For this journal entry, we will look a little closer at one of the events in Jesus’ birth, and uncover a truth that I found especially interesting. This truth is hidden in plain sight, but it is easy to miss if you read this story without paying attention.
In verse 25 we read, “but [Joseph] kept her [Mary] a virgin until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus.”
While Joseph had planned to send Mary away silently to not publicly disgrace her, an angel in a dream convinced him otherwise. We don’t know if their wedding was the next day, or if it happened at a future date, or if Jesus was conceived weeks or months before. If Mary raced off to be with Elizabeth for three months prior to her wedding, then it would be very possible that Jesus would have clearly appeared to have been conceived outside of marriage. However, if all this happened before or right around the same time with Joseph and Mary traveling to see Elizabeth and Zechariah immediately following their marriage (a.k.a. honeymoon), then it would have looked to outsiders that Jesus was a honeymoon baby.
We know from reading Matthew that Joseph kept Mary as a virgin until after Jesus was born – but to everyone else looking at the scene, it probably would have looked as though Jesus was Joseph’s son.
This is significant because often times in our own lives, each family has secrets that they don’t want to share and/or they don’t feel are either believable or relevant for others to know. Perhaps it is simply a countercultural choice that the couple has made that they don’t want to share for fear it will cause division, or perhaps it is a dark secret that has brought the family shame in the past and they would rather it be erased from their history.
At any rate, Joseph and Mary had an incredible and unbelievable family secret, and Joseph accepted the reality that it meant, and chose to raise Jesus as his own Son. Joseph stepped into the unbelievable, and became the earthly father to the Savior of the world. For us, we cannot change the past, but we can choose to accept the place we are currently at (including all the craziness present) and see it as a step towards moving forward into a better future.
This thought was inspired by studying the Walking With Jesus “Reflective Bible Study” package. To discover insights like this in your own study time, click here and give Reflective Bible Study a try today!
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