Heaven’s Gate
photo by Keith
Genesis 38:18 (NASB) — He said, “What pledge shall I give you?” And she said, “Your seal and your cord, and your staff that is in your hand.” So he gave them to her and had relations with her, and she conceived by him.
In short, we see Judah partner with fear because his previous two sons had died but he owed his daughter-in-law a husband. So he told Tamar, the daughter-in-law that when his youngest son is old enough he will be sent to marry her. In his heart, he did not mean this because he was scared to lose another son. Later on, when Tamar heard about what Judah had done she decided to take matters into her own hand to get her promised child and be taken care of. She disguised herself as a prostitute and had sex with Judah and became pregnant.
Before she did that she asked Judah to pledge to her so that she knows he will keep his word to send her payment. The items that he pledged to her are significant to our lives as believers and reveals to us 3 areas that the enemy will attack us at.
If the enemy can get you to submit in any of these areas he doesn’t need to possess, oppress, or suppress you because you will do it yourself. You will forfeit your birthright and abide in a place that you were never meant to set up camp as a believer in Jesus Christ.
The first item is the Seal.
The seal is very important because it represents our identity. In Matthew 3-4 we see Jesus water baptized and as He comes up the Holy Spirit descends on Him “like a dove”, the heavens open up, and the Father says “this is my Son who I am well pleased with”. Right there we see a public proclamation of what Jesus had known throughout His life in private.
One thing that we can also pull through this divine transaction is that God has a system, oftentimes what He privately announces to us, He will public proclaim over us…in His timing.
Now fast forward.
Jesus is led by the Holy Spirit, not the enemy, the Holy Spirit who is also God. (Matthew 4:1) He is led to the wilderness to experience “the ordeal of testing..”. Now after fasting, Jesus became hungry, it was in that moment that the enemy used a physical desire to approach the Son of God.
The enemy will always use our humanity to get us to take our attention off of spiritual matters. We are called to operate from unseen realities, not sensory articulated realities. (2 Cor 4:18)
It’s interesting what the enemy says next. “If you are the Son of God..” What did the Father say over Jesus previously?
Our identity is established by the WORDS of GOD THE FATHER. Not our past, our pastor, our prophet, our parents, our bishop, or anything or anyone else. In order to walk in our true identity that God has for us, it takes knowing God the Father and allowing His words to prune the past declarations that have “programmed” us differently.
No one knows God the way that He wants you to know Him. It takes ownership. It takes personal initiative. It takes private prayer.
Jesus responds to the enemies attempt to get Him to forfeit His Kingdom birthright by saying,
Bread alone will not satisfy,
but true life is found in every word
that constantly goes forth from God’s mouth.” - Matthew 4:4 TPT
It takes constant communication from God on the journey of becoming who HE has called us to be.
The second item is the cord.
The cord represents who you are intertwined with. This is a very important concept because it doesn’t just represent a spouse, kids, family, and friends. It is also inclusive of the generations that you are connected with.
Jesus had returned to Galilee where an eagerly excited crowd waited for Him. (Luke 8: 40) When He arrived a man named Jairus came in a desperate attempt to get Jesus to come to heal his 12-year-old daughter of an illness that had brought her to the point of death. As Jesus made His way to heal the little girl a woman who culturally should not have been where she was at “thought to herself” that if she can just touch the bottom part of the clothing that Jesus was wearing, she would be healed of her issue of bleeding that she had done everything in her power for the last 12 years to rid herself of.
Notice the number 12. 12 represents the perfection of rule(government), rulers are meant to take care of the generations. When we rule or govern the way that God has us to rule, we think generationally because God thinks generationally. That is one of the reasons He is referred to as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
He is a God of generations.
Also, it is key to note that Jesus is closing the gap in this situation. He is caught between 2 generations, the little girl, and the lady. We are likewise, we are between generations. We are called to impact the generation before and the generation after us in some way. We are also called to receive from both.
Our cord is our community. Who you are called to impact and be impacted by. Your tribe.
The third item is the staff.
The staff represents our work. Our work may shift from season to season but it proves to what kingdom we belong to. Not in the secular or sacred conversation, where some “jobs” are Godly and some are not. I am referring to being led by the Holy Spirit to operate in the WORK (Eph 2:10) that God the Father has destined you for in the divine time that He has called you to. This is above a job, our job can complement this truth our limit us from walking in this truth if we decide to submit to another lord other than Jesus Christ.
When we realize our identity and our community it can make it easier to discover our Kingdom work, but sometimes it takes just doing what we know to do and then we discover our work for the season that we are in.
Notice at the beginning of the book of Genesis that God gave Adam(representative of humanity) a “work” before He gave Adam a wife(community).
Walking out your divine purpose will lead you to your tribe. Our work will either expand His Kingdom or not. There isn’t an in-between.
To impact the way that God wants us to impact it takes not camping out in compromise but being led by the Holy Spirit from a personal foundation of identity in Jesus, a conviction for divine(God alignment for the season we are in) community, and abiding in the work He has called us to. Not the financial pressures and all it entails. Not the cultural norm that we grew up in or anything besides the voice of God through the relationship with the Holy Spirit brought about through the acceptance and belief as Jesus as Savior and LORD of our lives.
Testing will always reveal our allegiance.
Just like Judah, when we partner with fear by not abiding in love we subject ourselves to forfeit what God has called us to carry out. When we do that, we submit to an inferior kingdom that holds us hostage…
But you were meant to be free. You were meant to live free and only be bound by Love.
