“A Christmas Point of View” – Joseph – Matthew 1

“I have a dream” says Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

While we know that things have gotten considerably better on the civil rights front, it might be debatable whether that dream has come completely true.  While I will never be the preacher that Dr. King was, I too have a dream.  I have a dream of revival breaking out in Wise County, led not by me but other members of this church.

I have a dream of seeing this church ministering to the poor, addicted and incarcerated and it breaking out into a great turning-back of people to have a life-changing relationship with Jesus.  I have a dream of seeing our neighbor behind us coming to know God through His Son Jesus.  I have a dream of seeing the neighbors across the street know the peace and joy that comes with being a true believer.  I have a dream of seeing Lake Bridgeport being known as a hotbed of radical Christianity.

That’s my dream; well, one of my dreams.  I also dream of someday being a cowboy and a racecar driver.  Just being honest.  How about you?  What is your dream?  Do you dream about being rich and famous?  Do you dream of retirement?  Travel?  Anybody else want to be a cowboy or racecar driver?  Maybe we could go in together on something.  I don’t know.

The Bible talks quite a bit about the things that some people dreamed about.  In Luke chapter 2, it says, “²⁵ Now there was a man in Jerusalem called Simeon, who was righteous and devout. He was waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was on him. ²⁶ It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen the Lord’s Messiah. ²⁷ Moved by the Spirit, he went into the temple courts. When the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the custom of the Law required, ²⁸ Simeon took him in his arms and praised God, saying:  ²⁹ “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you may now dismiss your servant in peace.  For my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all nations:
³² a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of your people Israel.”

His dream was to see the Messiah.  Right after that it talks about a woman named Anna who had the same dream.  It had been prophesied over and over again in the Old Testament in places like Isaiah 9 that says, “For unto us a Child is born, Unto us a Son is given; And the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. ⁷ Of the increase of His government and peace There will be no end, Upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, To order it and establish it with judgment and justice From that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.”

That part about sitting on the throne of David was a big deal to the early Jews because David was kind of a big deal with God and God told David in 2 Samuel 7:16, “Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever."  And ever since then the Jewish people were waiting and hoping and dreaming of being able to see that prophecy come true.

Fast forward a thousand or so years and the Jewish people had not forgotten.  They would never forget.  They are still dreaming of one day seeing the Messiah fulfill the prophecy and reign on the throne of David forever.  There was a young carpenter who lived in Nazareth, which was north of Jerusalem, and I don’t know if he dreamed that same dream but I’m sure he was aware of the prophecy.  In fact, I’m sure he was aware of his genealogy that included David and how the genealogy of his soon-to-be wife also included David.  I wonder if they ever dared to dream that maybe the Christ, the Messiah, would come from their lineage.  It’s quite possible that their marriage had been arranged by two sets of parents with just that thought.  We don’t know.

But then the man’s fiancée comes to him with what seems to be obviously horrible news.  She is pregnant.  Since he knew that it could not be his child, he is devastated.  He loves her and wants the best for her but this will never work.  He can’t marry a girl who has obviously been unfaithful to him before they even get officially married.  In Jewish custom, they are in the betrothal period which is just like being married except they didn’t live together and this could only be broken by divorce.  Technically he could even have her stoned to death but he would never do that.

So he went to sleep determined to do the right thing by her even if she hadn’t by him.  But in this sleep, he too had a dream.  Let’s read about what Christmas must have looked like from Joseph’s point of view in Matthew 1:18-25.

¹⁸ This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. ¹⁹ Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet 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 conceive and 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 did not consummate their marriage until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.

Has anybody ever told you something and you really wanted to believe them but it was just too incredible of a story?  I used to work with a good friend of mine and he was always coming in and telling me these wild stories about crazy things that had happened to him.  He got mugged.  He got in a fight.  He met Merle Haggard.  Crazy stuff and I wanted to believe him but it was just too much.  Except it always turned out to be true.

Don’t you know Joseph wanted to believe Mary?  He really did, but come on!  You’re pregnant and an angel told you that it was ok because the Holy Spirit caused it.  That’s just too much to believe and even if he could believe it, nobody else would.  So, obviously the best thing to do for everybody was just divorce the girl quietly and move on.

We looked at Mary’s point of view last week and we saw that while God chose Mary to be the mother of the Savior simply through His grace, we also saw that she had put herself in the place to be blessed by being pure.  Now we look at it from Joseph’s point of view and look at what the scripture says about Joseph in verse 19.  He was a righteous man.  What do you think that means?

I did some research (not google this time) and looked up the word “righteous” in my concordance and believe it or not, do you know what the word means?  Righteous means to be right!  It means to be right with God.  Joseph was right with God before any of this happened.  Do you think that is a coincidence?  Do you think that God chose Mary who was pure and she just happened to be about to marry Joseph who was righteous?  This is a perfect example of what I have said so many times.  God’s will is going to be done one way or another and you can choose to be obedient and be a part of it or you can choose to disobey and suffer the consequences.  Joseph was righteous and that means he was obedient and so he got to enjoy the benefits of it.

But we don’t know much about young Joseph.  We don’t know specifically what made him righteous in God’s eyes so what does it mean and what does righteousness look like?  Well, there are several people named in the Bible as righteous.  Moses, Noah and Abraham were all called righteous and do you know what all three had in common?  All three were also named for their faith. 

In fact, if you turn over to what we call the “faith chapter” of the Bible, Hebrews 11, you will see several others named for their faith.  In verse 4, Abel was commended as a righteous man because of his faith.  In verse 7, by faith Noah became heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.  By faith Abraham, by faith Isaac, by faith Jacob, by faith Moses and on and on and then look at this fascinating verse 39 that says, “These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised.”

What had been promised?  What had been prophesied and predicted?  The Messiah, the Christ had been prophesied and it was what they all dreamed about getting to see.  But none of these mentioned had lived long enough to see that promise come true.  They all had a dream that one day they would see Jesus.  They all had faith that led to righteousness.  So, how does faith lead to righteousness?

I used to have an Australian Shepherd named JD. JD was a great dog and he went with me everywhere including to work every day.  I worked at a feed store in Arlington and JD loved to ride and loved to go with me even though the little store had no air conditioning.  So, I opened all the doors and windows and turned on all the fans and it was bearable.

JD liked to stay outside though either on the front porch and greet the customers as they came in or he would be in the back in the shade of a tree watching traffic go by.  He was always right there until one day he wasn’t.  He wasn’t in the front or back when it was time to go home so I closed up and went looking for him.  I drove around and saw this little kid playing and I asked him if he had seen a small grey and white dog running around.

He said, “Oh, like the one down at Accent Tire?”  I said “Thank you” because I knew the people at Accent tire and knew they didn’t have a grey and white dog.  So I drove two blocks down the road and parked in front of Accent Tire store and walked up the sidewalk to go in and who do you think I saw laying in the front office soaking up the a/c?

When I walked in the bell on the door chimed and JD lazily looked up and just put his head back down but then he jerked it back into a double-take when he realized it was me.  Busted!  I asked the lady in the office why she didn’t call me and tell me JD was there and she said she didn’t want to wake him up!  He was enjoying himself so much.

See, JD was not laying there dreaming of me or his job down at the hot feed store.  He was dreaming of the secretary giving him more jelly donuts.  Yes, she told me later she had given him jelly donuts.  I couldn’t believe it.  JD had no faith that I would walk in and find him there and so he was being disobedient thinking he would get away with it.

Joseph, on the other hand, along with all those others mentioned in Hebrews 11 dreamed, longed and hoped for the day the Messiah would come and so they kept themselves righteous, having great faith that any day their dream would come true and they wanted to be found worthy.  Joseph was righteous because of his faith.

Joseph was chosen by God because of God’s grace but also because Joseph had put himself in position to receive that grace just like Mary had.  From Joseph’s point of view this first Christmas was his dream come true even if it started out so unbelievably.  From Joseph’s point of view that took a lot of faith.  How about you?  Do you have faith?

“Oh, amen, pastor!  I have lots of faith!”  Do you?  How do we know?  How do you know if you have faith?  Look at verse 24 and we will see proof of Joseph’s faith and we will see how we, too, can prove our faith.  It says, “When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him.”  When Joseph woke up he was obedient and he was immediately obedient.

Thomas a Kampis said, “Instant obedience is the only kind of obedience there is; delayed obedience is disobedience. Whoever strives to withdraw from obedience, withdraws from Grace.”  It was God’s grace that allowed Joseph to be the legal father of the Christ-child but, again, Joseph put himself in a place to receive that grace by being instantly obedient.

Roger Staubach who led the Dallas Cowboys to the World Championship in '71 admitted that his position as a quarterback who didn't call his own signals was a source of trial for him. Coach Landry sent in every play. He told Roger when to pass, when to run and only in emergency situations could he change the play (and he had better be right!). Even though Roger considered coach Landry to have a "genius mind" when it came to football strategy, pride said that he should be able to run his own team.  Roger later said, "I faced up to the issue of obedience. Once I learned to obey there was harmony, fulfillment, and victory."

“Harmony…fulfillment…victory.”  Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it?  Well, since God is not going to ask you to be obedient by taking the virgin Mary to be your wife like He did with Joseph, what is He asking you to do?  Yea, sure, there’s the 10 Commandments.  We should all obey those.  Don’t have idols.  Don’t kill.  Don’t steal.  Don’t take the Lord’s name in vain.  Can I please stop right there and take a quick time-out?  This is not the Christmas story from Joseph’s point of view but I think he would agree that unless you are talking to God or about God…don’t use his name.  Saying OMG is a sin.  Stop it!  Ok, thank you.  Time in.

But I want you to realize how much more there is to being obedient to God than just following the 10 Commandments.  Having a relationship with God through His Son Jesus means that there is communication between you.  Isaiah 30:21 says, “Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the way; walk in it."”

That’s the voice of the Holy Spirit inside you telling you what to do, where to go and what to say.  Are you being obedient to that word from God?  Are you close enough to God to hear Him?  Being close to Him means you are righteous.  You are obedient.  What is there that God is telling you to do?  It may be some big thing that changes the world or it may be some small thing that changes you into someone more like Jesus.

Joseph had a dream and he was close enough to God to hear what he was supposed to do.  He believed God’s word and he was obedient to it.  It sounds simple and it actually is but you can’t even do that without God’s help.  It starts with having faith that the little baby born to those two young people was and is still God and that He lived, died, was buried and after 3 days was raised back to life.

Ask Him into your life today to be Lord and Savior; to forgive you of your sin.  You need to repent of that sin; turn away from it and accept His forgiveness and when you do your dream will start to become more and more like Abraham’s and Moses and Simeon…and Joseph.  That’s my dream for you today.  I want you to see Jesus.