SERMON NOTES FOR ADVENT 4: Isaiah 7:10-17, Psalm 80, Romans 1:1-7, Matthew 1:18-25.

 

In each heart lies a Bethlehem, an inn where we must ultimately answer whether there is room or not.

When we are Bethlehem-bound we experience our own advent in his.

When we are Bethlehem-bound we can no longer look the other way conveniently not seeing stars not hearing angel voices.

We can no longer excuse ourselves by busily tending our sheep or our kingdoms.

 

This Advent let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that the Lord has made known to us.

In the midst of shopping sprees let’s ponder in our hearts the Gift of Gifts.

Through the tinsel let’s look for the gold of the Christmas Star.

In the excitement and confusion, in the merry chaos, let’s listen for the brush of angels’ wings.

This Advent, let’s go to Bethlehem and find our kneeling places.                Ann Weems

 

In review of today’s assigned readings, Isaiah 7 tells us the Lord himself will give you a sign. God is love and nothing could keep him from his children. The Incarnation becomes a necessity. Therefore God took the one way in which to reveal his love: he became one of us. Through the life of Jesus Christ he spoke to us by human lips, and looked on us with human eyes. It is of him and him alone that we say, Immanuel, God is with us.

 

Psalm 80 is another testimony to Israel’s resolute confidence in God. The people are in dire straits, yet their faith persists that the Lord still tends them like a Shepherd and that he can and will save them.

 

In the reading from Romans today we are reminded that we as Christians are not our own because we have been bought with a price. The servant is one who, having no liberty of his own discovers that he possesses perfect freedom. When Paul speaks of being “called”, there is that deep assurance that in his own external purpose God has laid on us a task which we cannot evade but must discharge fully.

 

Today’s Gospel is about Joseph who was the protector of Mary’s good name and the foster father of Jesus, charged with the guidance and support of the holy family and responsible in some sense for the education of Him. Described as a just man, a word which implies both religious scruple and obedience to the will of God, he was sympathetic and kind. A just man was one who observed the Jewish law. A man of deep devotion, open to mystical experience and as a man of compassion, Joseph accepted his God-given responsibility with gentleness and humility.

 

Following Jewish wedding customs, there were three stages Joseph had to follow: the engagement, the betrothal and then the marriage. At the betrothal stage, it was told to Joseph that Mary was to bear a child, that that child had been begotten by the Holy Spirit, and that he must call the child by the name Jesus. Jesus is the Greek form of the Jewish name Joshua, and Joshua means Jehovah is salvation.

Jesus was not so much The Man born to be King as The Man to be Savior. He came to this world, not for his own sake, but for men and for our salvation. This passage tells us how Jesus was born by the action of the Holy Spirit. In Jewish thought the Holy Spirit had certain very definite functions. We must interpret this scripture in the light of the Jewish idea of the Holy Spirit, for that was all Joseph knew.

 

According to the Jewish idea, the Holy Spirit was the person who brought God’s truth to men. It was the Holy Spirit who taught prophets what to say: it was the Holy Spirit who, throughout the ages and the generations, brought God’s truth to men. Jesus is the one person who can tell us what God is like, and what God means us to be. In him alone we see what God is and what man ought to be.

The Jews believed that the Holy Spirit not only brought God’s truth to men, but also enabled men to recognize that truth when they saw it. The Jews specially connected the Spirit of God with the work of creation from Genesis to the Psalms to the book of Job. The Jews specially connected the Spirit, not only with the work of creation, but with the work of re-creation (Ezekiel and the dry bones). 

 

Back to the story; Joseph decides to end the engagement quietly rather than subject Mary to public disgrace. Joseph lies awake at night pondering the apparent horror that has overtaken him. Finally, he falls asleep, but his sleep is not peaceful. His sleep is disturbed by a dream. In his dream the angel of the Lord appears to Joseph. The angel calls Joseph by name and reminds him that one of his ancestors was David, Israel’s greatest king. Then the angel tells Joseph not to be afraid, but to keep his pledge to marry in spite of everything. Joseph wakes up, at peace because of the dream. He does what the angel told him to do. He marries his fiancé as planned, the baby boy is born, and he is named Jesus. Joseph is not stressed by the events in his life. The message from the angel confirmed everything. Most importantly, Joseph was willing to hear it and act on it. This dream that Joseph has is only the first in a series of important dreams that come to him. Each of them is meant to move him in the right direction, to keep his family out of harm’s way.

 

Joseph is a righteous man. He is obedient to God as he knows God. Joseph was a man of faith so when he had to act on something, it was an act of faith.

 

Think about Joseph’s story. In his story lies an important reason for us all to live a life of prayer, an important reason for the regular practice of prayer. If we are in relationship with God through a life of prayer, if we value God’s company on ordinary days, then, when the day of crisis arrives and our world seems to come apart, we can recognize God’s voice speaking to us at the heart of the crisis and we can respond in faith.

 

God speaks to His people in a variety of ways. For Joseph, it was through the Jewish law and that remarkable series of dreams. For others, it may happen through the reading of Scripture and through the experience of liturgical worship, through personal devotions, the beauty of nature, the warmth of human love, the circumstance of each day. It is vital that we persist in prayer so we become able to recognize the divine voice whenever it speaks. How we will respond is our choice. What each of us does in response to God’s voice has impact on other lives beyond our ability to reckon.

 

The Rev. Amy Richter says it best: When Matthew shows earthly parents who are doing right by their children, they are bringing them to Jesus, they are asking for their children to be healed, they are letting Jesus bless them. When parents care for their children by putting them in Jesus’ care, they are acting as sons and daughters of the Father in heaven. When any one of us cares for the least, the lost, the vulnerable, the weak, the little ones in our midst, we are acting as sons and daughters of our one Father, and brothers and sisters in Christ.

 

It’s at the beginning of this story that the spotlight shines on Joseph, who shows the baby Jesus the kind of care that is in line with what the child’s Father, and ours, desires. Joseph shows the kind of care that all of us are to show to those who are most vulnerable in society. Joseph follows the command of God. Joseph risks his own sense of what looks proper to the neighbors. Joseph aligns himself with someone others would call unrighteous. Joseph acts decisively when the child’s safety is at risk. Joseph is willing to act in such a way that Jesus will grow up knowing that his first allegiance is to God, and that means his family will be bigger, broader, and, stranger than any family Joseph could provide. Joseph is no earthly father to be sure, but shows us precisely the sort of love our heavenly Father wants us all to show.

 

May we, like Joseph our brother, know and show the love of our Father in heaven, this Christmas and always.

 

AMEN.