See a Miracle in the Making!

4th Sunday in Advent, 12/19/10
Matthew 1:18-25


See a Miracle in the Making!
I. Received by God-given faith
II. In fulfillment of God-given prophecy


“I don’t believe what I just saw!” You’ve probably made that statement recently, especially if you spend time surfing the internet. Modern technology has made it easy to capture the unbelievable on video and, with a few clicks of a computer mouse, make it available for all the world to see. No longer do you have to wait until the circus comes to town to see a freak show. It’s available on your computer screen at any time free of charge. And the things you see on a daily basis are amazing.

But are you amazed at what your God does for you? Maybe not so much. Truth be told, when tend to take what he does for us for granted. Part of it is due to the fact that we think we’ve heard it all before. But our own attitude about ourselves is partly to blame as well. If we don’t consider our own sins to be so damnable, then God’s forgiveness and his gift of eternal life aren’t so wonderful.

Once again we’re standing at the threshold of another Christmas. In just a few days we’ll be celebrating it with family and friends. Christmas is the presentation of God’s greatest gift to you and me—the gift of his Son, our Savior. For the Christian, celebrating Christmas is really the celebration of a miracle. But are you amazed by it? Do you blink your eyes to make sure you’re seeing things clearly? Maybe not. That’s because we’ve seen it all before. We’ve celebrated this miracle before. But let’s not miss it. Let’s see it for what it was. Let’s see it for what it still is.

See a miracle in the making. That miracle is presented to us this morning in Matthew’s account of the birth of Christ. It’s the account of his birth from the viewpoint of Joseph. As we take that viewpoint to heart, see a miracle in the making and be amazed by it all over again!

Part I.

After going through a difficult situation in your life, some of you have shared the following comment with me, “Pastor, if it weren’t for my Christian faith, I don’t know how I would have made it.” There are times in the life of every Christian in which things look so bleak and so hopeless that we would have given up completely if it weren’t for our trust that somehow God was going to work things out for us.

Joseph had a faith like that. Things had been going very well for him lately. He had decided to marry the love of his life, a young woman named Mary. In fact, they had recently spoken their vows to one another and were legally married according to Jewish law and were married in the eyes of God. But Jewish customs prevented them from living together as husband and wife right away. You see, according to custom, the Jewish groom, after he had spoken his wedding vows with his wife, would leave her at the home of her parents. He would then return to his home and get it ready for his new bride. That may take a bit of rearranging, cleaning or even construction. At any rate, when their home was ready, then he would go and get his bride and bring her into their home and they would begin living together as husband and wife.

Joseph was in the happy process of getting his home ready for his wife, Mary, when his happy world was shattered. Somehow he received the news that his beloved Mary was pregnant and Joseph knew that he wasn’t the father. How he found out we don’t know. Perhaps Mary told him. Perhaps it was a friend or a relative. How he received this terrible news didn’t matter. It was news that drove a dagger into his heart.

And as a respectable Jewish man, he figured there was only one course of action. He would terminate the marriage immediately. Matthew tells us, “Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.” He wasn’t going to air her dirty laundry before everyone. He would take care of things quietly and legally and it would be over.

But that’s when God stepped into his little world. He sent his angel to explain to Joseph what was happening. Mary had not been unfaithful to him. She had been faithful to her Lord and to Joseph. Of all the Jewish women in the world, the Lord had chosen her to be the mother of the Savior. What was conceived in her was not of human origin; it was divine. The Holy Spirit used his almighty power to cause her to become pregnant. It was indeed a miracle. And here was Joseph’s part in it, “Do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife.” He would not only be Mary’s husband, he would be the Savior’s legal earthly father.

And Joseph didn’t delay a moment. Matthew records, “When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son.” His response to this miracle is nothing short of amazing. He believed what the angel told him. And then he put that faith into action by doing what he had been told to do. But that faith wasn’t his doing. It was all God’s.

See a miracle in the making! A miracle received by God-given faith.

Joseph was the first to misunderstand the conception of Mary by the Holy Spirit. But he wasn’t the last. About a year later King Herod made plans to murder Mary’s child. Thirty years later the enemies of Mary’s child refused to believe that he was anything more than the carpenter’s son. Millions of people who will celebrate Christmas later this week will do the same. They’ll misunderstand the miracle of Christmas.

So how long has it been since you’ve pondered how blessed you are to know and believe what Christmas is all about? How long has it been since you were grateful that the holy God shared with you the eternally awful news about your sins? Yes, we should be grateful that we know what our sins are and what they cost our Savior. And how long has it been since you stopped to ponder how blessed you are to know that Mary’s child is indeed the Son of God and the world’s only Savior from sin? You’re part of a worldwide minority, but solely by the grace of God. God’s power worked that faith in you. God made you his own child by giving you faith in Jesus. And with that faith you correctly see the birth of Jesus for what it really is—a miracle! See a miracle in the making, a miracle received by God-given faith.

Part II.

Have you ever had an argument with God over his timing? Most Christians have. We wonder why God allowed this or that to happen at just that time. If we were in charge of all things, we would have done things a little sooner or later.

I imagine Joseph may have had such thoughts right after the angel informed him of what was going on with his wife. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Joseph became slightly irritated over the situation as the months of her pregnancy progressed. He easily could have argued, “You know, Lord, this would have been a lot easier on everybody if you just would have waited a few months. By then I would have had Mary in my home. We would have had a chance to settle in and get used to being married. A year later would have nice, Lord.”

Maybe that would have been easier on Joseph’s earthly situation, but it would have been eternally harder on him and every other sinner. You see, God knew what he was doing. He always does. Allowing Joseph to take Mary home as his wife and then sending us our Savior would have made God out to be a liar at the very least. It would have made Jesus nothing but a sinful human child, the biological son of Mary and Joseph, at the very worst. And both of them would have spelled eternal death in hell for us.

You see, God was simply doing things the way he had foretold. Matthew cites the prophecy from Isaiah 7:14. “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel!” We don’t refer to Jesus’ mother as the virgin Mary for nothing. God’s holy prophecy and our salvation depend on her virginity. God made sure things happened that way.

And because of it, we can be absolutely certain that Jesus was who his name “Immanuel” declares him to be. He is indeed “God with us.” He is God living in human flesh and blood. We call that truth the miracle of the incarnation. It made Jesus uniquely qualified to be our Savior. As one of us, he could be our substitute and live perfectly for us and die innocently for our sins. As true God his life and death have an infinite value and thus can pay for the sins of all people.

It took a miracle of God, but Jesus our Savior came into this world exactly as we needed. See a miracle in the making in fulfillment of God-given prophecy.

Today marks the final Sunday in the season of Advent, the season in which we prepare to receive our Savior, Jesus Christ. At the end of this week, we’ll celebrate his first coming to this earth. Don’t let all the preparations you’ll be making distract you from what Christmas really is. It’s a miracle in the making. It’s a miracle of God’s love for you that he was faithful to his promise to send you and me a Savior even though we don’t deserve it. See it for the miracle that it is. It’s a virgin birth. It’s God becoming one of us. Focus on that miracle and your celebration of Christ’s birth will truly be blessed by your God. Amen.