Expect the unexpected
The title of this message is to expect the unexpected. You may agree that it’s pretty unexpected for God to carry out his plan for humanity though this unlikely young couple, Mary and Joseph. God has unlikely and sometimes bizarre ways of working out his plans. And I want to explore the possibility today that we, just like Mary and Joseph, might still have a crucial part to play in God’s plans; and that we, just like Mary and Joseph, might be called to do God’s work.
The Gospel reading today helps us see the birth through Joseph’s eyes – we can be more familiar with Luke’s telling of Gabriel’s message to Mary and her response, but the story is essentially the same – as it is when anyone is called. It’s all about obedience, trust and faithfulness..The connection between the two gospels is the message from Gabriel: ‘don’t be afraid’. You see, for both Joseph and Mary, their calling was really scary and God knew that!
Imagine the fear. Imagine quaking in your boots if a real live Angel Gabriel stood in front of you and told you you’d be the Dad to the most amazing person to ever live on the planet!
1. OBEDIENCE
Being obedient is not easy…..especially when you can see the consequences.Do we only think of the Christmas story as a cute picture postcard scene of young children dressing up or do we sense the reality of what these two young people actually went through? This “holy family” had their own problems to face and overcome just as you and I do today.
Firstly, Mary and Joseph were incredibly young to be betrothed and married – they were probably only teenagers.
And the punishment for being pregnant in that society as it still is in some places today, was death by stoning. And there was this woman willing to say:
“I am the Lord’s servant. I am willing to do whatever you say.” That is a woman of faith. A woman who was ready to be obedient.
Mary and Joseph are not passive in their faith, they show courage. This is not fearlessness. This is courage in the face of fear. It’s the greatest and most decisive act of faith in our history. God honoured Mary’s obedience and an angel DID SPEAK to Joseph to reassure him that this child would be born of the Holy Spirit and he would be the son of the most-high, the messiah, saviour or the world. What obedience, to follow God’s will and take Mary on. All that God needed was that decisive “yes.”
Advent is an opportunity for us to think prayerfully about the times when we have been called by God. Both the times when we have responded obediently, and the times when we’ve let God’s call sail on past - because we have been too afraid of where it might take us, because where we are right now is safe, because we are too busy, because, because, because...
What is your calling? Have you had those moments where God is stirring something in you? Perhaps you’ve known you should pick up the phone to someone and have decided otherwise. Or you see someone on the other side of the street but walk more quickly as you don’t have the time to stop to talk. Or there is a sense that you should be doing something in the church, or in your community but you brush it off as there is already so much going on in your life. Maybe this was God reaching out to his people through YOU.
God interrupts our life with really inconvenient stuff and we can find we brush it off easily. These are choices that we all have through life as Christians. Do we follow God’s lead, or do we choose to ignore the call? Can you imagine if Joseph had ignored his calling, or Mary had simply said ‘no’?
We’re all called. Not necessarily into ordination; nor, I shouldn’t imagine, to father or mother the Son of God! But the thoughts that flit in and out of your head, the nudges or feelings – that ‘something you can’t put your finger on’ which almost feels like a burden and heavy in your heart (it can almost hurt) unless you get on and do it, they are real and alive in you and may be God-placed. Don’t ignore them. The whole of life is much less determined by the things we experience, than by how we choose to respond to such experiences.
How will you respond next time God’s call comes? Next time He whispers to your heart? Next time He invites you to try something new?
2 TRUST:
Mary and Joseph would have known the Scriptures. They would have read about the promised Messiah, born to a virgin, through the prophet Isaiah. But could they possibly have imagined this was their call? That they were part of the story?
Thankfully they did. However daunted by their future, they trusted that the God of Israel who had been faithful in the past, would be faithful to them as well. They trusted His plan. They trusted his call.
What can we learn from these events?
Don’t give up seeking what you want from God. Keep praying and who knows when God will answer.
Don’t be surprised if God gives you what you desire but in a totally different way from your expectation.
Don’t think that when you get your blessing everything will be perfect. Even the greatest blessings bring the most unexpected outcomes. As we know from the rest of the story Jesus was nailed to a cross and crucified by the people He came to save.
Don’t give up your trust in God. God hears our prayer and will answer them in His time. Trust in Him. When things look hopeless, this is the time when the God of hope steps in and does the unexpected.
3. FAITHFULNESS
Not only does he require our faithfulness to Him, He is faithful to us.
Jesus is Emmanuel – which means ‘God with us’. This name has been given to no one else. Jesus was there in the beginning and He promises He will be with his people to the very end of the age. God will be with us, even in the unexpected twists and turns of life. and not just in some sort of imagined future when everything is sorted out, be here, today, right in the muddle and craziness of our lives. It’s in that muddle where we are going to be called.
There is no higher calling or a more liberating job than to see every day as an opportunity to serve Jesus Christ. (Nicky Gumbel)
If God’s call comes in the midst of this muddled and crazy life, we need to be ready to let go of all the stuff of this world, so we can respond.
God is gentle. He knows you. He is your faithful father. But like all good Dads, he expects you to be responsive to Him in return. Not to ignore, but to trust. The most fruitful times in life are when we hand over the reins to Him and let him take control, and that isn’t necessarily the easiest thing to do as we know from this first Christmas story.
As we think about how Joseph and Mary chose to travel into the unknown, let's also think about how we might take a risk, step outside of the familiar and go where God is calling us. Who knows, we might even end up glimpsing the Kingdom of Heaven!
I want to finish with a powerful prayer, by Sir Francis Drake.
As I pray these words, invite God to speak to you, and ask for the gifts of obedience, trust and faithfulness, that you might respond.
“Disturb us, Lord, when we are too well pleased with ourselves, when our dreams have come true because we have dreamed too little, when we arrive safely because we sailed too close to the shore. Disturb us, Lord, when with the abundance of things we possess, we have lost our thirst for the waters of life, having fallen in love with life, we have ceased to dream of eternity, and in our efforts to build a new earth, we have allowed our vision of the new heaven to dim. Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly, to venture on wider seas, where storms will show your mastery, where losing sight of land, we shall find the stars. We ask you to push back the horizons of our hopes and to push us into the future in strength, courage, hope and love. This we ask in the name of our Captain, who is Jesus Christ. Amen”