December 19, 2010 - Advent 4, Year A (RCL)
There’s a video going around on Facebook and YouTube.
It’s the Christmas story
acted and narrated
by a group of children in New Zealand.
They might overact occasionally
but the story is clear.
But what stuck out most to me
is that the children included parts
that we often
forget.
We jump
from Gabriel to the inn to the shepherds;
I guess we like the way that the gospel according to Luke
tells the story.
But the kids have obviously read the gospel of Matthew as well.
They have Gabriel and the inn and the shepherds, but they also tell it this way
“Joseph, he was a builder
Mary told Joseph that she was having a baby called Jesus and it was God’s son.
He said, “What?”
Then Joseph saw the angel in a dream. I think Joseph was really scared.
And then they went to Bethlehem
on a donkey.”
The kids get
the essentials.
Mary tells Joseph,
Joseph isn’t exactly enthusiastic,
the angel tells Joseph not to be afraid,
Joseph takes Mary to Bethlehem.
What we’re missing, though,
is the details.
Details
that maybe aren’t so important to the overall flow of the story,
but that at least begin to answer
the sort of things we imagine we might ask
if we were in Joseph’s place.
Joseph
was, as far as we can tell, an ordinary man.
There’s not much about him in the bible, just a couple of other mentions related to Jesus’ birth,
the story of when Jesus was twelve years old and they visited the temple,
and this time.
When it comes to Jesus’ parents,
the spotlight is usually on Mary.
Joseph
kind of fades
into the background.
Most often, in the bible, the men we read about
are the great heroes.
But Joseph provides
one of the few pictures we have
of ordinary guys, being husbands and fathers.
It all began for Joseph
when Mary
told him that she was pregnant.
Joseph and Mary are betrothed, which was like being engaged, except more binding.
The way it worked back then, is that when you were betrothed,
you were as good as married,
except that you hadn’t moved in together yet.
Often it happened when you were quite young;
then you waited till both parties were of age, before the actual wedding.
But it was legally binding.
Mary and Joseph were betrothed,
And suddenly Mary came to Joseph, and told him
that she was pregnant.
We don’t know
if Mary told Joseph about the visit of the angel Gabriel. We have no idea how she explained her pregnancy.
But Joseph knew
that he didn’t have anything to do with this pregnancy.
He wasn’t
to blame.
He probably assumed
that she had some other boyfriend on the side.
Joseph
would have been right to be angry.
Mary had effectively admitted
that she’d had an affair.
And by law, it was his right
to cancel the marriage,
in effect to divorce her.
In fact, by law, he could have done even more. he could have made it a public spectacle,
could even have charged her with committing adultery
and had her stoned to death.
But Joseph was, at heart, a good man,
and although he must have been terribly hurt by her news, he decided that he didn’t want to make life any more difficult for her.
So instead of making a huge fuss, he planned to break their engagement quietly.
Maybe move to another town
with the excuse that there was more work there. Let the fuss die down
and begin over.
But just as he was ready to tell her the bad news, Joseph had a dream. And in his dream, an angel told him
that he was not to be afraid.
This pregnancy
was no ordinary pregnancy. This child
was no ordinary child.
God had been involved here;
and this child would
save his people from their sins.
I don’t know what Joseph made of the angel’s words. He must have wondered how on earth this could be true. But he took the angel at his word,
and when he woke up, instead of telling Mary that the engagement was off
he married her,
but didn’t consummate the marriage until after
Jesus is born.
And when Jesus was born
Joseph did what all men in his culture did,
he named his son.
He named his son,
and the baby’s name
was Jesus.
And by naming him,
Joseph was publicly saying,
“This is my son.”
No matter what people were saying,
the rumors and the whispers
about who actually fathered the baby,
Joseph was clear,
this was his son,
and he was his father.
And as the legal son and heir of Joseph,
Jesus was adopted
into a heritage
that stretched back
all the way to the great king David,
and beyond that,
all the way back to the great patriarchs,
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
But that’s only half of the story.
Because of course, the other half is
that as the angel said,
this child was conceived
by the Holy Spirit.
It wasn’t that Mary had gone and got another boyfriend
and Joseph
was being asked
to cover up.
Somehow, unbelievably to Joseph,
and I suspect, to most of us as well,
this baby
had God as his father.
We can’t explain how it is,
it makes no sense biologically speaking,
but Jesus
had as his birth father, God.
The children from New Zealand describe it this way.
“Mary put baby Jesus in one of those troughs.
They call the baby Jesus and they loved him. He has two daddies, God and Joseph. They both needed to look after the baby.”
Jesus had two daddies.
One by birth, one by adoption.
And what struck me when I heard those children say it,
and they said it
as if it were
the most ordinary thing in the world,
is that Jesus isn’t the only one
with two daddies.
Because all of us
have two fathers as well.
From the day we were baptized
we were adopted by God,
and invited to call him Father.
We’re the opposite way round from Jesus.
God was his birth father;
Joseph adopted him.
We have human birth fathers;
God has adopted us.
And we need both to look after us.
It’s always risky to talk about parents in church.
Because while most of the time
our parents do a good job,
there are always exceptions.
Many fathers are wonderful -
they are loving and nurturing,
they protect their children,
they provide for them,
they help them group into healthy and loving adults.
But some fathers
are not as good.
Some abuse their children, sexually or physically or emotionally.
Some are absent.
Some just keep their distance.
I’m lucky. I have a great human father, and we get on really well.
But my dad
is only human,
and even he
has made some mistakes.
And so I’m thankful
for my heavenly father,
for God.
Because no matter what our human fathers are like,
good, bad, or something in between,
God is our father,
and as our father
cares for us
and protects us
and sometimes even pushes us
to do more than we might have ever imagined doing.
Just like Joseph
tried to be for Jesus.
And so you who are dads,
can I suggest to you
that if you’re looking how to be a good father, look at Joseph.
And then take it the next step,
and look at God,
who is the very best father
there could ever be.
And all of us,
fathers and everyone else,
remember that God is our father
and is always there for us.
The same God
that we pray each Sunday
and many more times in between,
“Our Father...”
Amen.
© Raewynne J. Whiteley 2010