Want Advent emails delivered straight to your inbox? Sign up here!
Readings: Matthew 1:18-25 + Matthew 2:13-23
Growing up, my family didn’t regularly attend church. As I made my way through college, I started attending services. I especially love services for holy days – Ash Wednesday, Christmas Eve, Maundy Thursday, and Easter.
As major players in Jesus’s birth, Mary and Joseph are undoubtedly well known to most Christians.
During services around Christmas time, I remember the almost constant refrain as sermons focused on Mary’s response to the angel. She is known as a woman of faith.
But it’s only now that I’m starting to dive into Joseph’s story. As the human father figure of Jesus, Joseph isn’t mentioned very often in the New Testament. I tend to imagine him somewhat demure, head bowed, standing off to the side of tabletop nativity scenes.
Joseph’s life is full of speculation. We’re not sure how old he was when he and Mary met, if he’d been married before, or when he died. But in the records we do have, it’s clear Joseph is a strong man of faith.
It’s unclear how Joseph first found out about Mary’s pregnancy. His story only tells us that he knew and was contemplating a divorce.
Although not yet married, their betrothal was a serious legal matter, and to separate would require witnesses and paperwork. People would know, and Mary’s standing in society, along with that of her child, would change forever.
Although Joseph was well within his rights to divorce Mary, he has a change of heart after an angel visits him in a dream.
The angel explains what’s going on and encourages Joseph to stick around. Unlike Zechariah, Joseph asks the angel no questions. It’s unclear if he wrestled or questioned God at all. We only know Joseph woke from the dream and responded immediately in obedience (v. 24).
Throughout Jesus’s early life, an angel visits Joseph in his dreams at least two more times (Matthew 2:13; 19-20). Again, he asks no questions about what he’s told. Instead, he gets up and responds.
At the time, I doubt this was the life he’d imagined for Mary and himself. Her questionable pregnancy left both their reputations at stake. And now he’s parenting a child that technically isn’t his.
But despite the challenges, Joseph never hesitates to say yes to God. As Jesus’s earthly father, he provided for the child and Mary within society. Rather than question his role, Joseph just steps into it in faith.
Joseph’s story leaves a lot to our imaginations. And, if you’re anything like me, I like the character’s backstories. I want to know who they were as full people and what their lives looked like.
But the Bible doesn’t give us that with Joseph, despite his likely significant role in Jesus’s early life.
Perhaps Joseph’s story highlights our need for faith. Because there is so much we don’t know, about Joseph’s life and our own, we are simply asked to trust in faith.
For me, this part of the nativity story is a constant practice of letting go.
I can’t help but wonder how our lives would change if we acted a little more on faith and a little less on logic. We all have situations asking us to let go of things that don’t make sense to our logical minds and step out in faith. May we respond like Joseph with an open heart and mind, in both faith and obedience.
Journal Prompt: Where else in life do you not have the whole story? How is God asking you to let go, trust, and step out in faith?
