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December 23, 2007

When God Changes Your Plans

Sermon: Advent 4 When God Changes Your Plans
Matthew 1:18-25

The central point of today’s message is that God changes our lives so that we are blessed. By working through our lives, God also blesses the world. (Look at calendar…) This busy season of the year can clutter our calendar with many activities. Our lives can be cluttered with gathering material things. In the midst of all this, how do we hear God’s call to be intentional about spending time with people rather than things? How do we hear God’s invitation to do his will rather than our own over the blare of the Christmas music and the drive to get the perfect gift?

We return to the Christmas Story. It’s a story we’re familiar with—the Birth of Jesus. Admittedly, we hear Luke’s version more than any other. In fact, we will hear Luke’s version on Christmas Eve when we gather with the multitude of angels, shepherds, prophets, animals in the stable…but I’m getting ahead of myself.

This morning, we get a chance to hear from Joseph. Joseph gets a passing mention in Luke, “a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David.” But the Gospel writer Matthew reminds us that Jesus had two earthly parents—Mary and Joseph. And both of them had a very important role to play in the unfolding of this drama.

“Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. Her husband, Joseph…”

Mary has been visited by an angel and told that she was going to have a child. She says “OK God, let it be with me as you will.” Unfortunately, Joseph isn’t consulted about Mary’s visit from God. And now comes the point where her “ok” becomes reality. The consequences of her decision are starting to affect other people. Note that Matthew refers to Joseph as “her husband.” Technically, Mary was promised to him and thus legally she was his wife. They just had not consummated the marriage yet. She was engaged to be married, now is pregnant and not by the man she is engaged to.

I was struck by the words that Mary was “found to be with child.” Who found her to be with child? And would they have believed Mary that she was pregnant by the Holy Spirit? It certainly wasn’t Joseph who discovered she was pregnant. In ancient times, marriages were pre-arranged. In many cases the families did not consult the two individuals who were to wed. In other cases, a man arranges to marry a young girl and once she comes into puberty, they are married. Which I think was probably the case with Mary and Joseph. Mary and Joseph would not have been going out alone on a date, as young people do today.

I imagine it might be like something in The Godfather One Movie. Michael Corleone is hiding out in Sicily. While walking along the countryside, he comes upon a beautiful young woman with her family. Upon inquiring about her, he meets her father, finds out her name is Apollonia, and asks if he can court her. The next scene is a large family gathering around a long table. She is at one corner surrounded by women and children. He is at the farthest possible corner, surrounded by men talking to the Apollonia’s father. They look at each other periodically from over the crowd.

The next scene shows the two of them walking alone on a dirt road. As the camera pans back to offer a wider view of the scene, you see the family trailing along behind them--watching every move they make.

Someone brought Joseph this news that Mary was “found to be with child.” Who could it have been? Was it Mary herself during one of many walks while her family followed close behind? “Joseph, I’m pregnant, but it’s not like you think. It is the work of the Holy Spirit.” How could she risk Joseph getting upset in front of everyone? Would Joseph believe her that it was the work of the Holy Spirit? It would be hard to believe and maybe he might think she was a little deranged. That would probably scare him off more than the fact that she was pregnant. Was it Mary?

Was it one of the elders in her family? Maybe her mother or another adult woman in their family noticed she was pregnant during their sequestered time in the Red Tent. Each month the women would gather in a tent or location set aside from the men when it was their time of the month. Blood was unclean and so the women were separated from the men during their menstrual period.

As a young woman, Mary would have hung out with the women and been with them in the tent. Maybe one of her elders went to her father and told him she was with child and he went to Joseph. “Joseph, I need to inform you that Mary is with child.” If it was one of the elders of Mary’s family, we witness honesty and humility. Most likely, she has been indoctrinated with these same ethics. We cannot help but respect them for having the difficult conversation. They could have said nothing, go forward with the marriage, and then let Joseph deal with the premature pregnancy. But they did not.

Maybe it was a jealous sister or aunt who wanted Joseph to marry her. Maybe this person with the self-serving motives hoped that by telling Joseph that Mary was with child, he would leave Mary and come to her. There are examples in scripture that demonstrate that even when the motives are impure, God will use events to the good. The story of another Joseph comes to mind. He was the young man with the Technicolor coat who was sold by his brothers into slavery. Years later Joseph ends up coming into power and saving a nation and his family during a seven-year drought.

No matter who told Joseph that Mary was pregnant, the fact remains that he was given time and opportunity to make a decision regarding his future, the future of his fiancé and the unborn child. This is an important part of the story.

I really like this man Joseph. He’s such a solid citizen. He’s a faithful, thoughtful, discerning man. He’s just going about his life, doing the next right thing. He has chosen a wife, waited for her to come of age. Most likely has a spot in his family compound for them to live. He has a trade—he’s a carpenter. For Joseph, the time is quickly approaching and the plans made long ago are about to transpire. Get married, settle down and raise a family. Little did Joseph know that God had other plans—God had selected him to be the human father of his heavenly son.

“Her husband, Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, ‘Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

Joseph comes from the line of David, an important aspect that cannot be overlooked. The prophets foretold that the Messiah would come from the line of their greatest and most beloved king, David. And so he would. Undoubtedly, there were many men from the linage of David who could have been selected to be the father of Jesus. But God has selected this couple to be the parents of his son. Maybe we’ve gotten a glimpse of Mary’s family. What about Joseph? Why him?

When Joseph finds out Mary is pregnant, we get a glimpse into his character—and maybe why God selected him to be Jesus’ father. Instead of publically humiliating Mary and her family, Joseph planned to dismiss Mary quietly. True, it might have been better for him to do it quietly as well. But certainly everyone would have sided with Joseph. He would have appeared righteous and entitled to whatever happened to Mary. But Joseph was a man with a kind heart. He decided to not publically humiliate Mary and her family. Joseph was more concerned with doing what was right then appearing righteous.

Joseph was a discerning man, a man of faith. He listened to God. God interrupted Joseph’s plans by coming to Mary and getting her pregnant. Then a messenger came to Joseph and instructed him to trust God and continue with the marriage, even though it was unconventional and full of unknowns.

“When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angle of the Lord commanded him; he took her (Mary) as his wife, but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son; and he named him Jesus.”

Joseph is a trustworthy man. In order to save face, Joseph could have continued with the marriage to Mary and not followed through on what God asked him to do. But Matthew points out that Joseph does what God asked. 1) He took Mary to live with him as his wife. 2) He did not consummate the marriage until after the baby was born. 3) Very importantly, he named the baby Jesus.

In ancient times, it was the father’s place to name children. And so Joseph, provides Mary’s baby with two names. His own (what we could call family name) which connected him through genealogy to King David and Abraham; and he gave the child his first name Jesus, the one who saves.

When we look at the events of Jesus birth, or more generally the lives of people in the Bible, sometimes we wonder how that relates to us. Certainly, what happened to Mary and Joseph was an event of epic proportions. But let’s not over look the fact that God not only acted in the world 2000 years ago. God continues to act in the world today. And sometimes, God acts through us.

When reflecting on a good example of how God changes your plans, I continued to come back to Mark and me. So I went to him and asked Mark if I could share our story from his perspective. He said I could, as long as I made it clear that we don’t consider ourselves to be a modern day Mary and Joseph.

As the person in the limelight, I often get the praise and the credit, but I would not be here today if it wasn’t for Mark’s love, support, and partnership. I have a heart for the Joseph’s in this world, who continue to faithfully follow God’s direction in strong and quiet ways. Their stories deserved to be told too.

We had been dating for a couple years when I hesitantly confided to Mark that I believed God was calling me into the ministry. I’ll never forget his answer—“I’ve got plans for us.” Plans such as getting married, financial security, housing upgrade, and comfortable retirement to name a few. And that was typical (is typical) of Mark. He’s a planner, a great provider, a person who thinks situations through and tries to do the best he can with what he has. So when he said, “I’ve got plans for us,” I knew he did. He only other words to me were, “I’ve got to think about this.” And he did not bring it up for at least a month.

Reflecting back to when Mark was told that his planned future wife (note that we were not engaged yet) felt called to ordained ministry, many thoughts went through his mind. First, Mark did not grow up attending church regularly. He was not around organized religion. Those times when he was, he felt as if the preacher was standing in the pulpit shaking his finger at everyone—telling them to shape up or they were going to hell. He couldn’t help wonder how frequently those same persons who yelled at people from the pulpit ended up as front page news for some wrongdoing.

Not really interacting with church people very often, he had a misperception that everyone who went to church was a goodie-two-shoes. He wondered, “Do I really know this woman I was planning to marry?”

After the initial shock, Mark began to imagine what might be expected of him as the pastor’s spouse: attend worship every Sunday—in the front row (what about golf?), sing in the choir (by his own admission he can’t carry a tune in a bucket), teach a Sunday School class, organize the annual bake sale, cut the grass, be my number one supporter by attending everything that happens at church—in other words, when the church was open he would be expected to be there.

He went to speak to our Pastor at the Chicago Temple, Gene Winkler. Gene told Mark if he wanted to go play golf on Sundays then that’s what he should do. If he wanted to come to worship, then that’s what he should do. Gene encouraged Mark to decide how involved he wanted to be and to not allow church members, the DS or his wife (the pastor) to dictate what he would or would not do. Reflecting back, Mark believes Gene was encouraging him to go with it and trust God to direct him.

When Mark was ready, we sat down and discussed our options. We loved each other very much and did not think that God would put us together only to have my call to ministry tear us apart. We continued dating. I kept my full time job and the fall of 1997 took one class at McCormick Theological Seminary in Hyde Park. The very first day of the very first class, I knew in my heart that this was it. This was God’s plan for my life.

Mark watched and observed, and that Christmas, we got engaged. Mark asked me to marry him because of the love we shared and his trust that God had a plan for our lives—a plan that surpassed his limited vision and plans. I said yes because of the love we shared and our commitment to put God at the center of our marriage. There’s an old saying…You want to make God chuckle, make plans. That’s been our experience.

God continues to remind us how blessed we are. Sometimes we are receptive and sometimes it takes a good swift kick in the pants. Mark and I hope to translate the blessing of our changed plans into a blessing for others. We try to keep in mind that God’s plan for us includes us but aren’t exclusively about us.
In our better days, we want to be used by God to be a blessing for others. We are far from perfect at it. We just ask you to accept our humble witness as one of many examples of how God is changing people’s plans to fit into Her plans. The wonder, the wonder of it all, is that God is willing to put God’s awesome plans into our human hands—just as Mary cradled the baby Jesus and Joseph stood beside her, protecting them both.

God wants to use you too. God wants you to be flexible. God wants you to be open to the sound of his voice. God wants you to be able to discern his invitation when it comes and disrupts your plans. My prayer (our prayer) for you is that you’ll be open to it. We were and we are forever grateful.

Posted by vickie at 10:00 AM