Joseph
- Dave Rodriguez
- Dec 20, 2009
- Series: The Divine Disruption
Well here we are just days away from Christmas and mentioning that probably elicits one of two feelings
Joy or dread – Squeals of delight or mumbled bah humbugs
At Grace we want to elicit something diff than joy or dread...we want to make you say “hmmmmm?”
We want to provoke you to look at Jesus a different way
Jesus’ birth was a Divine disruption
- he came to cause trouble
- to change our lives in significant ways
- to alter business as usual
He came to be a stone, a rock to make us stumble
So far we’ve been learned through Herod he confronted - alters our notions of power and control
And through the life of John the Baptist that he reorients our understanding of God.
This week once again we’ll get a first hand look at one whose entire way of life that was altered dramatically by the coming of Jesus. Including his reputation.
His name – Joseph...Jesus earthly father.
Joseph:
This certainly isn’t how I thought it would be!
I have always looked forward to this day – the day when my firstborn son would come into the world.
Oh how there is nothing more exciting, more significant for a Jewish man: a son to carry on his father’s name – and for my family especially: a son to carry on our great legacy – the great legacy of King David himself lives on in my son today.
But this certainly isn’t how I pictured his birth – in Bethlehem, resting in a manger AND of all things with random shepherds coming to see him talking about angelic visits declaring my son as Messiah!
No nothing about my firstborn son is how I thought it would be. But why I am I surprised? It’s been this way all year.
TRANSITION to flashback
You see, it was about a year ago when my parents came to tell me of this girl Mary. They decided with her parents that it would be good for both of our families for us to be married. So I, we, paid the expected portion of the dowry and Mary and I were betrothed.
It was actually pretty exciting really. Finally getting married! Finally going to get to start a family! Finally… well, I can’t say that. Finally gaining something to give me some status in this town. I mean, I’m from Nazareth, which isn’t a town with the greatest reputation, and though I tried hard, I just didn’t have the ability to become a rabbi. So I’m a carpenter… again, not the most significant trade to be known for. But now at least, I was getting married. And I liked Mary. She was a sweet girl – a servant’s heart I noticed in her. Humble, strong, God-fearing.
Or so I thought…
Because then it happened. One day, when we were together with our families, I noticed something different. Actually, I had noticed it earlier, but I didn’t want to say anything. It’s never good to accuse your betrothed of gaining a little weight.
But she had been looking different. And then that one day, it was more than just a little different. I may not have been the smartest kid in rabbinical school, but I know pregnant when I see it. And Mary… she was pregnant. And it wasn’t by me!
At first, I was angry. How could she do this? I’ve been a good, law-abiding Jew. Sure I’d been tempted, but I had been strong enough to say no. How could she betray me like this?
My parents of course were none too pleased either! And her parents, well, they were just so ashamed.
And then there were my friends… they were angry too! “What would this mean for my reputation?” they said. I wondered too!
If I stayed with her, I’d just be a desperate, weak-willed spineless pushover who couldn’t find any other woman to marry!
I’d forever be known as the husband of an adultress!
I’d forever be known as the illegitimate father of this little child.
Oh I was angry. What made it worse was Mary’s explanation. It would have been much easier to deal with if she would have just come out and admitted her adultery! I think I could have even forgiven her had she done that, but instead, she had this crazy story that this child was conceived by God’s Spirit! “UNBELIEVABLE!” She’s blaming God for her adultery! She even had a story about an angel visiting her. “CRAZY!”, I thought.
So I made plans to divorce her because that’s what you have to do when you are betrothed if you want to break it up.
But like I said, I liked Mary – as angry and hurt as I was, I cared about her and I just didn’t think the culturally-acceptable way of divorce was the way to go. Sure, I could have subjected her to public disgrace and shame. I had every right to. My family and friends wouldn’t have blamed me – nobody would have; it was the expected response from me, even as a Jew trying to be obedient to God. In fact, it would have helped my reputation.
But as crazy as I thought she was and as hurt as I was by her betrayal, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t let her be so shamed that everyone in Nazareth would shun her for the rest of her life. I just didn’t want to see her shamed to the point of never marrying again, both her and her child becoming the burden of her parents… and after they died, the burden of who knows! I just didn’t think that God would be pleased with such condemning consequences. It didn’t seem to fit with my hope in a merciful God.
So my intent was to divorce her quietly – just two or three people with me who already knew – sign the papers and I could begin putting this embarrassment behind me. I could move on and hope for another day, another woman to marry to start a family with.
Aaaaand… that’s when the angel showed up!
Oh I had thought Mary was crazy when she had told me it was “God’s son” she was carrying. And I thought she was crazy when she said it was an angel that told her. But now, it was me who was going to speak(?) the crazy talk!
I was sleeping soundly when in my dream, as clear as this moment right now, an angel spoke to me.
Called me, “Joseph, son of David”. You know it’s serious when angels invoke King David’s name.
Told me NOT to be afraid to follow through with the betrothal and keep Mary as my wife.
Said that this baby was just as Mary had claimed:
…conceived by God’s Spirit…
…supposed to be named Jesus…
…the MESSIAH to save our people!
And then the angel told me something I didn’t know… something I had forgotten until that moment – this baby coming in this way had been prophesied by the great prophet Isaiah:
“The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel.”
In that moment, you better believe I remembered that prophecy. As Jews, our hope in Messiah coming was always in front of us. We all knew the prophecies.
Of course… the Messiah would come born to a virgin. UNBELIEVABLE!
This woman who I didn’t choose had been chosen by God to carry God’s son – to carry the gift of God with us!
Crazy? Maybe.
Unbelievable? Without a doubt!
But I still believed. And so here we are…
TRANSITION back to present
Those divorce plans were gone. Yeah, I’ve taken a fair amount of heat for it. Well, more than a fair amount really.
I don’t tell too many people about the angel’s visit. I just kind of take the jokes, the sad stares, the pity people give out. Sure it would have made more sense in the eyes of everyone around me to let Mary be humiliated, have her reputation ruined. Like I said earlier, no one would have faulted me for that.
No one that is, except God. And obeying God makes more sense to me. Following God makes a lot more sense to me than worrying about what other people think, caring about my reputation in my town.
I’m sure the rumors will keep going, people talking about Mary’s illegitimate son – people questioning whether or not I am the father. The latest rumor has something to do with a Roman soldier and Mary.
But I know the truth. This little baby back in there? He’s my son. Well, I mean God’s Son… (PAUSE)… but my son too. At least that’s the way I am going to look at it. This baby may be God with us, but he’s still a baby. And he’s changed my life.
He’s disrupted everything I thought would be… turned upside down all my notions of how my firstborn son would come to be, what it would be like to be a dad, let alone a husband. He’s turned upside down how I thought I would be known in my town.
But I’m okay with all of that.
Because I don’t care what people say. I don’t care what people will think. I’m not worried about the way others will look at me or my family. It doesn’t matter if no one understands why I stayed with her… it doesn’t matter if no one believes my story – our story.
I don’t care about my reputation.
What I care about is what God has asked me to do:
… to stay with Mary as my wife
… to care for this child as my own
…to let my life be completely disrupted!
This is God’s son. And he’s my son too!
A good reputation is more desirable than great riches;
to be esteemed is better than silver or gold. Proverbs 22:1
Everybody wants to be held in high esteem. Nobody wants a bad reputation.
Don’t you hate it when you know someone is thinking unfavorably of you? Don’t you cringe when you think that there is whispering going on behind your back – about you? Ever walk into a room that suddenly falls silent?
That was exactly what Joseph had to deal with his entire life.
There is great speculation as to what became of Joseph since he disappears from the gospels shortly after Jesus’ childhood years. Most assume he died in Jesus childhood. And in that relatively short period of time Joseph had to carry around with him a questionable reputation.
Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry. He was the son, supposedly, of Joseph, Luke 3:23
His name was sullied his reputation disrupted by the coming of the child into his life.
He realized is intuitively when first confronted with Mary’s pregnancy. Knowing what he faced, imagine his dilemma...
- He had every right to expose her infidelity. And if not publicly disgrace her he could at least divorce her and subject her to ridicule the rest of her life.
- By law she could have even been the victim of honor killing. Although we don’t have much proof that it was carried out normally in that day, the law was clear on this point:
If a man is found sleeping with another man's wife, both the man who slept with her and the woman must die. You must purge the evil from Israel. Deut. 22:22
Even if this wasn’t practiced, at the very least this woman would have been an outcast. And what would become of her was all in Joseph’s hands.
He could have ruined her reputation but instead he ruined his own – he instead exposed himself to public disgrace for the rest of his life. He allowed his status to be crushed. He sacrificed his reputation for this baby.
Why? What was his motivation?
Altruism? We know he was a good guy...a “righteous” man. But was it his goodness that made him so accommodating to Mary?
Or was he a pushover?...was he naïve? What caused him to sacrifice his own reputation?
I think he allowed his reputation to be disrupted for two reasons
(1) ...because he had heard from God
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.
- he believed God spoke to him directly
- his natural reactions were trumped by supernatural input
(2) ...and he came to believe that his life was going to be a part of something much bigger than he had planned. He believed the angel when he said...
“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.” Matthew 1:20-24
- he believed he had received marching orders
- he was more than a carpenter – he was now to be the caretaker of mission of God.
Joseph defied public opinion, risked his life, and sacrificed his reputation because he
Why Joseph sacrificed his reputation:
1) He believed God had spoken to him
2) He believed his life was going to be a part of God’s divine plan
Those two convictions led him to act counter culturally, to defy public sentiment, to go against the flow. And sacrifice his reputation.
Now let’s turn the attention off of Joseph to you. If you share those two convictions and allow them to shape your life then you too will have to deal with a disrupted reputation.
Your reputation will be disrupted if:
- You act as a response to God speaking to you
- You live your life on a mission to join God’s divine plan for the world
Notice I did not say if you claim to be a Christian your reputation will be disrupted.
You live in the safest place on earth to declare to be a Christian
- 80% of Americans claim they are Christian
- believe in Jesus
- say they live by Biblical values
If you share those beliefs you are in the vast majority
- no one’s reputation comes under fire for claiming to be a church going Christian.
But that will change, people will start to perceive you differently if you
- Claim to listen for the voice of God
- You begin responding to what you hear
- You begin to live attentively, responding by reflex to the voice of God
...and people know this about you
And people will start to be a little less amenable to you when they begin to realize
- you are on a mission , you have received marching orders
- you frame your life around God’s purposes for the world
- your life purpose is to join God in the salvation of humanity
You start talking like and living like that
...well then people are going to start looking at you funny
...you will make people uncomfortable
...you’ll have stepped over some invisible line of cultural appropriateness
...and your reputation will be disrupted.
I’ll say it again - No one cares that you are a Christian – they expect it!
- But lots of people don’t want to know you are so committed that you will adapt your lifestyle to the call of God
- You’ll ruffle feathers when you sacrifice your life for God – reorient your future for the sake of God’s purposes....
You do that and you’ll have a reputation all right.... a reputation as an extremist, or even a nutcase
Just like Joseph.
But...let me ask you....do you have a choice? ....did Joseph have a choice?
No...because he truly believed he had heard from God and was now a part of the eternal plan.
His reputation paled in comparison to the call of God on his life.
And that will happen to you too. If you hear the direction of God for your life and understand God’s kingdom purposes...you won’t have a choice either ...you’ll risk it all just like Joseph
And when you do...
...when you shift from living your casual Christian life to that of a compelled Christ follower...
...when you let Jesus’ agenda disrupt your life... your reputation will suffer but you’ll be blessed...
If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you. 1 Peter 4:14
Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven. Jesus, Matthew 5:11
