Sermon Tone Analysis

Many of you have said that you’ve been by our house and seen our Christmas lights.

I really hope you didn’t also see our nativity scene that was in front of our house.

That nativity scene has a rich family history for us.

It was my grandparents’ and it goes back many, many years.

Unfortunately, its experience at our house this year wasn’t so rich.

We pulled Mary and Joseph and baby Jesus out of the garage and set them out front.

We cleaned them off and plugged it in - the perfect complement to our icicle lights that I hung from our roof at great personal risk to my safety.

We plugged them and excitedly ran back around to the front of our house to see Joseph lit up, but Mary was half-lit and Jesus had no light whatsoever.

And He’s supposed to be the Light of the world, so that’s a problem.

We tried to replace the bulbs, but it’s so old we couldn’t find these bulbs.

So Mary and Joseph, and Jesus, sat outside for a few days, looking cold and dark and lonely.

Finally about a week ago we just decided, “You know what, we tried it this year, it’s not working out.

Let’s just pack them away and try to fix them next year.”

The whole idea of the Nativity scene is an interesting one, isn’t it?

What words would you use to describe the nativity scene?

Maybe cute?

Sweet?

Meaningful?

Intimate?

Loving?

Godly?

Holy?

Certainly it is all those things.

But here’s why I ask: we forget that for Mary and Joseph it had been a really, really tough year.

To at least some, Mary and Joseph’s situation was scandalous.

Scandalous — that’s probably not a word that you’re accustomed to using to describe the

nativity scene or the Christmas story.

But here’s the thing: We know from our vantage point that Mary was pregnant by the supernatural working of the Holy Spirit.

But to everyone else, there were only so many possibilities: 1) Joseph and Mary had not waited until marriage; or, 2) Mary had been unfaithful and the baby belonged to someone else.

The Bible doesn’t say that, but it’s almost certainly true.

Who would have believed their story?

Pregnant by the Holy Spirit?

Really, Joseph?

Maybe their closest family and friends made an effort to believe them, but certainly not everyone.

It’s almost certain that Mary and Joseph were the subject of a lot of gossip and slander.

After all, Mary is a young woman who was pregnant before she was married.

No matter when Mary and Joseph actually got married, she really was pregnant and showing her pregnancy visibly before then.

You think that kind of thing raises eyebrows now.

It really raised eyebrows then.

Marriage was held in very high regard among the Jews.

Sexual expression was reserved only for the marriage relationship — abstinence before marriage, monogamous after marriage - and rightly so.

And it appears, to almost everyone else, that Mary and Joseph did not meet these requirements.

That’s what I mean when I say that there is apparent scandal when it comes to the Christmas story.

And yet, that’s beauty in that.

There is grace in that.

The beauty in that is that our Savior did not consider himself above that kind of messiness.

No, it’s the reason He came.

Jesus came to us in order to enter into our mess with us and redeem us out of our messes.

How many of you feel like you’ve made a mess of your life?

Jesus has come to you in love - He’s not ashamed of you.

That is the meaning of Christmas.

So let’s make an effort this morning to hear this story freshly, with new ears, that we might see Jesus in all His beauty and glory.

And may the Lord strengthen our faith and bless the preaching of His word.

Notice with me, first, Joseph’s disappointing discovery.

#1: Joseph’s disappointing discovery

Look with me at verse 18.

If we’re following the flow of Matthew’s gospel, we just finished the genealogy.

All those names and all those begats are important because they show us that Jesus of Nazareth is the legal descendant of King David, just as the OT scriptures said he would be.

That’s the zoomed-out version.

Now in verse 18, Matthew zooms in and slows down and says this: “Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way...” Matthew leaves behind the vast span of the centuries that the genealogy shows us, and he zooms way in and slows way down, to tell us the story leading up to Jesus’ birth.

What were the circumstances leading up to the birth of the Messiah?

Now notice with me the second part of verse 18, and notice that Matthew fixes our attention on a very specific period of time: “When his mother Mary had been betrothed, before they had come together”.

Betrothal was a really serious thing in the first century.

It’s not like our engagement.

Our engagement period is not legally binding.

You can back out at any time.

But with betrothal, everything was already settled - the bride price had been paid, and the couple were considered legally married, except for one thing.

One thing the couple lacked at this point, and they had not consummated their marriage.

So after the betrothal period has begun, but before they have come together sexually, and to live together, Joseph makes a disappointing discovery: Mary is pregnant.

Look with me again at verse 18: Matt 1:18

Now let’s just imagine for now that verse 18 does not have the last phrase: from the Holy Spirit.

It would then read, “Before they came together she was found to be with child...” - period.

We’re being given information here that Joseph does not yet have.

He does not know why Mary is pregnant, but he can put two and two together.

The only possibility, as far as Joseph can see, is that Mary has been unfaithful.

Joseph knows that he and Mary have not been sexually active before marriage — which by the way was wrong then and is still wrong today.

“…[I]f Joseph marries her, everybody in that shame and honor society will know that this child not born nine or ten months after they got married; they will know she was already pregnant.

That would mean either Joseph and Marry had sex before marriage or she was unfaithful to him, and as a result, they are going to be shamed, socially excluded, and rejected.

They are going to be second-class citizens forever.”

[Keller, Hidden Christmas, p56]

Church, don’t think that because you’re a Christian everything is going to go according to plan.

Mark this verse down: Matt.

10:39

Joseph is getting the first lesson in discipleship which is that if Jesus comes into your life, He will disrupt things.

He will challenge you.

He will convict you.

He will call you into situations that are uncertain; He will call you into relationships that are messy.

Jesus will do those things, and He will also use those things to sanctify you, to make you more like Himself.

And it will all be worth it.

That’s Joseph’s disappointing discovery.

Notice with me next, Joseph’s righteous response.

#2: Joseph’s righteous response

Now because Joseph doesn’t know what’s going on just yet, he must have been devastated, broken-hearted, confused, angry.

This past week, I was driving and thinking about this sermon and this text in Matthew and I don’t know why it came to mind, but it did.

I started thinking about one Christmas about 20 years or so ago when I was dating this girl from the youth group.

We weren’t serious or anything but we were dating.

At least, I thought we were dating.

I had gone out to Blockbuster — yes, I am so very old.

And as I was sitting at the stoplight, waiting to turn left, I’m yielding to the oncoming traffic, and the cars are moving slow, slow enough to see the people in the cars, and here comes this car, and yep, there is the girl I thought I was dating in the car with another guy.

Now turns out that she thought we were dating each other and other people.

And I am very, very happily married to the love of my life.