Sermon 5/17/15
Matthew 1:18-25
Dreaming: Another Joseph
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas! Ok, maybe
not. But today, we’re having a little bit of Christmas in May. We’ve been
talking about dreams and dreamers in the Bible, and it just seemed wrong to skip
over Joseph and his dreams about the birth of the Christ-child, even if it
seems a little out of season. I have to admit, when we’re in the midst of the
season of Advent, I get annoyed when we’re in the lectionary year that focuses
mostly on the gospel of Matthew, because Matthew, unlike Luke, focuses on
Joseph in the birth narrative, instead of Mary. The way I figure it, women are
featured so rarely in the Bible, compared with men, and after all, Mary is the
one who carries and gives birth to Jesus – you’d think it would be obvious that
she should be center stage. But no, Matthew’s gospel manages to somehow make
even the birth of Jesus about Joseph,
not Mary.
Still, for today, talking about Jesus’ birth from
Joseph’s point of view makes sense for us, because, for whatever reason, the
scriptures recount that Mary learned of God’s plan through a visit from God’s
messenger, an angel, with Mary apparently fully awake. But Joseph, although
he’s visited by a messenger of God, is dreaming, asleep when all this takes
place. And since we’re talking about the stuff of dreams, today, we’re sticking
with Joseph. Besides, I find his perspective interesting for our conversations
about dreams. Because Joseph’s dreams are about someone else. His dreams are
more about what God is doing in someone else’s life than in his own. And we
need to think about what that means.
Our text tells us that Joseph and Mary were engaged, but
not yet living together, when Mary was discovered to be pregnant – “with child
from the Holy Spirit” we read. We’re not sure how Mary shares this news with
Joseph, or even if she spoke to him of it directly, and we don’t know if he
knows about this “Holy Spirit” piece or not. But presumably, the presence of
the Holy Spirit doesn’t make him think there isn’t someone else involved, because Joseph moves to “dismiss” Mary
– to divorce her, a formal separation that would be needed in this society even
though they weren’t yet married. He does this, we read, because he’s a
“righteous man,” a just man, who doesn’t want to expose her to public disgrace,
and instead chooses a private, quiet reaction. He could have brought her up on
charges, had her tried for adultery, but Joseph seems to want to protect her
from that possible end. When he’s planned to do this, he has a dream. A
messenger from God tells him “do not be afraid” to take Mary as your wife,
because her child is from the Holy Spirit, and her son, who will be named
Jesus, will save people from their sins, and fulfill the words of the prophet,
saying a child will come who will be God
with us.
Joseph as a dreamer in the scriptures stands out to me in
a few ways. First of all, we have to presume that this unfolding of events was not the dream that Joseph had for his
life. As he imagined wedding Mary and starting a family with her, I imagine he
did not anticipate this chain of events. In some ways, his personal dreams are
dashed twice – first when he thinks he must divorce Mary, and then when the
messenger tells him that Mary’s son will be from God, not Joseph. However
Joseph handles things, this can’t be what he imagined. Not only is it probable
that Joseph’s personal dreams are suddenly, at best, vastly altered by the
angel’s news, but Joseph also becomes a sort of secondary character in his own
life story. His dream is replaced, and he’s not a central focus in what happens
instead. In the scriptures, we hardly hear a word of Joseph after the birth
narrative. Occasionally, Jesus is referred to as the carpenter’s son. But we
don’t see him towards the end of the gospels. Only Mary. Still, the messenger
tells Joseph “do not be afraid” to take Mary as a wife. Do not be afraid. These
words appears hundreds of times in the scriptures. Do not be afraid. What,
exactly, would Joseph have been afraid of? I wonder, what exactly would Joseph
be risking to listen to the angel and follow God’s new dream for his life?
For the past couple of months, I’ve been taking part in a
program where you can complete research surveys online from different
universities. Psychology students doing their research coursework use participants
to carryout out their studies, test their hypotheses. Some of the surveys are
unique and interesting, but some of them are repetitive, and I feel like I’ve
done the same survey a million times No doubt, these surveys are from lower
class levels, where students are just learning research methods, conducting on
their own experiments that already have proven results. One of the surveys I
get repeatedly is a variation on a similar scenario, that all boils down to the
same question: how much of a risk-taker are you? Most recently, the scenario
was: I’m a vineyard grower. If bad weather destroys my vineyard, I lose
$30,000. A big storm is predicted to come my way, but usually the storms only
hit my region 30% of the time a storm is predicted. Insurance costs $9000. Last
year, my vineyard was hit, but I didn’t lose my crops. I’m cash-strapped. Do I
buy the insurance, or not?
These surveys make me think about what it means to be a
risk-taker. I’ve never considered myself a thrill-seeker. You’re never going to
catch me bungee-jumping. I don’t like roller coasters or rides that generally
spin you around fast or flip you upside down. I’m not likely to do something
that has a strong possible result of physical injury. And so in my head, in my
narrative of my self-identity, I’ve always thought: I’m not a big risk-taker.
But this past year, I’ve started to change my thinking. I’ve been blessed to
have a sabbatical year that turned out differently than I expected it to in
some good ways, a year that has brought some clarity and some possibilities for
my ministry before me. But when I started out, I was taking a big risk. I had
no real plan of how I was going to survive the year financially, and no clear
picture of what might be coming next for me. The research grant that I’ve been
working on with you and other churches wasn’t even yet on my radar when I
requested this sabbatical year. I just knew God was calling me to be doing
something different than I had been. I just knew that keeping on the same
pattern I was in was not serving God in the way I thought I was meant to be. I
don’t think I realized until I was well into that I had taken a big risk in
order to try to be faithful to God’s dreams for me. I don’t mean to sounds like
I’m telling you how great I am, how bold I am. It’s more that I realized that
when I believe the risk is really worth it,
really means something, maybe it is
worth taking, even if you aren’t usually a thrill-seeker. When it comes to
following God, maybe we can all be risk-takers, because when we really give our
lives to God, that step of faith is really a step firmly grounded in God’s
dreams.
I asked us to think about what Joseph was risking by
following God’s dreams. I think Joseph risked being made a fool of, first of
all. As a man in his society, he wouldn’t get in trouble for wedding Mary even
if she carried someone else’s child, but he would certainly be considered a
fool. He might have endured humiliation and ridicule. Perhaps people whispering
about him. And more than that, he’d risk always being in a sort of secondary
place in Jesus’ life, while raising him as his child. In the only scene we have
of Jesus as young boy in the Bible, Jesus says to his parents, “Didn’t you know
I would be in my father’s house?” He’s referring to God, not to Joseph, of
course. Joseph would have to know that he was
and wasn’t Jesus’ father, and live
always with that tension. Still, the phrasing of the messenger’s words: “Don’t
be afraid to take Mary as your wife” – these words suggest that Joseph wanted to take the risk, and needed just
those words of encouragement to follow through. Joseph trusted in God’s dream,
no matter how foolish he might look, no matter how diminished his own role
might be. I think of the apostle Paul, who frequently referred to himself as a
fool – a fool for the sake of Christ. Following God might involve doing things
that other people find astonishing – foolish even – when we choose to be last
instead of first, humbled rather than exalted, when we choose poverty over
riches, and serving rather than being served. Would you be a fool, for Christ?
A risk-taker, to follow God?
Do not be afraid! What would it look like if we weren’t
afraid to follow God? If we weren’t afraid to appear foolish to others? If we
didn’t mind playing second fiddle to the grand melody that God is writing? Are
you a risk-taker? What would it look like, if Apple Valley were a congregation
full of risk-takers? Of fools for Christ? For Joseph, it meant a different life
than he ever could have imagined. But it also meant having a front-row seat to
God becoming flesh and living among us, with
us. Worth the risk. Whatever God asks of us, no matter how foolish God’s plans
might seem at first glance, don’t be afraid. It’ll be worth it. God promises.
Amen.
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