We tend to focus on all of the other characters. They even have songs written about them:
Mary, Did You Know?
We Three Kings
While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks
and more
Even the angels have several songs written about their role at Jesus' birth.
But Joseph doesn't get a song, or at least none that I am familiar with, or that has become a classic we sing each Christmas.
Mary gets revered, almost worshipped by some.
We talk about the gifts the wise men brought, and follow their example of gift giving
The shepherds are a reminder that God sent his Son for the lowest of people
But what about Joseph? We don't even hear anything of him after they returned to Israel from Egypt. He just fades into history.
I doubt I have ever had an original thought, and this one is probably not original, or profound, but the thought hit me the other day: God chose Joseph also. Much is said about Mary being chosen to be the mother of Jesus, but no one ever talks about the man chosen to be his earthly father.
Think about it. You're going to have your only child raised by someone else. Would you just check out the woman and make sure she was fit to raise your son? Of course not. You'd check out the man also. Find out what kind of man he is, what kind of father he would make.
I seriously doubt God just set out to find the right woman to bear His only Son. He searched for the right couple. Man and woman. Mother and father. What good would the right woman be, if the man she married wasn't a good man. A good father.
We get a little glimpse into what kind of man Joseph was when he found out Mary was pregnant. I'm sure when she told him the father was God, that he thought "yeah right! Why did I pick her?!" Most men in his position would have brought her out to the synagogue and exposed her, broke off the engagement, and stood by or joined in while she was stoned. Not Joseph. He was willing to break off the engagement quietly and not make a scene.
God obviously had other plans. He had chosen this man to be the surrogate father to His Son, and a dream got Joseph back in the game.
And again, a dream convinces Joseph to make a run for it with Mary and the baby Jesus. He doesn't question God, but does as he is told to protect the greatest gift ever given to man.
The Bible doesn't say what kind of father Joseph was, but God wouldn't have picked an abusive or deadbeat dad. He'd have picked a man who would love His Son, who would teach him how to be a man. Joseph was a carpenter, and most likely taught Jesus his craft.
Back in those days, a son was taught his father's craft and took it over when the father was unable to do it. In all of those years the Bible is silent about, from Jesus teaching the teachers in the temple at age twelve, to the start of His earthly ministry at the age of thirty, we can assume He was working in Joseph's carpenter shop, learning to work with wood.
We don't know when Joseph died. He was obviously gone by the time Jesus died on the cross, as he asks John to take care of His mother, but it is possible Joseph was alive for most of the part of Jesus' life that the Bible is silent on. And it is highly likely that he and Jesus worked side by side, building things.
And maybe that's why God chose Joseph. To teach Jesus to build things. For later, Jesus would work on building a kingdom.
As they worked side by side, I'm sure Joseph taught Jesus far more than carpentry. Jesus was God in the flesh, but He was also man, and I think Joseph, the one we think least of at Christmas, had a lot to do with the kind of man Jesus turned out to be.
There may have been other Marys. Other girls worthy of bearing God's only son, but only one Mary had Joseph, a man worthy to be the earthly father of Jesus.... the most important job Joseph would ever have.
Excellent!
ReplyDeleteA beautiful read!
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