Christmas:  God Remembers to be Merciful
December 9      When God’s will is difficult – Matthew 1:18-25, Luke 1:39-45
Dennis Mullen

             One of the themes at the center of the Christmas story is the difficulty of being chosen by God for some special purpose.  Take Joseph, for example.  Sure, he had a clear understanding of his purpose in life – to help raise the Son of God.  But wouldn’t it have been much easier to be Joseph’s cousin (for example), to have nothing more to do than stay home and work and raise a family and live an ordinary, unremarkable life?  But because Joseph was singled out by God, his life was disrupted, his plans were overturned and he and Mary and Jesus had to leave the country for a few years just to stay alive.

            And Mary…knowing what we know now about Jesus and how his life would go, what mother would choose Mary’s task?  Better to be another woman in her town and raise an ordinary family out of the spotlight of God’s attention.  But Mary, being at the center of God’s plan to save the world, had a much more difficult task – to raise a son who didn’t belong to this world, destined to make enemies, destined to die for the sins of the world.

            In the Bible, being at the center of God’s will is often a difficult place to be. Of course, it is always the BEST place to be, especially from an eternal perspective.  But it can be a DIFFICULT place to be; it can be a sure path away from a comfortable and easy life.  Living in God’s will got Joseph (the one in Genesis) thrown into prison for a couple of years.  It moved Moses from being Prince of Egypt into the business of shepherding and running for his life.  Doing God’s will moved Paul from a promising career as a religious scholar out into the world where he got the chance to be shipwrecked, beaten and despised by many. 

            The odd thing is that when we talk about God’s will today, we sometimes speak of it as the easiest and most natural thing in the world that you can do.  Some folks say, “I just know that God wants me to be happy”, and they use that standard to measure their relationships, their money and their entertainment, and even if what they want to do is contrary to Scripture, well, how can God’s will go against their happiness? 

            Or sometimes we talk about what we want to do for God, but what we want to do is difficult or takes commitment, and we easily come to the conclusion that “God shut that door”.  Underlying this is the assumption that being in God’s will ought to be fairly easy, natural, that there ought to be a certain flow to it. 

            That’s why it is so valuable to spend a little time with Mary and Joseph once in awhile, to consider their plight and find out what it means to be in God’s will when God’s will is the most difficult thing in all the world. 

            Last week we saw how it was Mary first heard that she was to bear God’s son.  Her response was simply this:  LK 1:38 "I am the Lord's servant," Mary answered. "May it be to me as you have said."  Admirable obedience.  Her simple response doesn’t convey how difficult this situation was going to be for Mary - a very young woman, with child in the midst of a culture that really knew how to apply shame!  Maybe that’s why the very next verse is about Mary racing off to a relative’s house, possibly as much as 50 or 60 miles away (a week’s journey on foot) and staying away for three months.

            LK 1:39 At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, 40 where she entered Zechariah's home and greeted Elizabeth (who, remember, has become pregnant in her old age and is carrying the baby that will be John the Baptist). 41 When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. 42 In a loud voice she exclaimed: "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! 43 But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? 44 As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. 45 Blessed is she who has believed that what the Lord has said to her will be accomplished!"  Once again, the lesson from last week is repeated:  When God speaks, faith responds by hearing, taking the message to heart, and obeying.  Her willingness to surrender to the Lord's will marks her as one of the best among all his followers – in the Bible, in history itself.

            What about Joseph?  His task was as difficult as Mary, and more so in its own way.  Joseph was called to be a faithful supporting player in this drama, to do his best in a tough job that no one asked him if he wanted to do; or more accurately, a tough job that wasn't his, but Mary's.  Joseph was called to be a surrogate father to God's own son.  It most certainly was something that was beyond belief, and I have no doubt that Joseph would NOT have believed it...in fact, Matthew”s gospel says that he was ready to divorce Mary quietly – but God stepped in.

            MT 1:18 This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. 19 Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.  Remember in the video last week, the historically accurate scene where Mary's parents announce that the engagement has been made, and then her father says to Mary:  “You will live with us for the next year, but you are husband and wife, in every way except that which leads to children.”  That was the status of an engagement for them, or a “betrothal”.  So Joseph had in mind to end the marriage legally via an official divorce.

    MT 1:20 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."

    MT 1:22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel" --which means, "God with us."

    MT 1:24 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 had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.

            Like Mary, Joseph shows a profound and simple ability to listen to God's word and obey it.  And like Mary, Joseph doesn't give any indication how difficult this would be.

            We're going to watch a scene from last year's movie The Nativity Story, a scene which illustrates how difficult God's will might have made things for this young couple.  Remember that shortly after the angel's announcement to her, Mary went to stay with Elizabeth for three months.  This scene begins with her return home, when the people of Nazareth (including Joseph) found out about her pregnancy.

41:08 = ch. 11 Mary returns home
48:20 – dove against sky after dream

            Again this week, my applications are very simple.  Mary and Joseph had a difficult task given to them by God.  In many ways, it was almost impossible to accept, and would have been except for God's special revelation to them.  But at this point in the story, Mary isn't wrestling with whether to believe it, and after this point, neither is Joseph.  That's not the difficulty they face anymore.  Instead, their difficulty is how to respond when almost no one supports them in their faithfulness to God, when almost no one understands.

            This, I think, is where American Christians find ourselves woefully unprepared for discipleship.  If we can follow Christ as part of a solid and supportive group, we do it.  But when the group is whittled down to just a few, or to none, we're lost.  When we go to work or to school, we don't have the will to be honest or pure or godly because the pressure to conform is too great.

            In a way, that is very understandable, and in fact its why Christ founded the church.  It's why Hebrews tells us to never give up meeting together, and why 1 Corinthians and Romans talk about the church as the Body of Christ and how we all need each other.  We shouldn't have to stand completely alone.

            But the purpose of coming together (like we are now) is to strengthen one another so we can go out and live like Christ in the world even when it IS difficult.  We go out to let our light shine.  We come in here to get our batteries charged. 

            What concerns me is our tendency (MINE as well as yours) to approach everything about our faith as consumers.  Consumers ask:  “Do I want to go to church?  Do I have time to study Scripture?  Should I really give up half-an-hour to practice an act of service that I'm not really excited about?  Do I really want to pray?”  Consumers do these things when it suits them, and they do their own thing when it doesn't.  And then when we get into tough situations, where God's will is difficult, we spout years of marketing slogans that have shaped us more than the Scriptures, and we say:  “Well God wouldn't want me to be unhappy after all.  No one can REALLY expect me to be honest in MY situation!  Compared to the people I work with, I AM pure in my actions.”  And God's standards get watered down beyond recognition, and you and I get almost no benefit from following Jesus.  Benefit?  Am I talking like a consumer again?  Well Jesus always said that it would be worth it to surrender everything and follow him.  He who seeks to save his life will lose it, but he who loses it for me will FIND it!” 

            The Nativity Story shows a picture of Joseph and Mary with such a deep faith in God that this thing he asks of them – crazy as it seems to everyone else, costly as it is to them – isn't too much to ask.  Their response is the one worded by Mary (as we saw last week) when the angel told her about Jesus:  “I am the Lord's servant.  May it be to me just as you have said.”

            Close by calling to mind a situation coming tomorrow or this week where you KNOW that God's will is going to be the difficult path.  Commit now to follow it, and ask for God's strength and maybe some person who can share the load.

 Morrison Hill Christian Church
P.O. Box 59 - 1008 E. Race St.
Kingston, TN  37763   (865) 376-5205