Get Up and Go

This is the sermon given in the Wheatland Parish Sunday, December 23, 2012.  The Bible verses used are Matthew 1:28-2:23.

            When we think of the story of the birth of Jesus, who do we think of?  Who’s represented in your standard nativity scene?  Well, you have your shepherds and your wise men.  You probably have a camel, maybe a donkey, maybe a few sheep.  You have Mary and the baby Jesus.  And you have one other person.  Who is it?

            That’s right.  Joseph.  It would be unthinkable to have a nativity scene without Joseph.  He’s one of the most famous characters in the Bible, especially this time of year.

            And yet, when we read the stories of the birth of Jesus in the Bible, we learn almost nothing about Joseph.  There’s really only one passage of scripture that’s about Joseph, and it’s the passage we read today.

            And yet, it’s not really accurate to say that passage is about Joseph, is it?  What did we read today?  The first bit was about the angel talking to Joseph, but it’s pretty much a monologue by the angel.  We’re not told anything Joseph said.  We’re not told anything Joseph thought.  We’re not told anything Joseph felt.  All we’re told is that Joseph got up and did what the angel told him to do.

            The next bit is about King Herod and the wise men.  Joseph isn’t even in the scene.  Then we go to an angel talking to Joseph, and it’s another monologue.  Again, we’re not told anything Joseph might have said, or thought, or felt.  Again, all we’re told is that Joseph got up and did what the angel told him to do.

            Then we go back to Herod.  Then, we get the angel doing another monologue to Joseph.  Again, what Joseph said, or thought, or felt is not reported.  Again, all we’re told is that Joseph got up and did what the angel told him to do.

            It’s kind of amazing when you think about it.  This man is so crucial to the story of Jesus that we’d never dream of leaving him out of it, and yet we know almost nothing about him.  We don’t know how old he was.  We don’t know from this story what he did for a living.  We only know Joseph was a carpenter because later on, when Jesus started his ministry, some skeptics are quoted as saying, “isn’t he the carpenter’s son?”  We don’t know if he was rich or poor.  We don’t know if he was well-respected or looked down on.  There are traditions about some of those things, but we don’t know any of them from what the Bible tells us.

            There is really only one thing we know about Joseph.  We know Joseph was a righteous man.  We know that because the passage we read explicitly told us so.  And we also know it because of what Joseph did.

            Think about it.  Time after time, an angel visited Joseph in a dream.  Each time the angel told Joseph to do something, and each time Joseph got up and did it.  If he asked questions, they’re not reported.  If he had doubts, we’re not told about them.  If he was afraid, he overcame his fears.  Each time, he got up and did everything he was told to do.

            Think of the faith that took.  After all, these were not easy things.  First, he’s told to go ahead and marry this woman who is going to have a baby that is not his.  Even if Joseph believed what the angel told him about the baby, this was not going to be easy.  It’s like what we said last week about Mary:  how do you raise the Savior?  How do you act as a dad to a child conceived by the Holy Spirit?

            But, as far as we know, Joseph did not complain about it.  Joseph did not try to avoid it.  Joseph just got up and did what he was supposed to do.  He took Mary as his wife.

            Then, after Jesus was born, the angel comes to Joseph again and tells them that they cannot go home because Herod wants to kill Jesus.  Instead, they had to go to Egypt.

            Think about that.  Joseph had to take his family to a foreign country.  They could not even go home to pack.  All they had was what they’d taken with them to go to Bethlehem for the census.  They had thought they were taking a trip that might last a week or two.  Almost all their belongings were back in Nazareth, and they could not go home to get them.  Probably all of Joseph’s carpenter’s tools were back there, too.  They went to a foreign country, where they knew no one, maybe could not even speak the language, with nothing but a few provisions.

            But, again, if Joseph ever complained, we’re not told about it.  As far as we know, Joseph did not feel sorry for himself.  He did not argue or gripe about the unfairness of it all.  He just got up and did what he was supposed to do.  He took Mary and Jesus and went to Egypt.

            They were there, as far as we can tell, for a couple of years.  Then, the angel appears to Joseph once more.  And when that happened, Joseph must have thought, “Oh, no.  Not you again!  Now what?”

            This time, though, the angel told him that they were safe.  They could go back home.  That was good news, I suppose, but it was probably hard, too, in a way.  They’d probably started to establish themselves in Egypt.  They’d probably started to feel like that was their home.  And now it was time to leave again.  But again, as far as we know, Joseph never complained.  He just got up and did what he was supposed to do.  Joseph took Mary and Jesus and went to Nazareth.

            The Bible describes Joseph as a righteous man.  We hear that, and we think it means that Joseph was somebody special.  We think it means Joseph was a great and wonderful man, someone beyond the rest of us.

            It’s not true.  The Bible does not describe Joseph as somebody special.  The Bible does not describe Joseph as a great and wonderful man.  Joseph was just an ordinary man who loved God.  Because Joseph loved God, he got up and did what he was supposed to do.

            Most of the time, that’s what righteousness is.  Yes, sometimes it can involve doing great and wonderful things, but most of the time it does not.  Most of the time, what righteousness involves is simply loving God and then getting up and doing what we’re supposed to do.

            That means you and I can be righteous people.  We can be every bit as righteous as Joseph was.  Most of the time, of course, we don’t have an angel to tell us what we’re supposed to do.  Most of the time, though, we don’t need one.  All we need to do is open our hearts to God and open our eyes to the world around us.

            There are hurting people all around us, if we’ll only take the time to see them.  There are lonely people crying out to us, if we’ll only take the time to hear them.  There are all kinds of people around us who need God’s love, if we’ll only take the time to show it to them.

            I’ve said before that we’re not supposed to go through life alone.  That’s why God put us in communities, so we would not have to.  Think, though, about what a community really is.  It’s not just a collection of people who happen to live near each other.  When Wanda and I lived in North Sioux City, we had all kinds of people who lived near us, but they were not a community.  There was a community within the church, but there was not a community among the people who lived in our area.

You see, a community is people who care about each other.  A community is people who are there for each other.  A community is people who rejoice with each other and mourn with each other, laugh with each other and cry with each other.  A community is not defined by location.  A community is defined by love.

           

In theory, then, a community for a Christian should be everybody, because we’re told by Jesus that we should love everybody.  In practice, though, we can’t really love everybody, because we cannot get to know everybody.  What we can do, though, is show God’s love to everybody we do know.  We can bring them into our community.  We can keep them from having to go through life alone, and instead let them go through life as part of a group of caring, loving Christians.

           

When we do that, we are doing exactly what Joseph did.  We are showing our love of God, and we are getting up and doing what we’re supposed to do.  We are being righteous people, just like Joseph was.

           

Joseph was an ordinary man.  He was so ordinary that we know almost nothing about him.  But because he loved God, and because he got up and did what he was supposed to do, this ordinary man did extraordinary things.  He is still remembered two thousand years later, and will be remembered forever.

           

You and I are ordinary people, too.  But it we love God, and if we get up and do what we’re supposed to do, we can do extraordinary things, too.  We may not be remembered two thousand years from now, but we’ll always be remembered by God.