Advent IV – Sunday, Dec. 21st, 2025

The Struggle of Joseph

The readings for this Sunday, Advent IV – are Isaiah 7:10-16, Psalm 80:1-7, 16-18, Romans 1:1-7, Matthew 1:18-25.

This Sunday the fourth Sunday of Advent brings us almost to the end of the season, with Christmas only a few days away, and perhaps you are ready, decorations are hung, shopping and presents all wrapped, and baking all done in readiness for the celebration.  This Sunday also marks the beginning of the winter Solstice, or the longest night. A day when we think about those who may for some reason or other, find Christmas challenging, perhaps they are grieving the loss of a loved one, or maybe a loss relationship, others may find it difficult because they are out of work, struggling financially, or find themselves alone because of some other hardship they maybe enduring. Christmas is not the happy or joyous occasion that most find it to be. We know however our God didn’t make his way into the world, in the most pleasant of circumstances, and in Matthew’s gospel, we read about the real life dilemma that Mary and Joseph find themselves in. Our gospel reading for today, is Matthew’s version of the Christmas story, only it is told very different from that of Luke’s gospel. 

Matthew has no angel chorus revealing the good news, no shepherds in the fields, or babe in swaddling cloths laid in the Manger.  Instead Matthew tells it from the perspective of what Mary and Joseph, would have dealt with in the reality of their lives.  It was a frightening time for them.  Everything Mary and Joseph had ever thought about, planned and hoped for in their lives together had suddenly been changed by this news that Mary was with child. But not just any child, but as the chosen one to bear God’s Son.  

As long as he could remember Joseph recalled hearing the words of the prophets, “the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child, and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel.” Still Joseph struggled greatly with accepting what Mary had told him. We read that in the text when it says, “being a righteous man, and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, he planned to dismiss her quietly.”  

Being betroth in that day, was the same as if they were already married, and for Mary to be found with child while she was betroth to Joseph, and he to leave her,  would not only have brought great shame on her; should it be made known that Joseph was not the child’s father, by law Mary could have been charged with adultery.  It was no small predicament they had found themselves in. Joseph struggled not only with what Mary had told him about the child, but also with what the religious and moral law dictated that he do.  

God doesn’t always do things in an orderly, or predictable fashion, sometimes things get messy, things get thrown upside down as such;   We know however that as God chose Mary and Joseph for the purpose of bringing hope, his salvation to the people, through the child to be born; so too he makes his way known to us, sometimes through the most unlikely situations and circumstances of our own lives and world, that he might save us. 

“Joseph resolved to let Mary go, and an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. “ Regardless of what the expectation of the day would have dictated Joseph do, or even what the religious or moral law he had so obediently followed his whole life instructed him, Joseph knew truth when it was revealed to him, and obediently heeded God’s word.  “ and did as the Angel of the Lord commanded and he took Mary as his wife. “

No, God doesn’t operate outside of our lives, but steps into them with us, just as he did with Mary and Joseph, guiding them as he did with Joseph in a dream;  and as he do us, …maybe not in a dream, (and then perhaps sometimes he does)…. he continues to make his way known to us.  We hear it in his word, through others, and through the many messages of his presence he gives to us in the world, in the hope, the peace and the comfort that is given, but also in the way truth is revealed to us. We may not always recognize it, as Joseph didn’t at first when hearing about the child Mary was carrying, but in time it became truth for him, in the message he received, and through the words of the prophets.  

Joseph wasn’t any bystander in the Christmas story, he too had a pivotal part to play in it; one that originated not at the time of Jesus birth, but long before it, as was told through the old testament prophets, that the Messiah would descend from the throne of David . Joseph being in the direct line of descendancy from David, when Joseph took Mary as his wife, Jesus became his legally adopted son, and he too became one in that line of descendancy through Joseph.  

In Jesus is the fulfilment of all that had been promised for the people of Israel, but also for us who believe today.  That this child, “Immanuel, meaning God with us,” was given for us all.  And so even in these uncertain times of ours, we know God is not outside of all that is happening in our world or in our lives, the challenges and struggles we may face, the decisions in life we must make,  the suffering and hardships of this world, but right there in the midst of it with us, is where we will find him, because God has come, and is coming still, in the gift of the Christ child given. 

And so over these last days of Advent, as we make our final preparations, this Sunday we light the Candle of love, the candle that reminds us of God’s own love for us all, given in the Christ child.  As we come to Christmas let it be with our hearts open, ready to receive him once again, and be renewed in all the hope and promise that he gives. 

Amen, God Bless