The Journey to Bethlehem: Joseph December 4, 2016 Matthew 1: 18-24 18 This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. 19 Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. 20 But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins. 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel (which means God with us ). 24 When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. 25 But he did not consummate their marriage until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus. There is a man we all know. We know his name. We think we know his story. Yet we ve never seen him in person. We ve never heard his voice. We ve never heard anything about what he said. We see depictions of his likeness in many Christian homes and in virtually every Christian church we might walk into at this time of year. But, his voice is silent. Don t let his silence fool you. He is not without power. He is not without influence. He has made an impact. His name is Joseph. He was the husband of Mary. He was the earthly father of Jesus. Yet, the Bible never quotes a word he said. He could talk. But, his words were never recorded. We hear about Joseph before Jesus is born. We hear about him when Jesus is born and as Joseph and Mary take Jesus to the Temple for the purification rites when he is a tiny baby. We hear about him going to the Temple with Mary and Jesus when Joseph is 12. But that s about it! Some non-biblical traditions from the 2 nd century say Joseph was an elderly widower when he married Mary. That s common in the Roman Catholic tradition. The Bible doesn t say. It is just as likely that he would have been 14 or 15 years old which was typical age for boys to marry. We know that Joseph was a carpenter. It says so in Matthew 13:54-56 (NIV) where it says of Jesus, 54 Coming to his hometown, he began teaching the people in their synagogue, and they were amazed. Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers? they asked. 55 Isn t this the carpenter s son? Isn t his mother s name Mary, and aren t his brothers James, Joseph, Simon and Judas? 56 Aren t all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all these things? 1
While Mary was from Nazareth some suspect that Joseph may have been from Bethlehem. That would explain why he had to go to Bethlehem for the census. Often marriages, in those days, were arranged and it could have been a long-distance engagement. Bethlehem itself was a small town of about 500-1,000 people. That s twice the size of Nazareth, where Mary was from. Bethlehem was adjacent to Jerusalem only about 6 miles or about a 2 hour walk from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. Today, they ve run together. But you know which one you are in because still today Bethlehem is the impoverished neighbor to the bustling Jerusalem. Today, they ve built a wall to separate Bethlehem which is in Palestine from Jerusalem which is in Israel. You have to go through a border crossing and a check point to get from one to the other. It s really quite sad Now Bethlehem actually means House of Bread Bet Lehem. Back in Jesus day, it would ve had bakers and millers along with general working class folks such as carpenters like Joseph. Although still small, Bethlehem was better known than Nazareth. It was known as was the place that Rachel had died giving birth to Benjamin. Jacob buried Rachel nearby. It was also setting of Book of Ruth. It is where Naomi was from. Naomi s great great grandson was David, the great king. Bethlehem became known as the City of David. Bethlehem was the town that the prophet Micah prophesied about in Micah 5:2: But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are small among the clans of Judah, out of you will come for me one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times. 3 Therefore Israel will be abandoned until the time when she who is in labor bears a son, and the rest of his brothers return to join the Israelites. 4 He will stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the name of the LORD his God. And they will live securely, for then his greatness will reach to the ends of the earth. Growing up in Bethlehem, Joseph would have known these words of Micah...that one day a son would be born whose greatness would be known worldwide. Maybe that helped him. It seems that Joseph didn t believe Mary had become pregnant by the Holy Spirit. Otherwise, he wouldn t have been planning to divorce her quietly. But, wait, you might say, they weren t yet married. In that day, the only way to break off an engagement was to file for a divorce. The engagement was a binding contract. Mary had been unfaithful. Joseph was sure of it. He must have felt betrayed, dishonored, humiliated, hurt. But he knew that the punishment for adultery according to Jewish law was death by stoning. Joseph didn t want that. He didn t want to hurt Mary, he just wanted to quietly get out. If Joseph was in fact living in Bethlehem, maybe he learned about Mary s pregnancy when she was visiting her relative Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah. Zechariah was a priest that served in the Temple in Jerusalem. So, it wouldn t have been far for Joseph to walk that six miles from 2
Bethlehem to Jerusalem to visit Mary while she was there and discover that she was pregnant and to hear the story she had to tell him. Joseph s walk back to Jerusalem from seeing Mary in Bethlehem would have been difficult. He was trying to figure out what to do. Maybe he thought it was worst day of life? A terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day as Alexander would have said even in Australia. Perhaps Joseph felt that his hopes and dreams had been crushed and he just didn t want to go on. But then an angel appeared to him in a dream as he slept, and told him not to be afraid because indeed the baby Mary was carrying was conceived by the Holy Spirit, not by Mary being unfaithful. But the angel also told Joseph what to name the baby: name him Jesus because he will save people from their sins. Jesus is the Greek form of Joshua, which means the LORD saves. And Matthew tells us that when Joseph woke up, he did what the angel commanded him and completed the marriage to Mary. That probably meant that he went back with her to her hometown of Nazareth and had the formal wedding so that they could be living together when Jesus was born. Somehow, Joseph trusted in and believed what the angel said to him. He was no longer thinking that Mary was lying to him. He was no longer concerned about what other people might say to him about having a wife who was pregnant when they got married. He fulfilled his commitment to marry Mary. It must have been hard for Joseph, just as it was hard for Mary. Did you catch the other thing that Matthew said about the baby who was to be born? He said that All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel (which means God with us ). This comes from Isaiah 7:14. Now Joseph would have known this scripture and perhaps as he listened to the words of the angel Isaiah came to mind and he knew that Mary s baby was Immanuel. This was a prophesy from Isaiah from 700+ years before Jesus. That was during a time when Israel was under siege. Foreign powers were knocking at the door and pulling Israel apart. The people who understood that they were God s chosen people felt forgotten by God. Now at the time, Isaiah probably immediately referred to child that was going to be born who would take on the throne and restore Israel s greatness. But, perhaps it also means something deeper that one day one would come who would be God s presence with us forever: Immanuel. 3
The son born in Isaiah s time was Immanuel for his generation a visible reminder of God s promise to be with his people. But, Jesus is Immanuel to every generation since his birth, a visible reminder that God is with us. Perhaps we are called to be signs of God s presence in the world to others: we are to be visible reminders of God s love to others. Just this week, I saw a video of a man on a plane that expressed that love. He saw a woman travelling alone with a baby. The baby was fussy and the mom was exhausted. So, he explained that he had kids of his own at home and offered to carry the child up and down the aisle of the plane to calm him while the mother caught a nap. She accepted his offer. The mom slept and the man walked up and down the aisle until the child, too, fell asleep. To that mother, in that moment, that man expressed God s love to her. She was at wit s end, and God sent someone to help. Wasn t it the same with Joseph? He d received devastating news. Yet, in the midst of that, God was working. God was working to form Jesus in Mary and God was working to prepare Joseph. What if Joseph had walked away when he learned of Mary s pregnancy? He would have missed out. He would have missed the greatest gift. Have you ever been in a situation where you didn t want to be? Where things turned out very differently than you had thought they would and not in a good way? The job didn t turn out. The relationship didn t turn out. The family plans didn t turn out. The report from the doctor didn t turn out. Perhaps then, we need to respond as Adam Hamilton suggests. When life gets hard and even painful, we would do well to remember Joseph. Just as it all seems to be going wrong, it could be that God is doing something remarkable that you and I simply cannot see yet. God takes our disappointments, heartache, and pain and uses them in profound ways. P. 45 As Romans 8: 28 says, all things work together for good for those who love God, and are called according to his purpose. When things seem to take a turn for the worse, perhaps like Joseph we can put our trust in God. We can ask God to help us know that we aren t forgotten that God is with us. But maybe you aren t feeling forgotten by God. Maybe things are going ok. Then you can be the one who looks to help others who are struggling. You can embody God s presence to them and let them know that they aren t alone. We are called to show by our actions the love of Christ. We are called to come alongside people and let them know they re not forgotten. 4
During this Christmas season, may God help us to be the Holy Spirit with flesh on to others to be Immanuel, God with us. That s why we give out food boxes to show others they are not forgotten. We feed people, give them gloves, hats, etc. to let them know they aren t forgotten not by us, not by God. We don t share God s love with others to be recognized. Think of how important Joseph was. Yet we barely hear about him and we have no recorded words of his. But, we know that Joseph was faithful. As Hamilton writes, God s greatest work in our lives may be difficult and challenging, and we may never receive recognition or the praise of others, but we are called to serve anyway, seeking nothing more than God s satisfaction and glory. P. 55 This Christmas, may we seek to be like Joseph, trusting in God and serving where he calls us. Let s pray 5