All week long I’ve been looking at the women who are in Jesus’ genealogy. You can check them out here and here and here. But I’m going to shift gears this morning and talk about a man. Yes, I know you could say, “Pick a man. Any man” much like you would in a card trick. Jesus’ genealogy is no different in that respects from any other one from that time. {Side note: for Matthew to include women in Jesus’ genealogy was highly unusual. Women were considered non-entities in that day and age. Even in His lineage, Jesus breaks the mold}. Okay, off the rabbit trail and back on course. 🙂 The man is mentioned in Matthew 1:16 with a fuller story in verses 18-25.

Joseph. The earthly father of Jesus. The husband of Mary.

Jewish marriage was in 2 stages. The parents usually arranged the marriage to start with. The first stage was the kiddushin, or what we would call the engagement period. The second stage was the huppa. It was actually more like our engagement period, but the couple was considered married and had all the rights and privileges of marriage EXCEPT the sexual relationship. Joseph and Mary were in this stage.

That explains why Joseph sought to divorce Mary. In his eyes, the explanation Mary gave for being pregnant had to be incredulous. “Seriously? An angel told you what?” I honestly believe Joseph loved Mary and it was more than an arranged marriage at this point. His only go to was Mary had broken her virginity with someone. He just knew it wasn’t with him. Joseph was an honorable man. He didn’t want a scandal. He didn’t want to embarrass or demean Mary. Take her away. Divorce her quietly. Let her live her life without shame.

Until God intervened in a dream. Long story short (and you probably know it): Joseph did as he was told, i.e. stay with her and marry her and don’t have relations with her until after Jesus’ birth.  Then be the father to Immanuel. That seems like a lot to us. But consider this: Joseph went through life with the reputation of being married to a promiscuous woman-which, of course, was not true. Mary went through life being considered an immoral woman. On one occasion the Pharisees said to Jesus, “Well, we weren’t born as a result of sexual immorality.” (John 8:41).  Yeah, like let’s bring up someone’s past. “Mary, you had an illegitimate child. Joseph, you are the father of that child.” They lived with Nathaniel Hawthorne’s scarlet letter glowing brightly.

Joseph’s story seems to end sometime after Jesus’ turned 12 and was found in the Temple. It is surmised that he died after fathering other children with Mary. Joseph teaches us the importance of listening and saying “Yes” to God (just like Mary). Jesus had two good earthly teachers-a father who loved Him as his own, and a mother who loved Him until His death. May we all be like Joseph and be willing to change the course of our lives if led by God to do so.