God Knows

The message given in the Sunday morning worship services in the United Methodist churches of the Wheatland Parish on December 11, 2022.  The Bible verses used are Matthew 1:18-25, 2:13-14, 18-23.

            Angels play a really important part in the Christmas story.  We know that, but I don’t know how much we think about it.  Over the last couple of weeks we’ve talked about how the angel Gabriel spoke with Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, and then six months later spoke to Mary, the mother of Jesus.  Today, we look at the conversations an angel had with Joseph.

            We don’t know whether this angel was Gabriel or not.  Matthew just says, each time, “an angel of the Lord”.  It could’ve been Gabriel, but it might not have been.  It might not even have been the same angel each time.  We don’t know.

            Joseph hears from an angel three times.  We read all three today.  Each time, it follows pretty much the same pattern.  

First, the angel appears to Joseph in a dream.  That’s different from the times Gabriel appeared to Zechariah and Mary.  We did not hear anything about a dream in those stories.  Zechariah and Mary, as far as we know, were wide awake.  But for Joseph, the angel shows up in his sleep.

            Each time, of course, the angel gives Joseph a message.  And listen to what happens next.  The first time, we’re told, “When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him.”  The second time, we’re told, “So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt”, which of course is what the angel had told him to do.  And the third time, we’re told, “So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel,” which again was what the angel told him.

            When Gabriel talked to Zechariah and Mary, they were given the chance to have a conversation.  They got to ask questions.  But not Joseph.  The way the story is told, the angel appears to Joseph in a dream, the angel tells him to do something, and Joseph wakes up and immediately does it.  No hesitation.  No questions asked.  He just does what the angel of the Lord told him to do.

            I wonder why that was.  Why did the angel not give Joseph the chance to ask questions?  Why did Joseph not get to voice any doubts or objections?  It was like what Joseph thought or felt did not matter.  He just gets his orders and does as he’s told.

            Did you ever think what would’ve happened if Joseph had not done that?  What if Joseph had said no?  I assume he could have.  What if Joseph had said, you know, I just cannot do this.  It’s too hard.  It’s too much.  I’m sorry, angel, but tell God you need to find somebody else.  I cannot do it.

            But you know, maybe that’s why Joseph was chosen.  Because God knew Joseph would not say no.  Because God knew Joseph had a faith that was strong enough to not ask questions.  Joseph had a faith that was strong enough to not raise any objections.  Did you notice, Joseph does not appear to have been afraid of the angel, the way Zechariah was and Mary was and most people are.  If an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph and told Joseph to do something, well, that was good enough for him.  He went ahead and did it.  Period.

            There’s one more thing that shows up in the description of all these angelic appearances.  Some of you probably caught it.  The first time, we’re told, “All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet.”  The second time, it’s, “And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet.”  And the third time, “So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets.”

            Think about that.  Those prophets that Matthew refers to made their prophecies hundreds of years before Jesus was born.  That means    God knew exactly how this was all going to play out.  God had told the prophets about it all those years ago.  

God did not give them all the details, but God gave them enough so that, when these things happened, people would recognize what was going on.  People would know that Jesus was the Savior.  Some people, like the Pharisees, refused to admit it or acknowledge it, but that always happens, right?  We all tend to see what we want to see.  The Pharisees did not want to see that Jesus was the Savior, and so they did not.  But people who had their minds open and their eyes open did see it.  And they saw it because of what the prophets had said all those centuries ago.

            I have to think that God chose the key players in the Christmas story with great care.  God did not just choose Mary and Joseph, or even Zechariah and his wife Elizabeth, at random.  As we said of Mary last week, God chose these people because they were people of great faith.  God chose them because they were people who would trust God.  They trusted God enough that they would agree to do things that seemed impossible.  They trusted God enough to do things they did not want to do.  They trusted God enough to do the things that were necessary for the things the prophets said to come true.

            And they did that deliberately.  After all, they knew about these Old Testament prophecies, too.  Everybody knew about them.  Mary and Joseph knew they were following a plan that had been laid out centuries before.  They did not know the details of the plan, but they knew God was behind it.  They knew that, whatever was going to happen, God was in control of it and that it would happen the way God wanted it to happen.

God has messages for all of us.  Sometimes, those messages are designed to shake us up. Quite often God asks us to start on a path without knowing exactly where that path will lead.

  That can be hard for us to do.  Most of us are fairly comfortable with our lives as they are.  We don’t want to change things, especially when we don’t know where that change might take us.  It takes a lot of faith, and a lot of trust in God, to be willing to do that.  It’s not always easy for us to have that much faith.

            Maybe it will be easier for us if we remember how all these things the angel told Joseph were to fulfill Old Testament prophecies, how God had planned all this stuff out centuries before.  Because that’s proof to us that God knows what’s going to happen in the future.  And God does not just know the future in broad strokes, either.  God knows the details.  God knew the details involved in Jesus’ story.  And God knows the details of your story and my story, too.

            Now, we still have free will.  Joseph had free will.  Joseph could’ve said no.  Joseph could’ve gone ahead and divorced Mary like he planned to.  Joseph was chosen not because he could not refuse to do what God wanted, but because God knew he would not refuse.  God knew that Joseph had enough faith that he would willingly do what God wanted.

            God knows our stories, just like He knew the Christmas story.  God has been planning our stories for a long time, just like God planned the Christmas story for a long time.  God has brought us to this point in time deliberately, and for specific reasons.  We may not know what the reasons are, but we know God has them.  

And now, God is giving each of us a message to take us to the next point in time.  God is asking us to take a step.  That’s all we get to see, that next step.  But God sees the whole path.  God knows exactly where it’s going to take us.  Just like God knew exactly what would happen with Zechariah and Elizabeth, with Joseph and Mary, and with Jesus, God knows exactly what will happen for each of us when we trust God enough to take that next step on the path God has laid out for us.

            But because we have free will, the choice is up to us.  We can be like Joseph.  We can hear God’s message, and get up, and do what God has told us to do.  We can trust God and follow that path.  Or, we can say no.  We can say, you know, I just cannot do this.  It’s too hard.  It’s too much.  I’m sorry, God, but you need to find somebody else.  I cannot do it.  

            God has a plan for each one of us.  God has a plan for you, and God has a plan for me.  God sees the whole path that’s ahead of us.  We don’t, but God does.  God knows our story, and God knows how the story will end.

            Joseph listened to God’s message.  Joseph followed God’s plan.  And the story came out just the way God had planned it.  If we listen to God’s message and follow God’s plan, our story will come out the way God has planned it, too.

            So let’s listen to God’s message.  Let’s follow God’s plan.  And let’s do it confidently, knowing that God’s plans are always best.