Matthew c1:18-25: Let's celebrate Joseph, Mary's husband

What a great day to celebrate Joseph.

What a God-centred man he is.

If you think about it we should have expected God to choose a righteous man to be Mary’s husband and the step-father of her child.

We can see his goodness in his refusal to go through with the wedding! The truth of our love for God is shown by our obedience to Him. Though Joseph loves Mary, he puts his love for God first. That was the righteous, the very good thing to do.

It shows us that Joseph really is a God-centred man. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 10:37 “Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.”

God is meant to be our first love.

We know that it would have been a terrible thing for Mary to be a single parent, a wife without a husband and for Jesus to be a child without a dad.

There was no welfare state, no social acceptance, no work she could have done, no good way for her to earn money, no home she could have stayed in or family she could have stayed with, without scandal and stigma. Small town Israel would not have been a safe place for her to live.

What if Joseph had decided he would disobey God and marry Mary anyway? How would that have worked? Joseph would always have suspected Mary of adultery.

Jesus would not have been a joy that united them but a child who divided them. Joseph would have broken his relationship with God, even as he was pretending to be righteous by parenting His son.

It was in his breaking off the marriage that Joseph that showed he was truly righteous and therefore the right person to marry Mary and be Jesus’ human dad.

And it was because he did the right thing by obeying God, God sent an angel to him to tell him that Mary really was pregnant by the Holy Spirit and to marry her, and to give her son the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.

Because he was righteous Joseph took up his destiny, and became the husband Mary needed and the step-father Jesus required. What a great man.

Elizabeth and Zechariah, Mary and Joseph are models of righteousness for all Christians. What they did was unique and is not to be repeated, but who knows what the Lord will uniquely do through His righteous men and women today, who express their love for Him in such obedience.