Young and In Trouble
December 15, 2013
Most times
the announcement is taken as good news!
Grandparents tell everyone who will listen. Good friends throw parties and shower the
mother-to-be with soft blankets and little booties that are just so cute. The words, “We’re going to have a baby” will
make nearly everyone smile and shout “Congratulations.”
Most times
the announcement is taken as good news, but not always. Sometimes the baby comes when you least
expect it and are ill prepared to take care of it. Having a child is a tremendous responsibility
requiring much care and sacrifice, but not everyone is at that stage in life
where they can offer that care. Not
everyone is willing to make the sacrifice needed. It is not always good news when
a child comes before you are ready so fear rather than joy becomes the dominant
emotion.
This
morning’s scripture is about a most unexpected pregnancy and about the feelings
that follow. It chronicles the response
of a young woman in trouble and the man who stands beside her. Let us pray:
Lord, most
of us want to do the right thing, but often we are uncertain about what that
right thing might be. We see merit on
both sides. So, we pray that through your Word and by your Spirit, we might see
more clearly the path to take. When we see clearly that path to take, grant us
the courage and conviction to follow it.
We pray through Jesus Christ who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.[1] Amen.
David Barry
the newspaper columnist wrote, “My most vivid childhood memory of Christmas
that does not involve opening presents, putting batteries in presents, playing
with presents, and destroying presents before sundown, is the annual Nativity
Pageant at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Armonk, New York.
Mrs. Elison
was the director and she would tell the children what role they would play
based on their artistic abilities. For
example, if you were short you would get a role as an angel, which involved
being part of the Heavenly Host and gazing with adoration at the Christ child.
Shepherd
was my favorite role because you got to carry a stick, plus you spent most of
the pageant waiting in the back of the closet with a rope that led up to the
church bell and about 750,000 bats. Many
were the happy rehearsal hours we shepherds spent back there in the dark,
whacking each other with sticks and climbing up the ladder so as to cause bat
emission products to rain down upon us.
After a
couple of years as shepherd, you usually did a stint as a Three King. This was not nearly as good a role because
you had to lug around the gold, the frankincense and of course the myrrh, which
God forbid you should drop because they were played by valuable antique
containers belonging to Mrs. Elison.
Nevertheless, being a Three King was better than being Joseph, since
Joseph had to hang around with Mary who was played by a girl. You had to wait backstage with this girl and
walk in with this girl. Needless to say,
you felt like a total wonk, which was not helped by the fact that the shepherds
and the three king were constantly suggesting that you really liked this
girl. So, during the pageant Joseph
tended to maintain the maximum allowable distance from Mary, as though she were
carrying some kind of bacteria.”[2]
That comes
pretty close to describing the relationship between the real Mary and Joseph.
He was going to want to keep his distance from Mary, and he would have, had the
Lord not intervened. “Now the birth of
Jesus the Messiah took place this way.
When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph before they lived
together, she was found to be with child….”[3]
That last little bit changed everything.
The invitations and the cake, the reception hall and the band had all
been booked but now they would all be put on hold and probably canceled. Babies were supposed to follow marriage, and
when that sequence was reversed all of Nazareth would take note. People would
talk or rather whisper and point when Mary walked down the street.
Sometimes
people look at Mary as the quintessential, “unwed mother”, but to do so is to
misunderstand the marriage customs of first century Israel. She was not unwed, but she was not exactly
wed either. Marriage in Jesus’ day was a
three-step process. It began with an
engagement announcement. This was always
made by the parents, much the same way wedding announcements appear in our
newspapers today. “Mr. And Mrs.
so-and-so are pleased to announce…” But, in those days of arranged marriages it
could be made when the daughter was still a child. Sometimes the announcement
was even made shortly after birth.
When both the prospective bride and
groom came of age, the next step was betrothal, and although the Bibles in the
sanctuary indicate that Mary and Joseph were engaged, they were in fact,
betrothed. “The betrothal was what we
might call the ratification of the engagement into which the couple had
previously entered. Engagements could be
broken by either side by just saying so, but once the betrothal was entered
into, it was absolutely binding.”[4] The couple was considered married even though
the marriage ceremony was a year off and that is why Joseph is referred to as
Mary’s husband in the verse 19. To
separate during this one year betrothal period would require an official and
legal divorce.
So, when
Mary told Joseph she was carrying a child, which he knew most definitely was
not his, the sin in his eyes was nothing short of adultery, and the consequence
for adultery was clearly defined by his community and by the scriptures they
considered to be holy, to be from God.
Deuteronomy
22:23 spoke directly to this kind of situation.
“If a young woman, a virgin, already engaged to be married and a man
meets with her and lies down with her, you shall bring them to the gate and
stone them.” We will see later on in the gospels that this was still practiced
during Jesus’ day.
The one and
only thing the Bible says about Joseph is that he was a “righteous” man, so he
wanted to do the right thing. His
problem was in deciding what the right thing was because sometimes that is not
so easily understood. Life is often more gray than black and white and it’s
hard to know what to do. On the one hand
Joseph held the scriptures with this clearly stated command. His culture and community would have followed
that without question. No one would
fault him for invoking that commandment, bringing Mary before the elders, point
at her growing womb and declare, “The child is not mine.” The shame would be Mary’s and not his. People might even throw a little sympathy his
way.
On the other
hand, there was this trembling young girl with her story of angels and a coming
Messiah. While, he clearly put no stock
in her ramblings, it was evident to him that she was young and confused and in
trouble.
For him the
choice was justice or mercy. He would
invoke one or the other, but which one?
This is a
question most of us have struggled with at one time or another. Parents
especially have to decide, “Do we invoke justice to teach him a lesson”, or do
we grant mercy to show her we still love her.”
Sometimes justice seems the way to go.
Let him get away with it this time, we think, and next time the
consequences could be worse. He has to be taught that this is not the way to do
things. Consequences for actions is a
great teacher.
But, other times mercy seems called
for. She comes in after curfew, and you are ready to lower the boom, to ground
her until she’s thirty-five, but then you notice she’s crying. Her date did not go well and she asks, “what
is wrong with me”, so mercy and a shoulder to cry on seem the course of action
to follow. Sometimes it seems clear cut
and you know exactly what to do, but some are not so you just try to do the
best you can.
Joseph, to
his credit, thought the spirit of the law should be followed in this case and
not the letter of the law. He decided he
would show mercy to Mary and “quietly divorce her”. There would be no public scandal. She would
still face the challenge of carrying and bearing and raising this child on her
own, but she would at least avoid an angry stone laden mob. Most men of Joseph’s day would not have been
so kind.
But then
the Bible says, “The Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream”, and the Lord
presented Joseph with a third option he hadn’t even considered and that was unbridled
grace. While justice means, “you get
what you deserve”, and mercy implies “you don’t get what you deserve”; grace
means you receive a gift that no one really deserves.
God told
Joseph to take Mary as his wife and raise this child as his own, for it will be
through this child that the grace of God will be seen by all. So, Joseph did as God instructed, and the
rest is, as they say, history.
The impact
and influence that Joseph would have upon Jesus has been well chronicled by
students of scripture. There are hints along the way that give us a clue about
the relationship between Joseph and Jesus.
Joseph was a carpenter – Jesus became a carpenter. Joseph was a righteous man who valued mercy
and sought to follow the spirit of the law over the letter of the law, and so
was Jesus.
On more
than one occasion Jesus used the metaphors of building and construction and
carpentry in his parables because that was the language Joseph spoke to
him. When Jesus referred to God as
“father”, this image for him was not one of detached coldness, but one of
warmth and intimacy, because I think that is what he felt from Joseph.
The home in
which Jesus grew would have been much different had Joseph walked away from
Mary, but part of the good news of the gospel is that Joseph, by God’s grace,
recognized the importance of being a good father, even to a child he knew was
not his. Somehow Joseph learned that it
is love and not DNA that makes for a good father.
That’s an
important lesson for most adoptive parents and children learn. Sometimes
children are conceived by accident. They
were not intended. Children who are
adopted are chosen. There is nothing accidental about it. It is love and not DNA that matters.
For
everyone who struggles to do the right thing but sees only shades of gray and
is looking for clarity and direction consider the choices Joseph had – justice,
mercy, grace? Then consider the choice
Joseph made. Grace has always been the
gift God has given, and it is the gift God hopes to see each of us give to each
other.
There are
times when justice is called for when consequences should follow actions. There
are times when we mercy seems the way to go because the lesson has been
learned. Repentance and confession have
been expressed so consequences are replaced by forgiveness.
It is the grace of God that allows
us to see the difference. It is the Word
of the Lord that gives us guidance and direction.
The table
set before us is the perfect example of that.
“For while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” The bread and the cup are an eternal reminder
to us of God’s grace, a gift freely given.
When you receive this gift, consider the gift of grace you may extend to
someone else. This gift, like all good
gifts, is meant to be shared. It is to
multiply and grow.
Let us pray:
Lord, so
often we see gift giving in this season to be a chore. We struggle through long lines to buy a thing
we’re not sure has much meaning anyway.
Help us, Lord, to give with a right spirit. Remind us that we follow a pattern of grace
you set on that first Christmas, for then we experience the joy you
intend. Amen.
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