Following God

The Sunday morning message given in the United Methodist churches of the Wheatland Parish on December 31, 2023.  The Bible verses used are Matthew 2:1-15.

            Well, Christmas Day has come and gone.  The presents have all been handed out and unwrapped.  Some families ware still having get-togethers this weekend.  Some are even having a late “Christmas” because of last week’s weather.   And of course this is New Year’s Eve, and we still have New Year’s Day to celebrate.  But still, the Big Day is over.  In a couple of days, we’ll settle back into our normal routines again.

            I would think that, after that first Christmas night, there’s nothing Mary and Joseph would’ve liked more than to settle back into their normal routine.  But they could not.  For one thing, they had a new baby to deal with.  Now, I’ve never had children, but I’m pretty sure that when your child is a few days old you don’t just settle back into your normal routine.  In fact, that normal routine is probably never coming back again, right?  You find a new routine, a new normal, but I’m pretty sure that a baby changes just about everything in your life.

            And then, there’s the fact that they were not home.  They were still in Bethlehem.  We don’t know how long they were there.  They were still there when the wise men came to see them, obviously.  Some people think they might have been there as long as two years.  

            Now, they obviously did not stay out in the stable that long.  At some point, Joseph and Mary did find a place to live.  In fact, we’re told that the wise men came to “the house” to see the baby.  Whether they built a house, bought a house, rented a house, were living in someone else’s house, we don’t know.  But at least they did have a house to live in.  Still, it was not home.  I would think the one thing they probably wanted most, after all this time, was just to go home and start living their lives together.

            But of course, that’s not what happened, is it?  One night, when Joseph is asleep, an angel appears.  We don’t know if it’s the same angel who told Joseph that Mary was going to have a child.  But an angel came and told Joseph to take Mary and Jesus and go to Egypt, because if they stayed where they were, Herod would have Jesus killed.

            Now, as I’ve said before, we’re never told what Joseph’s thoughts or feelings are when he’s told to do something.  We’re just told that he did what the angel said.  I mean, when an angel comes and tells you that your child will die unless you leave and go to Egypt, you’re going to go to Egypt.  Any parent would do that for any of their children, never mind that this is Jesus we’re talking about.  When Joseph heard this, he did not hesitate.  He woke up Mary and they took Jesus and headed for Egypt that same night.

            But even though Joseph did not hesitate, I have to think he was not particularly thrilled with any of this.  Neither was Mary, for that matter.  “Egypt?  We have to go to Egypt?  We don’t want to go to Egypt.  We just want to go home.  We want to get back to our family, to our friends.  We want to get back to our old lives.  What are we going to do in Egypt?  We don’t know anybody in Egypt.  We don’t even speak the language.  Why Egypt?  Why can we not go back to Nazareth?  Or how about Jerusalem?  In fact, why can God not protect us somehow so that we don’t have to go anywhere?  I mean, He is the all-powerful God, right?  And besides, the angel said our child is God’s Divine Son.  Surely God would not let his Divine Son die.”

            Now, I want to make clear that this is all speculation.  The Bible does not tell us what was going through Joseph or Mary’s minds when all this was happening.  It just tells us that they went to Egypt.  But it seems logical, don’t you think?  Even though they obeyed God, I would think they still had to wonder sometimes just what God was doing and what God was getting them into.

            We’ve talked before about this idea that following God should somehow give us an easy life, and how the Bible makes clear over and over again that an idea like that is simply not true.  It seems to me this is Exhibit A.  Joseph and Mary followed God.  They did everything that was asked of them.  There were a lot of times when they did not understand it.  There were a lot of times when it did not make sense to them.  But they still did it.  And it certainly did not get them an easy life.  In fact, in the months and years immediately after Jesus’ birth, following God seemed to get Joseph and Mary nothing but trouble.

            Most of us would say that we follow God.  Not perfectly, of course.  There are times we go our own way, do our own thing.  We all have those times when we decide we know better, when we decide we have to do it our way rather than doing things God’s way.  But for the most part, we do try to do the things God wants us to do.  We do try to live our lives the way God wants us to live them.  

            How’s that worked out for you?  Has it given you an easy life?  Probably not.  That’s not to say everyone here is miserable.  Most of us would probably say that our lives are more or less okay.  But I don’t know that any of us are on easy street.  Our lives may be more or less okay, but we still have plenty of problems.  And of course, there are some people in our congregations whose problems are pretty serious.

            And in fact, sometimes, following God seems to make things worse.  Because the thing about following God, about truly following God, is that sometimes God leads us to places we don’t want to go.  Sometimes God leads us to do things we don’t want to do.  Sometimes God leads us to deal with things we don’t want to deal with.

            And sometimes we think, “I don’t want to go there.  I don’t want to do that.  I don’t want to have to deal with those people.  I just want to be home.  I just want to be with my family and with my friends.  I just want to live my life.  Why can God not just let me stay where I am?  I mean, he’s the all-powerful God, right?  Well, then, whatever it is that needs to be done, God can surely do it without me.  Why do I have to do this?”

            You know, we talk all the time about how we need to trust God.  And of course, we do.  But too often, we end the sentence there.  What we don’t ask is, “Trust God to do what?”  What is it that we really need to trust God to do?

            Trust God to take care of us?  Well, that’s what we’d like, of course.  But as we’ve already said, following God does not guarantee us an easy life.  God will take care of us in the sense that, if we accept Jesus as the Savior, we’ll have salvation and eternal life.  And it’s impossible to overstate how important that is.  But that does not mean that God will take care of us while we’re on earth.  God might, but God might not.  Following God might mean that our lives on earth are a constant struggle.  Following God might mean, as it did sometimes for Joseph and Mary, that our earthly lives are nothing but trouble.

            Trust God to make things work out all right?  I think we can trust God to do that.  But here’s the thing:  God’s definition of things working out all right might not be the same as our definition of things working out all right.  And the time at which God makes things work out all right may not be the time we want them to work out all right.  After all, as we’ve said before, God sees hundreds, thousands, hundreds of thousands of years into the future, if the world is going to last that long.  God is making things work out all right, but that does not mean that things will be all right in our lifetimes.  It might not happen until a long time in the future.

            Trust God to do what’s right?  Now we’re getting there.  God will always do what’s right.  And if we follow God, we will do what’s right, too.  

            That’s what Joseph and Mary did.  They may not have understood why they had to go to Egypt.  They might not have known what they were going to do there or how they were going to survive there.  They just knew that going to Egypt was what God wanted them to do.  And they trusted that, if it was what God wanted them to do, then it must be right, even if they did not understand it.

            That’s the kind of faith Joseph and Mary had all their lives.  It’s what led them to agree to be Jesus’ earthly parents.  It’s what led them to go to Bethlehem.  It’s what led them to go to Egypt.  It’s what led them to, eventually, go back to Nazareth after Herod died.  There were plenty of times that Joseph and Mary did not understand what was going on.  They did not understand why God was asking them to do these things.  But they knew God wanted them to do it, so they did it.  And they trusted that it must be right, because it was what God wanted them to do.

            That’s the kind of trust you and I need to have.  Trust that if God wants us to do something, it must be the right thing to do.  Trust that if God wants us to go somewhere, it must be the right place to go.  Trust that whatever God wants us to deal with, it must be what we’re supposed to deal with.  And continue trusting that way, even when we don’t understand, even when it seems like things are not working out right, even when it seems like our trust is getting us nothing but trouble.

            It’s not easy to have that kind of trust.  It was not easy for Joseph and Mary, either.  But they did it.  And if they can do it, you and I can do it, too.  God will always do what’s right.  If we follow God, we’ll always do what’s right, too.