Let that baby be born...

“Immanuel” – Part 2

(Matthew 1:19-21, Preaching: Pastor Stephen Magee, December 19, 2010)

19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

20 But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.

21 She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

And her husband Joseph... (19)

The way that our Messiah, the Son of God, came into the world was by being conceived as a tiny baby in the womb of a poor woman from Nazereth in Galilee. She was a virgin, and she was pregnant. That had never happened before. She was with child by the Holy Spirit of God, so that the baby, who was truly her child in every way, was also the eternal Son of God.

That woman, Mary, was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph, who was himself a poor Galilean. What was he supposed to think about Mary when it became evident that she was carrying a child within her? He knew that the he was not the father of that child. We do not really understand the culture he lived in. It is very possible that his conversation with Mary up to this point had been very limited. Even if she did talk to him, what could she have said to him? Can we expect that he would have believed the truth if she had told him?

“An angel gave me this message: 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.' Joseph, God chose me for this blessing.” Would Joseph have believed her?

No, Mary was pregnant,and Joseph made his own plans. Joseph was a righteous man. He was an observant Jew who was listening to the voice of God through the Word, and dedicating himself to a life of obedience. It appeared that Mary had been unfaithful to the commitment that they had made to each other. But Joseph did not want to put her to shame. He did not want to proclaim his own righteousness at her expense. He resolved to break off the engagement quietly. That way they would both be able to go on with their lives. Mary had apparently created a scandal by being with some other man. Perhaps that man would marry Mary. He would be the father. Joseph would no longer think of Mary as the woman he would marry. He would let her go, and he would go on with life as well. He would avoid a further public spectacle, but he also would not pretend that nothing had happened. This would be a private divorce, canceling their engagement before they had fully become man and wife.

But as he considered these things... (20)

That was as far as Joseph's thinking would take him, but sometimes the Lord intends to move his servants places that they cannot get to simply by their own thinking. This was one of those occasions. As He had sent an angel to Mary, now an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. He may not have believed what Mary would have told him if she tried, but God can give any one of us a message that we surely will believe. Joseph gets the perfectly persuasive message of the Lord through a dream.

The angel in the dream calls Mary's fiancee “Joseph, son of David.” The David referred to here is the psalmist and king of Israel. God promised that David that one of his descendants would be an eternal king. Even though Joseph will not be the father of Jesus, as the husband of Mary he will seem to be the father of the child to everyone, and he will have that role within their family for all of their children for the rest of his life. This Joseph, and his betrothed, Mary, were both descendants of King David. Both would have a genealogy that would establish each as a true descendant of King David, one as the legal father of Jesus in the eyes of the community, and the other as the birth mother and legal mother of Jesus.

In order for Joseph to be able to move ahead with this role as a special father to Mary's Son in good conscience, it was important for him that he know that he was not doing the wrong thing by marrying Mary. The child which Mary carried within her was from the Holy Spirit.

There have been many miracle babies over the centuries before and after Jesus, but none of them were conceived by the Holy Spirit. There have been many infertile men and women who were suddenly given the gift of fertility. But no other virgin has ever become a mother without first being with a man. This baby is different from all the rest. Joseph needed to know that.

She will bear a son... (21)

Mary will have this baby. The angel told Joseph this. It is always a gift when a child is brought into the world. Do you believe that? I do. It is such an amazing blessing when a new human being is conceived. Another child... Another person with a spirit... Another soul born to believe, to hope, and to love... What a gift! Yet this child! There has never been a gift like this one!

His name would be Jesus. That's Isus in the language of the New Testament. The same name in the language of the Old Testament is Joshua or Yeshua, like the man who brought the people of God into The Promised Land. The name means “Yahweh is salvation,” or “Yahweh saves.” This was the name for the Messiah given from heaven. And there is a reason added: “He will save His people from their sins.”

Mary's baby will do that? Oh yes... What a turn around from thinking that Mary had done something improper, and that the best solution was a quiet divorce in order to avoid embarrassing her too publicly! What a change from thinking that he would just have to start his life over again without Mary! What glorious news to submit to!

Joseph could trust God. Yes, yes, I know what everyone would say... Everybody would imagine that there was a more obvious explanation for this pregnancy than the one that the angel had spoken to both Mary and now to Joseph. Let them be. The truth is the truth. God can press the truth upon a soul in His own way. He can make that truth irresistible to the heart. That's what counts for us. The intellect alone will not lead you into holiness and peace. But when God assures the heart that a birth is a blessing, it is a blessing. Jesus has saved his people from their sins. He did that through the scandal of pregnancy. And then he did it definitively through the further scandal of the cross. What God saves, He really saves! And now there has been another birth. Christ has been born in you. You are with new life by the Holy Spirit! Congratulations! Now let the Son of God live. Let Him be born. Let Him grow. Don't worry yourself about the scandal of faith. Let faith grow into hope, and then let it express itself in love, until the earth is filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord. It's good news! Rejoice! God is with you!

1. Why would Joseph have decided to divorce Mary? What were his alternatives?

2. What did the angel explain to Joseph? How was Jesus from the Holy Spirit?

3. What is the significance of the title, “son of David?”

4. What is the meaning and importance of the name “Jesus?”

OT Passage: Isaiah 8:9-10