Now that we are fully into the Advent season, my mind melts into thoughts of the details of the Nativity.

I don’t necessarily think about the scene at the manger that we are all so familiar with.  I think about each of the people involved.  How much did they know and understand of what was really going on?

Could  twelve-to-fourteen-year-old Mary really comprehend that she had just carried for nine months and then delivered the God of the universe in human infant form? That God had indeed, for a time, changed places with her and became HER child though she was really HIS?

Did the shepherds know that this was the Child that would one day save their souls?  That He would one day be THEIR shepherd?

Did the wise men, the astrologers from afar, get that they were coming to worship the Creator of the stars they so diligently studied?

But this year my mind went to Joseph.  What was going through his mind as he prepares to be the foster father to this God child?  I wish we knew more about him.  So little is said about him.  But we know that he was obedient to God even though what God was asking him to do seemed ridiculous and almost wrong.  He was to marry this espoused child bride Mary even though she was already pregnant. He was to give Him the name Jesus.  He was to care for this child as his own.  To train him up in his trade of carpentry.  A simple man raising and teaching the omniscient God.

It’s alluded to in scripture that Joseph died before Jesus’ ministry began. He was already an older man by the time of Jesus’ birth.  He never got to see the things that Mary did.  His miracles.  His interaction with His disciples.  His death and resurrection.

Joseph got to experience the joy of being this Boy’s father.  But he didn’t get to see the end result of his obedience to co-parent and raise this child.  He simply responded in faith to a God he knew and trusted and allowed God to work out His plan.

I can learn a lot from this understated man.  Devotion.  Trust.  Obedience.  Living out the life that I’ve been called to, no matter what it requires of me, knowing that it has a divine purpose. Experiencing the fact that God can use the most unlikely people, circumstances and things to carry out His plan.  And, like Joseph, I can watch and join in, in wonder…

Matthew 1:18-25 –  This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit.  Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorceher quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dreamand said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”). When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he did not consummate their marriage until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.