The deficiency of Joseph?
Matthew 1:18-25 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. 19 Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and 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 be with child and will 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 had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.
Have you ever played right field in baseball, softball or kickball? The team sticks the weakest player out in right field. They want to minimize his or her deficiencies.
Years ago, Peter, Paul and Mary sang a classic baseball song titled, “Right Field.” Here is a portion of it:
Saturday summers when I was a kid,
We'd run to the school yard and here's what we did,
We'd pick out the captains and we'd choose up the teams,
It was always a measure of my self esteem.
Cause the fastest, the strongest played shortstop and first,
the last ones they picked were the worst.
I never needed to ask, it was sealed,
I just took up my place in right field.
Playing right field, its easy you know,
You can be awkward, you can be slow,
That's why I'm here in right field,
Just watching the dandelions grow.
Out on the field, in the important positions of Christmas, you will find the Baby Jesus, Mary, shepherds, angels and Wise Men. But stuck off in lonely right field is … Joseph. He is stuck out there to cover up his deficiencies and weaknesses. Deficiencies like how he never has a spoken word recorded in Scripture. Deficiencies like how there are no Christmas hymns in our hymnal where Joseph is mentioned (only CW:552 v8). “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” while “Shepherds Lately Knelt,” and “Gentle Mary Laid Her Child.” But nothing about Joseph, the guardian of the Son of God. Deficiencies like how in many nativity sets, Joseph is interchangeable with the shepherds. He is the forgotten guy, the least important.
Where many people stick him out in right field, today the Holy Spirit, through the Gospel of Matthew, moves Joseph front and center. Though many see deficiencies in Joseph, I want to focus on the efficiency of Joseph. Joseph’s quiet efficiency promotes Jesus’ sufficiency.
Matthew tells us this version of the Christmas story from Joseph’s point of view. It is not as well known as Luke’s version with its idyllic setting, the story of the little town of Bethlehem, no room in the inn, the manger, angels, shepherds and all that. But it is the story of how God uses a simple man, a quiet man, a man of faith, to provide a home for this long-awaited Child, believe His promises and protect the newborn King from King Herod.
Here is demonstrated, not the deficiency of Joseph, but the quiet efficiency of this man a faith, a man of action. Not a single word from the carpenter of Nazareth is recorded in Scripture. It’s all action. But that’s OK. His actions speak much louder than any of his words, which is proper for a man who made his living from building things. His faith is shown in his quiet action.
Joseph had every right to publicly humiliate Mary for her seemingly obvious unfaithfulness to him. But “he did not want to expose her to public disgrace,” so he was going to quietly break off their engagement, so she could marry the father of her unborn child. But before He could carry out his merciful plans, Joseph was shown even greater mercy from God. An angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and told him that this child was not the result of infidelity, but of fidelity. That is, God was being faithful to His promise to send a Savior. No man had fathered this child – it was God Himself, come down in mercy. Just as the prophet Isaiah had written over 700 years earlier (a promise that a just and godly man like Joseph would have known well): “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel.” Yes, Mary had not been unfaithful to him. She was still a virgin. She would be the Mother of God.
So with quiet efficiency, Joseph puts aside his previous plans and takes his pregnant fiancé home.. He names the Child “Jesus.” Then he quietly flees with the holy family to Egypt when Herod wants to kill the Child. Later he settles in Nazareth when the danger is past. All without so much as a recorded word. Can any words from this man’s mouth say more than this simple, faithful act? Can any song or hymn say more about the life of faith this: “he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus”?
Joseph is so different from us and our culture. We like to boast. We like to brag. If we do anything great or small, we want God and the world to know it. We desire trophies and medals. We display plaques and diplomas. We post every little accomplishment or minutest thought on Facebook. We want positions of glory – shortstop, quarterback, striker, manager, supervisor, boss, C.E.O. We make ourselves more so people will look at us more.
But Joseph made himself less so He could make his foster Son, Jesus, more. God called Joseph out of right field, put him up to bat as God’s pinch hitter in this critical situation, and then he quietly want back out to right field. And Joseph was fine with that.
The deficiency many see in Joseph was really quiet efficiency. Joseph’s efficiency of faith was all about pointing to Jesus’ sufficiency as Savior.
An old pioneer traveled westward across the Great Plains until he came to an abrupt halt at the edge of the Grand Canyon. He gawked at the sight before him: a vast chasm one mile down, eighteen miles across, and more than a hundred miles long! He gasped, "Something musta happened here!" A visitor to our world at Christmas time, seeing the lights, the decorations, the trees, the parades, the festivities, and the religious services, would also probably say, "Something must have happened here!" Indeed, something did happen. God came to our world on the first Christmas.
Something great happened at Christmas! Joseph was the silent guardian so the Creator could live among His creation. He is Immanuel, God with us. He was born in a barn so we may live in paradise. He was wrapped in strips of cloth, probably torn from Joseph’s cloak, so we may be wrapped in the white robes of Christ’s righteousness. The Son of God humbled Himself to become a baby living in a womb for nine months so we may become God’s children to live in heaven for eternity.
He is God with us in the word of absolution that comes from the pastor’s mouth to forgive your sins of boasting, pride and arrogance. He is God with us in the Word made flesh to turn your whole life inside out – away from a life of loud praise of yourself to quiet service for the Lord. He is God with us in the waters of Baptism where you died to sin and self and were raised to a new life of fidelity to God. He is God with us in the Lord’s Supper where Jesus comes to you personally to give you the strength to become an efficient man, woman or child of faith.
Immanuel is God with us in Godly strength in the cancer clinic and God with us with resurrection hope in the hospice home. Immanuel is God with us with abiding care when the pink slip comes and with us with prodigal love when the beloved child sneers, “I hate you.” Immanuel is God with us in uncommon compassion when your dear wife or mother stares at you with an Alzheimer’s glaze and absently asks, “What was your name again?”
He is God with us. His name says it all.
When Jesus is with us, nothing, not even death can separate us from God and His love. “God is with us!” It’s what Christmas is all about. Think about it: Moses was caught between Pharaoh and the Red Sea in a seemingly hopeless situation, yet God was with Him and God opened a way out. Shadrach, Meschach and Abednego were thrown into the seemingly impossible situation of the fiery furnace, but God was with them and not a hair was singed. Little David stood before Giant Goliath with nothing but a slingshot and faith, but God was with him in that valley and it made all the difference!
So it’s interesting that when the Holy Spirit wanted to capture the meaning of Christmas in a single word, He reached into the Old Testament and pulled out an old word, dusted it off and used it to convey a message. That word was Emmanuel. That’s what Jesus and Christmas is all about – “call him Immanuel” which means, “God with us.”
A grade school class was putting on a Christmas play which included the story of Mary and Joseph coming to the inn. In that class was one little boy who wanted very much to be Joseph. But when the parts were handed out, his biggest rival was given that part, and he was assigned to be the inn keeper instead. He was really bitter about this.
So during all the rehearsals he kept plotting what he might do the night of performance to get even with his rival. Finally, the night of the performance, Mary and Joseph came walking across the stage. They knocked on the door of the inn. The inn keeper opened the door and asked them gruffly what they wanted. Joseph answered, “We’d like to have a room for the night.” Suddenly the inn keeper threw the door open wide and said, “Great, come on in and I’ll give you the best room in the house.”
For a few seconds poor little Joseph didn’t know what to do, and a long silence ensued. Finally, though, thinking quickly on his feet, Joseph looked in past the inn keeper, first to the left and then to the right and said, “No wife of mine is going to stay in a dump like this. Come on, Mary, let’s go to the barn.” And once again the play was back on course.
What a great lesson from Joseph. It is obvious that Joseph cared deeply for Mary. He would not have risked his own reputation and protected her's if he did not. But even more than that, despite shame, uncertainty, and fear, Joseph had the courage to do what God asked him to do. Joseph decided to do more than law and custom required. He elected to do more than was expected of him. He let justice, compassion and obedience guide his decisions. He was pulled, not by the strength of custom, but by the law of love.
Learn from Joseph. Make yourself less and make Jesus be more in your life. Let your apparent deficiencies really become your quiet efficiency of faithful service to the Lord. Allow Jesus, your Immanuel, to be all-sufficient. Listen to the Lord. Obey His words. Protect your faith in the Christ Child.
So whether you have great spiritual gifts or are in a position of authority, whether you feel like you are stuck out in right field or whether you feel like you are an elderly person or a shut-in sitting on the bench, God will use you for His Kingdom work. He’ll use you right alongside Joseph, the guardian of the Son of God. Amen.
Have you ever played right field in baseball, softball or kickball? The team sticks the weakest player out in right field. They want to minimize his or her deficiencies.
Years ago, Peter, Paul and Mary sang a classic baseball song titled, “Right Field.” Here is a portion of it:
Saturday summers when I was a kid,
We'd run to the school yard and here's what we did,
We'd pick out the captains and we'd choose up the teams,
It was always a measure of my self esteem.
Cause the fastest, the strongest played shortstop and first,
the last ones they picked were the worst.
I never needed to ask, it was sealed,
I just took up my place in right field.
Playing right field, its easy you know,
You can be awkward, you can be slow,
That's why I'm here in right field,
Just watching the dandelions grow.
Out on the field, in the important positions of Christmas, you will find the Baby Jesus, Mary, shepherds, angels and Wise Men. But stuck off in lonely right field is … Joseph. He is stuck out there to cover up his deficiencies and weaknesses. Deficiencies like how he never has a spoken word recorded in Scripture. Deficiencies like how there are no Christmas hymns in our hymnal where Joseph is mentioned (only CW:552 v8). “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” while “Shepherds Lately Knelt,” and “Gentle Mary Laid Her Child.” But nothing about Joseph, the guardian of the Son of God. Deficiencies like how in many nativity sets, Joseph is interchangeable with the shepherds. He is the forgotten guy, the least important.
Where many people stick him out in right field, today the Holy Spirit, through the Gospel of Matthew, moves Joseph front and center. Though many see deficiencies in Joseph, I want to focus on the efficiency of Joseph. Joseph’s quiet efficiency promotes Jesus’ sufficiency.
Matthew tells us this version of the Christmas story from Joseph’s point of view. It is not as well known as Luke’s version with its idyllic setting, the story of the little town of Bethlehem, no room in the inn, the manger, angels, shepherds and all that. But it is the story of how God uses a simple man, a quiet man, a man of faith, to provide a home for this long-awaited Child, believe His promises and protect the newborn King from King Herod.
Here is demonstrated, not the deficiency of Joseph, but the quiet efficiency of this man a faith, a man of action. Not a single word from the carpenter of Nazareth is recorded in Scripture. It’s all action. But that’s OK. His actions speak much louder than any of his words, which is proper for a man who made his living from building things. His faith is shown in his quiet action.
Joseph had every right to publicly humiliate Mary for her seemingly obvious unfaithfulness to him. But “he did not want to expose her to public disgrace,” so he was going to quietly break off their engagement, so she could marry the father of her unborn child. But before He could carry out his merciful plans, Joseph was shown even greater mercy from God. An angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and told him that this child was not the result of infidelity, but of fidelity. That is, God was being faithful to His promise to send a Savior. No man had fathered this child – it was God Himself, come down in mercy. Just as the prophet Isaiah had written over 700 years earlier (a promise that a just and godly man like Joseph would have known well): “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel.” Yes, Mary had not been unfaithful to him. She was still a virgin. She would be the Mother of God.
So with quiet efficiency, Joseph puts aside his previous plans and takes his pregnant fiancé home.. He names the Child “Jesus.” Then he quietly flees with the holy family to Egypt when Herod wants to kill the Child. Later he settles in Nazareth when the danger is past. All without so much as a recorded word. Can any words from this man’s mouth say more than this simple, faithful act? Can any song or hymn say more about the life of faith this: “he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus”?
Joseph is so different from us and our culture. We like to boast. We like to brag. If we do anything great or small, we want God and the world to know it. We desire trophies and medals. We display plaques and diplomas. We post every little accomplishment or minutest thought on Facebook. We want positions of glory – shortstop, quarterback, striker, manager, supervisor, boss, C.E.O. We make ourselves more so people will look at us more.
But Joseph made himself less so He could make his foster Son, Jesus, more. God called Joseph out of right field, put him up to bat as God’s pinch hitter in this critical situation, and then he quietly want back out to right field. And Joseph was fine with that.
The deficiency many see in Joseph was really quiet efficiency. Joseph’s efficiency of faith was all about pointing to Jesus’ sufficiency as Savior.
An old pioneer traveled westward across the Great Plains until he came to an abrupt halt at the edge of the Grand Canyon. He gawked at the sight before him: a vast chasm one mile down, eighteen miles across, and more than a hundred miles long! He gasped, "Something musta happened here!" A visitor to our world at Christmas time, seeing the lights, the decorations, the trees, the parades, the festivities, and the religious services, would also probably say, "Something must have happened here!" Indeed, something did happen. God came to our world on the first Christmas.
Something great happened at Christmas! Joseph was the silent guardian so the Creator could live among His creation. He is Immanuel, God with us. He was born in a barn so we may live in paradise. He was wrapped in strips of cloth, probably torn from Joseph’s cloak, so we may be wrapped in the white robes of Christ’s righteousness. The Son of God humbled Himself to become a baby living in a womb for nine months so we may become God’s children to live in heaven for eternity.
He is God with us in the word of absolution that comes from the pastor’s mouth to forgive your sins of boasting, pride and arrogance. He is God with us in the Word made flesh to turn your whole life inside out – away from a life of loud praise of yourself to quiet service for the Lord. He is God with us in the waters of Baptism where you died to sin and self and were raised to a new life of fidelity to God. He is God with us in the Lord’s Supper where Jesus comes to you personally to give you the strength to become an efficient man, woman or child of faith.
Immanuel is God with us in Godly strength in the cancer clinic and God with us with resurrection hope in the hospice home. Immanuel is God with us with abiding care when the pink slip comes and with us with prodigal love when the beloved child sneers, “I hate you.” Immanuel is God with us in uncommon compassion when your dear wife or mother stares at you with an Alzheimer’s glaze and absently asks, “What was your name again?”
He is God with us. His name says it all.
When Jesus is with us, nothing, not even death can separate us from God and His love. “God is with us!” It’s what Christmas is all about. Think about it: Moses was caught between Pharaoh and the Red Sea in a seemingly hopeless situation, yet God was with Him and God opened a way out. Shadrach, Meschach and Abednego were thrown into the seemingly impossible situation of the fiery furnace, but God was with them and not a hair was singed. Little David stood before Giant Goliath with nothing but a slingshot and faith, but God was with him in that valley and it made all the difference!
So it’s interesting that when the Holy Spirit wanted to capture the meaning of Christmas in a single word, He reached into the Old Testament and pulled out an old word, dusted it off and used it to convey a message. That word was Emmanuel. That’s what Jesus and Christmas is all about – “call him Immanuel” which means, “God with us.”
A grade school class was putting on a Christmas play which included the story of Mary and Joseph coming to the inn. In that class was one little boy who wanted very much to be Joseph. But when the parts were handed out, his biggest rival was given that part, and he was assigned to be the inn keeper instead. He was really bitter about this.
So during all the rehearsals he kept plotting what he might do the night of performance to get even with his rival. Finally, the night of the performance, Mary and Joseph came walking across the stage. They knocked on the door of the inn. The inn keeper opened the door and asked them gruffly what they wanted. Joseph answered, “We’d like to have a room for the night.” Suddenly the inn keeper threw the door open wide and said, “Great, come on in and I’ll give you the best room in the house.”
For a few seconds poor little Joseph didn’t know what to do, and a long silence ensued. Finally, though, thinking quickly on his feet, Joseph looked in past the inn keeper, first to the left and then to the right and said, “No wife of mine is going to stay in a dump like this. Come on, Mary, let’s go to the barn.” And once again the play was back on course.
What a great lesson from Joseph. It is obvious that Joseph cared deeply for Mary. He would not have risked his own reputation and protected her's if he did not. But even more than that, despite shame, uncertainty, and fear, Joseph had the courage to do what God asked him to do. Joseph decided to do more than law and custom required. He elected to do more than was expected of him. He let justice, compassion and obedience guide his decisions. He was pulled, not by the strength of custom, but by the law of love.
Learn from Joseph. Make yourself less and make Jesus be more in your life. Let your apparent deficiencies really become your quiet efficiency of faithful service to the Lord. Allow Jesus, your Immanuel, to be all-sufficient. Listen to the Lord. Obey His words. Protect your faith in the Christ Child.
So whether you have great spiritual gifts or are in a position of authority, whether you feel like you are stuck out in right field or whether you feel like you are an elderly person or a shut-in sitting on the bench, God will use you for His Kingdom work. He’ll use you right alongside Joseph, the guardian of the Son of God. Amen.
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