“But when he had considered this,
behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son
of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has
been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.
She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save
His people from their sins.” Matthew
1:20-21
As you know, the Bible speaks of several men of faith that went out to
do God’s will. I am certain that the one
that displayed the most amount of faith, was the one person in the story of
Jesus’ birth, that is spoken very little about.
Joseph was a man that really had his eyes attuned to God. Think about all that Joseph had to deal with,
and accept. It would be practically
impossible to think about it, in this day and age.
Joseph takes Mary, a virgin, to be his wife. Then, he finds out that Mary is pregnant….
Mary, the virgin. Joseph doesn’t make a
fuss. Instead, he plans to send Mary away,
quietly. Why? He’s a good man and doesn’t want to openly
disgrace her. However, we find that the
Lord sends an angel to pay Joseph a visit, assuring him that Mary is still a
virgin, yet is carrying a child conceived from God.
Try to imagine that nowadays. A
man’s bride-to-be is pregnant, though being a virgin. The first instinct would be for the man to
get angry, wanting to know “Who is the father?”
You get the answer, “Well, the father is…. the Father.” How do you process THAT bit of
information? Could you be as calm as
Joseph was? I daresay that you wouldn’t. He kept his cool (so Matthew records) and
wasn’t going to make a big deal about it.
The angel steps in to reassure Joseph and he stays with Mary. FAITH!
A little later, Matthew records that after Jesus’ birth, the angel of
the Lord appears again to Joseph. The
Christ child’s life is in danger, due to King Herod. Joseph takes his family away to Egypt, as
instructed. FAITH! Surely, Joseph wasn’t prepared for all of
this. He just wanted to have a nice
little family, have his work, and just have a happy and carefree life. It takes more than an average man to
willingly do what Joseph did. He could
have said, “No! That is it! I don’t want ANY part of this, I’m done!” But, he didn’t.
Joseph is a perfect example of what a father should be. Where I grew up, we called those type of men “daddy.” They are the ones that are willing to go the
extra mile. They follow their hearts to
do what they know is the right thing to do, even if it may be difficult. Remember the example that Joseph set,
trusting in God to lead his family where he needed.
Joseph is a fantastic example of a "daddy". Great blog and reminder about such an important person in the story of Christ. Through FAITH he enacted one of the most important aspects of Jesus's birth.
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