherd's tool, and it's carved with a personal emblem of leadership and inheritance. So this represents his role, his reputation, his authority within the tribe of Judah. So together, these items symbolize his identity, authority, authority, and lineage. I do want to make the distinction that by asking for them, Tamar is not seizing power from Judah. Tamar is asking and holding Judah accountable. She takes what he refuses to give her: honor, justice, and a place within the covenant family. And later, we know that Judah lies with Tamar, who is his daughter-in-law, removed, which feels icky, but we know that they lie together. And when she is accused of being immoral, we and brought out to be punished because of these, she brings with her these objects, these very symbols of Judah's authority that vindicate her. And they expose his failure to uphold her righteousness. And it is here that Judah utters one of the most stunning confessions in all of scripture, I think. And so join me in 38, verse 26, when it says, Then Judah identified them and said, She is more righteous than I. She is more righteous than I, since I did not give her my son Shalah, and he did not know her again. And in that moment, the messianic line is preserved through her courage. So, what does Tamar's story teach us about the heart of God? I think there's four things. First, God sees and defends women who are wronged. She is abandoned, forgotten, and mistreated, but God never abandons her story. God values courageous agency. Her actions confront injustice and they protect the covenant line. She, as a woman, as a widow, steps into the space Judah refused to fill. Third, I think God weaves redemption through complex, imperfect situations. This story is morally tangled. It's a hot mess. And yet, through it, God carries with it the promise that he will fulfill redemption. And fourth, God honors the overlooked. Tamar is a woman that Judah tried to forget, and she becomes the cornerstone of the Messianic lineage. So, what does that mean for you and me today, friend? I think that our girl Tamar speaks directly to the hearts of women today who feel perhaps forgotten by the systems or people who are supposed to care, misjudged by those who don't fully know their story, stuck in a painful in-between season, and tempted to believe their situation is too complicated for God to redeem. Her story reminds me that your story isn't too tangled for God to redeem. In fact, he does his best work in the places we think are beyond hope. That our courage matters. Sometimes righteousness looks like enduring faithfully, sometimes it looks like bold action. And Tamar, she models both. We're not defined by the failures of others. Judah's unfaithfulness and failure did not cancel God's. And I think the most important thing we can learn from Tamar is that we carry light even when others have dimmed it. Her faithfulness kept the covenant lion alive. Our faithfulness, even in the unseen, participates in God's redemptive work too. As we close, let me speak this over you, friend. May you know that God who saw Tamar sees you with clarity and compassion. May her courage remind you that righteous boldness is precious to God. And may you trust even the most complicated chapters of your life can be the places where God's redemption takes root. Friend, this is the lineage we belong to. A lineage of courage, of faith, and unexpected light. I'd love for you to come back and join me for week two. Join me next week as we dig into Rahab, a woman whose bold faith still speaks. Until then, walk in the light of the lineage you carry. Your story is part of his story too.