18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ [1] took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed [2] to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 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.” 22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:
23 “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
and they shall call his name Immanuel”
(which means, God with us). 24 When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, 25 but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.
Grace mercy and peace to you from God our Father through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text today is the gospel lesson just read. You may be seated.
Dear friends in Christ. “It’s so easy,” the teacher told her students, “All you need to do is to take the square of side a ad add it to the square of side b, find that square root, and then you have the length of the hypotenuse. It really is quite simple.” Oh the dreaded words of math class – “It’s really quite simple!” I cannot remember how many times I heard these words in math, but things never seemed that easy. It got more and more difficult the more I looked at it, until finally in Calculus, I realized “It isn’t as easy as they think.” It is a little more complex than it looks.
Don’t you wonder if that is what Joseph is thinking in our text today? Don’t you wonder what he thought when an angel of God appeared to him and said, “Joseph it really is quite easy, yes she’s pregnant, but it is by the Holy Spirit, and the baby she gives birth to will save his people from their sins.” In Matthew’s account it is almost as if the angel is saying “It’s really quite simple Joseph!”
But in Joseph’s head, I am sure it wasn’t as simple as the angel made it out to be. His fiancée, the woman he was preparing to marry comes to him one day and says she is pregnant. Suddenly that happy life he was looking forward to is thrown into pieces. And what is more, Joseph knows he is not the father, for our text says “It was before they had come together.” Suddenly he wonders what will happen, and how will he deal with this situation?
If this news gets out, that Joseph is not the father and that Mary is pregnant, it could be bad news. Mary could legally be dragged out of town and stoned – killed. Her life could come to an end, and Joseph himself would be disgraced. So our text says that Joseph comes up with a plan, a plan to protect himself and his bride to be. He decides to quietly divorce her, to alleviate himself of the situation. But in the midst of this plan, an angel appears to Joseph in a dream, and says, “Come on Joseph relax - it is so simple.”
We can probably understand what Joseph was feeling, because our lives our not simple either. Our lives are not easy to figure out, or easy to understand. We have difficult situations that arise over and over again, and we must figure out how we are to deal with them as Christians here on earth.
“You shall not commit adultery” scripture clearly says. Joseph had heard it, and you have heard it. It’s simple, but yet in our world of sin, similarly to our text, we see young mothers who are found to be pregnant out of wedlock. Unlike our text, these pregnancies are not God’s amazing work through the Holy Spirit. These young women must determine what course of action to take, how to tell their parents and family, and how to raise a child when they feel little more than a child themselves. We see young Fathers, who upon finding out that their few minutes of selfish desire have now become a child wonder what they are going to do, and how they are going to face their parents, and the mother’s parents. It becomes complex. It becomes difficult
In addition we see husbands and wives who must tell their beloved spouse that they have not always been as faithful as they promised in their vows, that their own sinful desires led them to infidelity. There is divorce and remarriage everywhere we look. In this sinful world, something as simple as “You shall not commit adultery,” something as simple as only sleep with your spouse after you are married, suddenly becomes extremely difficult.
Our lives are complex in other ways as well. Because of sin, things get difficult. A seemingly simple family get together can degenerate into family fighting and yelling. A simple promise can become a lie. A seemingly simple medical procedure can degenerate into a complex struggle between life and death. The list could go on and on and on, and in the midst of it all we see the truth, we are guilty and we are sinners. Each one of us, even if we haven’t outwardly committed one of those obvious sins that others can see. Even deep within ourselves we are sinful and guilty. And because of this, our seemingly simple world, in sin becomes too complex for us to handle.
Friends, sin is at work in our world, and that sin makes this world confusing beyond belief. It leads us to ask the question – in the midst of all these convolutions of our sinful world, what is truth? It is the question Pilate asked, and it is the question we must ask. What is the truth regarding Abortion? What is the truth regarding homosexuality? What is the truth regarding death, life, hate, war and more? And the answers to these questions often are way more complicated that we can even begin to understand.
And so we feel like Joseph must have felt, when his entire simple world collapsed upon him. Just like us Joseph must have asked, “Why?” And the angel gives him an answer. “The child in her womb is from the Holy Spirit, and will set his people free from their sins.” The child that has turned Joseph’s world upside down has come to do that to you and to me. He has come to take our sinful lives and to completely disrupt them.
For the baby that Matthew so simply put “was born and called Jesus” has come for one simple purpose. That baby has come to set you free from your sin. He has come to rescue you. He has come so that by being nailed to a cross, and dying, he might destroy your complex world and give you this simple truth – “you belong to Jesus.” You belong to Jesus because he has purchased and won you, not with gold or silver but with his holy precious blood, innocent suffering and death.
And here is another truth given to you by Jesus’ death on the cross. You sin is forgiven. The sin that disrupts this life, that divides you from loved ones, that attacks your heart and desires is gone, atoned for. Jesus has come and now he brings a
SIMPLE SOLUTION TO THE COMPLEXITIES OF THIS WORLD
And that is this, that sin, death and the devil no longer have power over you. The questions that we ask that seemingly have no answer are now answered by the blood of Jesus. The death you deserve Jesus has died.
And now as you go through this world, there is a simple answer to all the difficult questions, and that is this, Jesus. Jesus is there with you as you struggle. Jesus will never leave you nor forsake you, Jesus will be there with his all-powerful hand holding you up. Yes, it will be difficult as you face those difficult situations, but in the midst of them Jesus is with you.
Jesus gives us a promise of simplicity, a simplicity not of this world, a simplicity waiting in heaven, a simplicity of eternity. Amen.
