In Jesus Holy Name December 20, 2019
Text: Matthew 1:20b-21 Advent IV - Redeemer
“The Ponderings of Joseph and Mary”
Well, it's almost Christmas Day. I hope most of the rushing around is over for you. Therefore, I'm going to work under the assumption that your Christmas cards have been sent, the presents have been bought, your dinner plans are made. If you mind is still filled with your upcoming dinner plans or last-minute gifts, I hope you have a few minutes to slow down and ponder this pre-Christmas message.
Let’s take a few minutes to ponder the birth of your Savior and contemplate how that long ago event, impacts your todays and all your tomorrows.
I encourage you to ponder the words of the angel to Mary and Joseph, because I imagine is exactly what Joseph and Mary were doing on their journey to Bethlehem. It’s a 97-mile journey. Lots of thoughts can go though your mind when you are walking and riding a donkey for 97 miles, knowing that a baby is due any day. Let’s return for a moment to the events about 9 months earlier.
Matthew writes: This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about. His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. (Matthew 1:18) Was the news good? Yes. But that is hardly seeing things from Mary perspective. She was “pledged to be married” to a carpenter in her village. A young man named Joseph.
What our version calls “pledged to be married,” the older versions use the word “betrothed.” It refers to an ancient Jewish marriage custom, when most marriages were arranged by the parents. The two sets of parents would meet and draw up a formal marriage contract. When the contract was signed, the man and woman were legally “pledged” to each other.
This period of betrothal would last up to a year, at the end of which period they were formally married in a public wedding ceremony.
Now that sounds like our practice of engagement, but there were some major
differences. In the first place, the “pledge” was considered as sacred as marriage itself. During that year, the couple were called husband and wife but they did not live together. If the man died during that year, the woman would be considered a widow even though the wedding ceremony had never taken place. The only way to break the betrothal was through a legal divorce.
After the angel’s visit, in a few months, even with loose clothing, Mary”s condition was going to become noticeable. The tongues of the gossips in Nazareth would begin to wag. Joseph would know and he would also know that the Child Mary was carrying wasn’t his. She would have to explain her pregnancy to her father who would assume she had brought disgrace upon the family’s good name.
Ladies, let me ask you, what your father say if you went and said, “I’m pregnant by the power of the Holy Spirit and my Son is going to be the perfect savior of the world?” No man would ever believe such a thing, and in those days, such an infidelity could end up with Mary being stoned. For Mary, those months before Christmas were not so perfect.
Let me continue. Joseph had entered into the engagement process in good faith. The agreement would have been made between families and he would have been proud to see the wedding preparations proceeding smoothly. He would have looked forward to the day when he could bring his new bride into their new home in Nazareth. But then Mary became great with Child. Some observers would have assumed the Child was his. Others would have spent a great deal of time trying to guess the name of Mary’s secret lover. But Joseph knew. He knew the child was not his.
Disappointed, Joseph decided although he wasn’t’ going to accuse Mary of infidelity, he wasn’t going to marry her either. I think Joseph cried harder that day than he had ever cried in his life. That is the way it was with this man until the Lord revealed the truth to him in a dream. Still, you can understand these days before Christmas were not perfect for the foster father of Jesus.
Joseph is the forgotten man of Christmas. The Gospel of Matthew tells his story. He is the husband of Mary and the foster father of Jesus. He’s one person from the first Christmas story I would like to meet. He acted on one dream.
When I call Joseph “the forgotten man of Christmas,” that’s not an exaggeration. Not much is said about him in the Bible. Not many sermons are preached about him. As a matter of fact, there’s just not much written about Joseph at all. Let me briefly list for you the things we know about Joseph:
–His father was Jacob.
–His family hometown was Bethlehem in Judea but he lived in Nazareth in Galilee. That meant that Joseph and Mary had to travel about 97 miles in the dead of winter in order to register for the Roman census.
–He is from the royal line of David. The genealogy in Matthew 1 makes that clear.
–He was a carpenter by trade.
–He was a poor man. We know that because when he and Mary presented Jesus in the Temple, they brought a turtledove to sacrifice. Jews only did that when they could not afford a lamb.
–He was a religious man, a devout keeper of the Law.
–How old was Joseph? We don’t know the answer for sure, but most writers agree that he was a young man and probably between 19- 23 years old. According to customs that would probably be about right.
Joseph is facing a theological dilemma until the dream from the Lord. On their 97mile journey was he pondering the words of the angel…while feverishly searching for a room in Bethlehem. Did they walk those dusty miles? Did she ride a donkey? It doesn’t make much difference, does it. Either way it wasn’t going to be a perfect Christmas.
Have you ever wondered: "Just what was Mary thinking?" On that journey of 97 miles the words of the angel? Only once in the last few hundred years had the Lord directly revealed His will and wishes for His people. Did she switch between thinking that she was blessed and then knowing how tongues would wag about her pregnancy? Knowing she would give birth to the world's Savior was wonderful news but trying to explain to her fiancée or her father that she was pregnant by the Holy Spirit's power was a most unpleasant prospect.
No doubt Mary had breathed a sigh of relief when the Lord’s angel appeared
in a dream to Joseph and helped him believe the unbelievable. Truly, it would have been wonderful if Luke had let us eavesdrop on those conversations, but he didn't. What he did do was tell us that "Mary kept all these things and pondered them in her heart".
We can only imagine the stress Joseph felt while they were looking for a room in Bethlehem and finding only the signs of “no vacancy”.
Mary and Joseph know the contractions are minutes apart. They are still searching for a room. Imagine the panic in Joseph’s heart, knowing he is responsible for his pregnant wife and the expectant child that an angel told him was very, very special. Finally out of compassion and a desire to keep the couple off the streets the inn keeper offered his stable. It was hardly ideal, but it would work. They agreed. Later that night, in a stable with all the animal smells, sights and sounds, the baby Jesus was born. It looked as if this holy Child would be born in a stable. If so, it was not the antiseptic stable that appears on so many Christmas cards.
Luke doesn't let us know, but I've often wondered, "What did Mary ponder regarding the birth of her son in a stable?" Would she not have given some consideration to the reason Jesus had been born in a stable with all the sights and smells and sounds that a stable bestows?
Did she ponder the visit of the shepherds? I mean shepherds were not on the “A” list of people to have over for a visit.
Naturally, Mary would have pondered the story the shepherds told about the angels singing in the heavens. Surely she would have pondered how the shepherds knew the exact location on the night Jesus was born. On the other hand maybe she wasn’t that surprised after all….Visits by angels had almost become a commonplace occurrence for the people who surrounded her. Uncle Zacharias and Elizabeth, Joseph, and now the Shepherds…What did she ponder the meaning of that last phrase of the angels message.
“Do not be afraid, I bring you good news of great joy
That will be for all people. Today in the town of David
A Savior has been born… he is the Messiah, the Lord.” Luke 2:10-11
In their ponderings did Mary and Joseph ever reflect on all the work to which the Lord had gone for them to arrive in Bethlehem at the right time, at the exact time, when Jesus was to be born?
Did they ponder how the story of Jesus' birth had actually begun in Rome, more than 1400 miles away from that Judean hamlet? Caesar's question put into motion his bureaucracy and that bureaucracy ordered a carpenter from Nazareth, and his very-pregnant fiancé to make the 97-mile journey to Bethlehem just to be counted.
Some would say that the Baby Jesus' birth in Bethlehem was completely coincidental and entirely accidental. All I can say is this: if Jesus had been born before that trip, or during that trip, or any time after that trip, He would not have been your Savior.
The facts are these: Jesus was born in Bethlehem as the prophet Micah (5:2) had said He would be. Micah's Holy Spirit-inspired prediction was only one of more than 300 such prophecies which Jesus would fulfill during His short 33 years of life.
The Bible also said that Jesus was to be crucified between thieves. That's a prophecy nobody would rush to claim. Even so, Jesus fulfilled that one, too. There are more than 100 prophecies, all of which Jesus fulfilled. This He did so that you might believe, so you might know He is, beyond any shadow of a doubt, the Messiah, the Son of the living God. And if anyone still has doubt in his heart and mind, there is one more event which should quiet that doubt. Jesus, having lived a perfect life, having rejected every temptation, having died on the cross in our stead, rose from the dead with a glorified resurrected body.
Understand, we're not saying Jesus revived a few minutes after His heart stopped beating. When we say 'Jesus rose from the dead', we mean, He was nailed to a cross and after He had obviously died, just to make absolutely, undeniably sure, the Romans pierced His heart with a spear. From such a wound people don't come back.
Jesus was the Son of God, as well as the Son of Mary. True Man and true God, three days after Jesus was buried, He made Himself unburied. After His resurrection, for about a month-and-a-half, Jesus showed the world He was alive. He ate, He walked, He prayed, He talked, He breathed, He offered His disciples the opportunity to touch Him. I do know the disciples, touched by Jesus, and the power of His resurrection, were transformed. One-time cowards the disciples went out and shared the Savior's story of salvation with any and all who would listen".
During these days of Christmas, I encourage you to stop your business. Grab a cup of coffee or hot tea or hot chocolate and ponder God’s love for you.
