What do with Joseph?

That is something that preachers have wrestled with over the years. 

He’s not the main character–at least not in church Christmas pageants. That’s Mary.  Little girls, or maybe it’s their mothers who want their daughters to play Mary in church Christmas pageants. Joseph doesn’t really have a speaking part.  As a matter of fact, in the gospels he never utters a single word. Did you know that?

So, what do you do with Joseph?

Matthew tells us that Joseph was a righteous man, a good man, a man of faith who will not put Mary to shame. He sticks by her. No matter what. 

So what do you do with Joseph?

Fred Craddock saw something in Joseph that few others see. He wrote:

He reads his Bible through a certain kind of lens, the lens of character and the nature of a God who is loving and kind. Therefore, he says, “I will not harm her (Mary), abuse her, expose her, shame her, ridicule her, or demean her value, her dignity, or her worth. I will protect her“

Where does it say that? … I’ll tell you where…it says that in the very nature and character of God. 

Christmas for me has already started because I know that when Jesus is born, the man who will teach him, raise him, care for him, show him how to be a carpenter, take him to the synagogue, teach him his bible, and teach him lessons. He is a good man and he will do right. 

When you have somebody like that, it is already Christmas, and Christmas will last as long as God can find in every community one person who says, “I will do what is right.” 

What is right is to read the Scripture and to read the human condition in the light of the love and grace and the kindness of God.

As long as there is one in every community, it will be Christmas.The question, of course, is whether or not you will be that person.