Pregnant With Hope?
Advent 4a, December 19, 2010- (Matthew 1:1-18)
Do you ever dream? I mean do you ever have dreams?
Joseph did. I suspect first that he had dreams. He was engaged to Mary. They would soon have their own place. Eventually they would have a child, even children. They would work hard. It wouldn't be easy. I mean there were realities: Rome and all, taxes and all; limitations on where they could travel, what their kids would become. But they cared about each other. They had family. It would be good.
But his dreams were shattered. You see, even before he could be with (if you get my drift) his betrothed, his Mary, he discovered that she was pregnant! Now everything was going up in smoke. Now Joseph had decisions to make. By law, by rule he could go to the courts and have the contract of his engagement, that betrothal annulled. But making such a choice would be very hard on Mary. Joseph still cared for her. In addition such a public act could also lead to serious repercussions for Mary. Once her "adultery" was outed, she and the father of her child, if his identity could be learned, could be stoned to death. Such stoning was within the realm of the law.
But Joseph was a caring person. He decided to get that divorce as quietly as possible. It would be better for Mary that way – probably for both their families too. But before he took such action, Joseph fell asleep. He dreamed a different dream. This was a dream that changed his life. It is a dream that when acted upon changes the course of history. Matthew speaks of Joseph's dream in this way: "Behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, 'Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit, she will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins'."
Amazingly in the face of all conventions, all the rules of that time, Joseph trusts the angel of his dream. He takes Mary to be his wife. He claims Jesus as his Son. And God's efforts to reach out to humanity continue to unfold.
But what do we make of Joseph's dream? The child conceived in Mary is of God's Spirit? This child will save or deliver people from their sins? Come on!
Isn't sin an archaic term? I mean we make mistakes. We have a few shortcomings. But if we just try harder or if we are just a little nicer next time – they really don't mean that much, do they? Really?
Can we be actually be honest with ourselves, even at worship? Can we fight against our propensity to minimize or not deal with reality?
Look around. Look within. Wars and battles have raged from time immemorial. Those who think that humanity is getting better and better, more sophisticated, seem to have lost sight of this fact. We continue to harm, to injure, to kill one another both via word and deed. And we spend so much time and money on such killing efforts(try employing lawyers or funding a military exploit) – time and money that could be invested in caring for each other – with the construction of schools, hospitals, recreational centers. The damage that we do in such battles, Afghanistan, Iraq, Darfur, child custody wars is immeasurable. Nor are such battles limited to states, countries, nations or even some configurations of the family. We also wage such battles in the church, between religions including our very own families. And again the damage is untold – as children are harmed, forced to take on our particular views of the world, wounded by damaging words and actions directed at people they depend upon for love. We have shelters for those who have been beaten and abused in every city in this country. And they serve only a small fraction of the wounded.
Sin isn't just those little or big things we do that we shouldn't do. Sin is part of who we are. Even though we know we shouldn't – we do anyway. We consume to the point of being overweight, overspent. While so consuming we suck the very life from the planet not just in the present but for the future. We know or at least have been told that we can talk with God – that God longs for our relationship to be intimate and deep. But instead we frequently invest our time in things that empty us and others. We cannot help ourselves. And hat is the point dear people of God. So often, we simply cannot and do not help ourselves – in the purest sense of that word.
But God, in God's love acts. Amazingly, inconceivably, God acts. Through a young woman and a young man, in a backwoods place, in the midst of a culture that had many similarities to ours - where violence and power, money and whom one knows matters so much. Things are the way they are and so many, the vast majority, are convinced not only that things won't change but they can't change.
That's what Joseph thought too. He was working at carving out his life within the rules and traditions, the status quo of his time and place. But then Mary became pregnant with a child that wasn't his, "My God! What was he to do?" He would put her away quietly and then see what would happen. Maybe there would be another woman that he could be husband to, another woman with whom he could father children. That was the plan. But then he had this dream complete with an angel and an action plan that he must either accept or reject.
To accept the angel's message and act accordingly would be an audacious choice. Not his child – and yet his child. This child the angel said would deliver the people, Joseph's own people from their sin. What on earth would that mean?
Joseph wakes up. Things are the same. And yet things are also changing. He takes Mary to be his wife. She is very much with child. The future – a new future is about to be born.
How about you? How about me? Is it the same old, same old? Are you running around, trying to get everybody something? Are you running around trying to keep ahead of tasks that must be done? What are your relationships like – with those closest to you? Is there honesty, forgiveness, unconditional love that flows from God to you and then spreads to others? Or is it, one damn thing after another?
What about the world? Do you have hope, do you bring hope to and for the world? Are you able to daily laugh and cry, arising each morning, realizing that God is calling you to care? You will be blessed both in the middle of work and play. Or are you sometimes the way I occasionally am: tired, tired of the sickness, of powers that so often take the easy way instead of the caring way, especially when it comes to those who are sick, vulnerable, oppressed in ongoing ways?
Joseph isn't the only one who has had a dream or even the angel of the Lord appear to him! We, dear people, are privileged to live within the story of this child who is conceived in and born of Mary. As Luther says, the wood of the manger is somehow also the wood of the cross. This one soon to be held by the manger is born to free us and the world. It seems like such a crazy plan, that God would dare to come to us and be born as human being, weak and vulnerable. But this is exactly what God does.
So, are you watching? Are you waiting? Are we in any way pregnant with hope? God promises that this One can save even us from our sin. God knows we all need help!
Open our eyes. Open our ears, our minds and our hearts, to such pregnant hope. Amen.