Prayer: True and almighty God,
refresh us with the mystery of our Savior’s first coming during this Christmas
season.
Tell us,
Uncle Matthew, about Jesus who our family respects so highly. You were close to him. Tell it from the beginning.
This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about:
You say that he is our Messiah. That sounds pretty important.
His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant…
Uh, oh. She got pregnant before they got married! I bet her parents were upset. What was she thinking? Poor Joseph, too.
… pregnant through the Holy Spirit.
Huh? You mean that God somehow, I mean, that’s incredible! I bet that never happened before!
Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.
He must have felt so mixed up. Seems he did care for her, but he had to do the right thing somehow without compromising his convictions or ruining her life, right?
But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream....
Joseph had a dream with an angel in it! How did he know it was an angel? From God, yikes! He must have woken up very scared.
The angel said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.”
So, it’s just as Mary probably explained to reassure Joseph. Now he is involved too, since people will probably think… Well, if an angel of the Lord spoke to me, I guess I would…
The angel also said, “She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”
Whoa! Clearly, this baby was very unusual: named by an angel with the purpose of his life already identified. And what a huge purpose it is too!
All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”).
Oh, I remember that last week when the reader in synagogue unrolled the scrolls to Isaiah. Right?
When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he did not consummate their marriage until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.
Good for Joseph, though it must have been hard, especially having to wait for… you know what I mean. Anyway, that’s the way it happened, Uncle Matthew? That’s how our Jesus was born. That’s even better than we thought.
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