Sermon Tone Analysis

Good Morning,

A few years ago we visited Yosemite national park and it is the most incredible stunning place on the planet… On the way home we took route 120 to leave the National park but after a while discovered the road had a lot sharp bend…and we started to suffer from car sickness and nausea…

Then we came to this fork in the Road and it offered an alternative route… continue on Route 120 or this road to the left called old Priest Grade.

We could continue with the windy road for another 15 minutes or longer?

or could take Old Priest Grade.... and it would take us about 5 minutes...

After a little collaboration we decided we going to turn left … and take the short cut and avoid all the turns..

We figured we were driving the Ford Explorer and it should handle the road in front of us....

We used the best information we had and made a decision...

But as soon as we got started I realized that it might have been a mistake…and there was no room to turn around … The road was not only steep but narrow... What made matters worse there were these patches of gravel and every time I came to a sharp turn, I would break and the car would skid towards the edge of the road.…

Did I mention that there were no guard rails and an easy 500+ foot drop on the side of us…

I read one comment online that said if you take Priest Grade take your prayer book with you..… and they are not joking..

It was the most intense 5 minutes in my driving career…

When you got your in-laws in the car you got to impress.. you got make it.…

It was a hair raising drive… thankfully we made it down the mountain .... we were all relieved to get to the bottom… The first thing we did at the bottom of was change drivers… I was done..

We are in the second week of our Advent Series and this morning I want to talk about Overcoming Hope..

Last week we made an important definition of Hope — English word for Hope can be week… but biblical hope is a sure word --- it speaks of Assurance, substance, certainty.

…It’s Hebrews 11:1 kind of Faith.

Faith and Hope go together and it’s Conviction that all of God’s invisible attributes can be trusted.. it’s the belief that God that not only is God all powerful, All knowing… but that God is Always present.. God is not only present in our today’s but he is also present in our tomorrows..

We are in an advent series… and Advent simply means the coming of Christ... and one of the great blessings of celebrating Advent is that it can be a time the of preparing our hearts… Just as God prepared Mary and Joseph and others for his coming our heart too can be prepared.

This morning We are going to look at Joseph and his response to the News of Mary’s pregnancy..

Joseph comes to a Folk in the Road…He came to place of uncertainty and the unknown… It’s interesting that the first words out Gabriels mouth at the birth announcements.. “fear not” -

---Do not be afraid.”

When the unknown comes into our lives it is easy to become afraid… often we assume the worst..

Fear is like a great magnifying-glass; or one of those mirrors which give a distorted image of things reflected in them---

Charles Spurgeon makes the observation - The angel said, “Fear not,” as though the times of fear were over, and the days of hope and joy had arrived.”

The Christmas narrative is full of these unknown moments...

Luke records the responses of Zachariah and Elizabeth and Mary the Angel Gabriel … ....Zachariah is in the temple presenting the prayers of the nation before the Lord — when the angel Gabriel appears to him and tells him that he and Elizabeth will bear a son in their old age… and that the prayers of Israel for a Redeemer have been answered… This was another unknown moment … something they had prayed for years but now it didn’t seem possible..

Zachariah responded with fear and doubt....

As a result there were consequence - He lost his ability to speak and became mute…and was unable to bless Israel and share the miracle of the birth of John with Elizabeth..

Then we have Mary’s response to the unknown..

Gabriel Appears to Mary… with a strange greeting… Greetings O favored one the Lord is with you.

…

Mary is fearful but when Gabriel explained his mission that she would have the honor of being the mother of Jesus the savior — she pondered these things and responded with faith believing and said “So be it according to your word.”

Mary is blessed among woman and full grace --- because God chose her.. and because she responded with Faith believing.. Similarly, Elizabeth receives her pregnancy in faith and giving thanks than God has removed her shame.

Now, Joseph the husband of Mary going to be challenged with an unknown ...

Joseph is one of those characters in the Bible where we don’t have much information.

We know he was a carpenter.

We know he was alive at Jesus’ 12th birthday and but he disappears off the radar and we suspect that he had died before Jesus crucifixion.

We know that he lived in Nazareth, his hometown was Bethlehem, and he was a direct descendant of King David.

We know that he was a righteous man, because verse 19 says he was.

But we don’t know much more about him...

Even so there is much that we can learn about Joseph when it comes to responding to the unknown.

Let’s read our Text.

T/S We learn from Joseph — that we need to take time to...

1. Understand the nature of the Disruption in our lives.

Now the birth of Jesus took place in this way....

We have started our marathon of Christmas movies … Have you noticed that most Christmas movies have a love story woven in somewhere… There is a love story woven in the Advent story… this love story between Joseph and Marry who betrothed to be married …And like every good love story there is a Conflict of some sort that has to be resolved… Joseph and Mary were in love… they had marriage plans… they had gone through the hoops.

Now in Jewish marriages there were three stages

1.

The arrangement… this often between parents.

2. Then the engagement or betrothal period this could last 2 years… Where woman would live with her parents… the third part was..the

3 consumption of the marriage.

So Mary and Joseph committed to one another basically in a marriage commitment.

The only thing that’s yet to happen is for them to live together, to physically consummate the marriage

But, something disrupts their plans.... Have you noticed that even the best made plans can be interrupted… by the unexpected..

“Before they came together (before they entered into physical relationship with one another) Mary was found to be with child That’s obviously a pretty glaring statement.

Now Matthew adds “from the Holy Spirit” to clue us in to something supernatural that’s going on here.

But Platt, D. (2011).

This quite different from Greek mythology where where it speaks of children born to the gods who with woman… The Birth of Jesus was a miracle performed by the Holy Sprit…

The word found means to be discovered… means it became obvious that Mary was pregnant.. Some have suggested that Mary is possibly in her 2nd trimester of pregnancy… … As you can imagine, this creates a huge problem in the Joseph and Mary’s relationship…

Take a moment to put yourself in Joseph’s shoes.

You’ve asked this woman to marry you.

She’s said, “Yes.”

This marriage is contractually there.

The only thing that’s left is for her to come into your home.

And right before that’s about to happen, you find out that she is pregnant.

Knowing that you have had no physical relationship with her, there is only one possible option for how she is pregnant in your mind.

Clearly she has been involved with another man.

So imagine the emotions in you as husband, about to bring your wife into your home, only to find out that for all you know she has been involved with another man and is now pregnantPlatt, D.

We don’t have a record of the conversation between Joseph and Mary… but we can imagine it was an uncomfortable… and didn’t end very well… .

The text implies that...

Joseph didn’t believe Mary’s story of the angel announcement and her miraculous conception..because Joseph was contemplating how to fix or resolve the situation...

b.

Joseph --- tried to understand the situation but then came up logical solution.

Ray Johnson in his book “Hope Quotient” talks about discovering the source of our discouragement… Sometimes you don’t have enough fuel in the tank… Every engine that moves forward not only has to be on it has to have fuel… there are things that drain us of fuel..

Ray mentions 3 sources that can steal you hope.

1. Circumstances

2. Yourself - (messages)

3. Others -

One of the things we can do is Understand the nature of the Disruption in our lives… Sometimes it might seem like the circumstances but it is also our response to the circumstances… and in order to do that we need to create space for this to happen...

As he is meditating and contemplating what to do....An angel from the Lord appears to Joseph in a dream..

T/S We learn from Joseph - how do we deal with life’s disruptions and Regain Hope..First we have to.

1. Understand the nature of the Disruption in our lives.

2. Create time and Space for Reflection

In 1956 environmentalist Sigurd Olson built a small cabin on the banks of a lake in northern Minnesota.

The naming of lake homes is customary in the land of ten thousand lakes.

Most names are rather predictable, but Olson was a little more intentional.

His objective in building the cabin was to "hear all that was worth listening for."

So he named it Listening Point..

What we learn from Joseph is that we need a listening Point...

Joseph has come to this fork in the Road.

We told that Joseph is a just man — he is upright in his Character and ethics…He wants to do the right thing..

Joseph has a Listening point …a place where he can think and contemplate… as he mulls over what to do..

He has a couple of options - He could go take the legal path and take her to the priest and according to the Law she could be stoned…

2.

He could do a less severe action and privately divorce Mary privately…

When you think about it — Joseph could have easily made up his mind…on the spot… could have acted out of his emotions of hurt and feelings of betrayal.... but to his credit the scriptures says that he took time to consider these things…

The word consider means to meditate… process information and consider various aspects of what is happening… I never forget that my professor Rod Cooper saying that … sometimes in conflict resolution and leadership.. “Slower is Faster.”

Rather than jumping to conclusions… He took time to think… pray.... ponder....

If you read the psalms it is full of encouragement to meditate...

Meditate on your bed and be still…any time in the morning, at noon, in the evening… through the night… meditate on the Word and on his precepts (principles) on his words on his doings, on his wonders, on his loving kindness… let medication be acceptable and pleasing in his sight..

And he came to a decision… and that that Joseph was to exercise compassion and grace - Matthew tells us that even in the face of evidence..

Joseph knew he wasn’t the father… he was..