December 21, 2025 • 16 mins
A wedding plan shatters, a dream interrupts, and a quiet man chooses trust over reputation. We walk with Joseph through the shock of Mary’s pregnancy and the sober mercy of his first response, then pause at the turning point where a nighttime message names the child Emmanuel—God with us. It’s a short passage with long shadows, inviting us to consider how we respond when our own plans collapse and grace arrives uninvited.
We unpack the three-plan arc—A: marry, B: dismiss quietly, C: obey the angel’s call—and why Matthew highlights Joseph as the bridge to Israel’s promises. From there, we shift to the present tense of faith. Instead of angels, most of us encounter God through signs that look ordinary: acts of kindness that protect dignity, justice that repairs what’s broken, comfort that stays with pain, and peace that steadies anxious rooms. The challenge isn’t seeing these moments; it’s refusing the subtle diversions that keep us from acting. “I’m not wired like that.” “It’s not the right time.” “It costs too much.” We name those scripts and offer a better one.
Our guide is Joseph’s simple pattern: see, trust, respond. We offer practical ways to train your eyes during Advent—naming a daily act of kindness, taking one concrete step toward justice, offering comfort to a specific person, making peace by going first. We’re honest about cost and risk, because following the way of Christ can unsettle routines and budgets. Yet the core promise holds: the journey may be difficult, but it is always blessed by presence. Emmanuel doesn’t erase the valley; it keeps us company through it, turning ordinary courage into holy ground.
If you’re longing for a quieter heart and a braver life, this message will meet you there with hope, challenge, and a clear next step. Listen, share with someone who needs courage, and if it resonates, subscribe and leave a review—what faithful step will you take today?
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Pastor Darren (00:00):
So I'm curious doing sort of an informal poll
in this uh season of giftgetting and gift uh giving?
I'm wondering how people feelabout surprises.
How many of you like a reallygood surprise at Christmas?
(00:24):
Right?
How many of you can give or takea surprise at Christmas?
How many of you just reallydon't like to be surprised?
Don't you?
I just saw the tech guys, I sawPaul's hand go up and don't give
me a surprise.
You know, in in in uh in myhouse, my wife and my daughter
(00:49):
really like the surprises,right?
They're gonna work over, youknow, bending over backwards to
make sure nobody knows.
I mean, they purposefully don'ttell me or my son that certain
things are happening because wejust have sort of a blind spot.
We'll just start talking aboutit.
Not to reveal the surprise, butjust because it's in our brain
(01:09):
and needs to get out.
I don't know if anybody elselives lives in in that uh in
that world.
But yeah, they get all fussyabout making sure everything is
wrapped and it's hidden, right?
So that surprise is is keptauthentic.
And I'm over there going, allright, here's what I want to get
(01:32):
you, but I don't want to get youthe wrong thing.
Blink once if you want this.
Blink twice if you don't, andthen I'll surprise you at
Christmas, right?
And anybody in that boat, or isthat just me?
Right?
I I you know I hate getting thething, and then it's all the
(01:54):
work, and maybe it's even a bigthing with a little bit of
money, and I'm like, I want tomake sure it's the right thing.
That's kind of how I uh kind ofhow I operate.
You know who uh who reallydoesn't like surprises?
The leader or the projectmanager of anything.
Those people do not likesurprises.
(02:16):
We hate surprises like that.
You know who likes to surpriseme?
Vinnya in the church office.
Right?
The boiler's broken, you're notgonna have heat for three
Sundays.
Surprise.
No, surprises, right?
But that's what Joseph gets,right?
(02:39):
He gets this big surprise.
And we know who he is.
He's the earthly father toJesus, presumably the man who
raised him.
We don't have very many storiesabout Jesus being raised.
Uh, but it's one of theinteresting things about Joseph
is that we don't know a wholelot about him.
(03:00):
In our four Gospels, right?
The the stories of Jesus, theGospels, Mark doesn't mention
him.
In fact, Mark doesn't even havethe birth story.
Mark gets started when theministry gets started with the
baptism, right?
And then John, John onlymentions him two times and kind
of lightly, just a throwback to,you know, Jesus' father.
(03:23):
Luke doesn't do much more thanthat either.
Just reminds us that he had afather and his name is Joseph.
Matthew is really where we learnmost of what we know about
Joseph.
And what you just heard is kindof it.
That's who Joseph is.
(03:43):
Right?
And Matthew, it's important tohim.
He's the guy who wrote thegospel that had the value for
connecting to the older faith.
Right?
And Joseph was the connection tothat life, that bloodline that
went through David all the wayback to the forefathers.
So Joseph's important to Matthewbecause that connection is
(04:04):
important to Matthew.
But pretty much what we learnabout Joseph can be summed up
pretty quickly.
He set to marry Mary, probablyas much as a financial agreement
as anything else, right?
As a lot of marriages werearranged back then, and it was
(04:24):
an arrangement that relied a loton what was being transacted and
what who was going to take careof who and what values were
going to be enhanced by thatparticular marriage.
But then she becomes pregnant bythe Holy Spirit, right?
And what uh we learn is thathe's going to dismiss her
(04:47):
because, as far as the worldoutside understands, the Holy
Spirit isn't making babies, andMary just showed up pregnant,
and it was a bad thing backthen, because that would suggest
that she'd been unfaithful, andnot only unfaithful, but
unfaithful before she was evengoing to get married, on her way
to getting married.
(05:08):
So he was going to dismiss herquietly.
But then the angel of the Lordcomes and lets Joseph know who
exactly this is that is comingand who's behind all of this,
who is Jesus' divine father.
And at that point, uh Jesus, uhJoseph wakes, he agrees to
(05:29):
marry, uh to marry Mary.
They go with uh to Bethlehem forthe birth, and that's pretty
much it.
That's Joseph's thing in anutshell.
It's kind of interesting thatyou feel like you got a pretty
important role in the movie, andyet that's your little blip in
the whole story.
(05:52):
I guess I figure, you know, whenyou're when your other dad is
God, you know, when you're justthe second dad, you're gonna get
second billing.
You know, that's just how it'sgonna you're gonna move into a
support role and not necessarilya starring role anymore.
But what we do know is Josephgets this big surprise.
(06:17):
And it's a surprise that's wayworse than the boiler going out.
It's a surprise that hisbetrothed is pregnant before
they are getting married.
Our United Methodist Materials,they develop materials for us to
help us get started and thinkingabout sermons on Sundays, and uh
they lay it out pretty good.
(06:38):
They lay this whole dilemma outpretty good.
Joseph has a plan A, they'regonna get married, and then plan
A gets all messed up with thatpregnancy.
So then plan B, he will dismissher quietly, which actually is a
kind move on Joseph's part inthose days and times.
(07:00):
He was um, well, it was open tohim to actually punish her, and
some would say it's evenmandated that she be punished
for this crime of lack offidelity.
So his dismissing her quietlywould have been a kind thing in
that context.
So then we move to a plan C,right?
(07:21):
And uh um that kind of gets setup by the angel visiting Joseph
and letting Joseph know whoexactly is on his way.
Jesus Emmanuel, which means Godwith us.
Jesus is going to be here.
(07:43):
He will be the embodiment ofGod's presence here with us.
And he will save us from oursins.
Right?
Save us from our sins.
I know that's a big phrase andit feels really heavy.
For many people, that's just adifferent way of saying we know
(08:05):
a God of grace.
We know a God of forgiveness, weknow a God of love.
We're not gonna be defined bythe sins that we do, or at least
only by those sins.
We're gonna be grounded in graceand forgiveness.
This is what Jesus is going tomean.
This is what Jesus is gonnabring to humanity.
(08:27):
And so when Joseph hears that,he gets back into this plan C,
which is really plan A, to marryMary, and they head off to
Bethlehem.
To me, the point of the storyfor us, or at least the message
that we might pull today, isthat Joseph sees the signs of
(08:53):
God's presence.
In this case, he gets he gets adream where an angel appears to
him, right, in this dream andactually tells him what God
wants him to hear.
It's a sign for him that pointsto God's presence, points to
God's uh uh omniscience andomnipotence.
(09:15):
And then he does maybe the mostimportant thing Joseph responds
with faith, with trust.
The angel came to him, he didn'thave to do what the angel said,
he didn't have to trustsomething that happened while he
was asleep, but he did.
(09:39):
He recognized God's presence andhe responded in faith.
It sounds pretty simple andstraightforward, but how good
are we at doing that same thing?
We get signs too, don't we?
We get signs of God's presencein our world.
They may not come as angels inour dreams, but they come.
(10:02):
If we're talking about evidenceof the presence of God in the
world, for us Christians, werecognize that presence when we
see kindness, when we seejustice, when we see comfort,
when we see peace.
For we Christians, that'slargely how we experience God.
(10:28):
Is when those those the thethose uh entities, those
feelings, those experiencesbecome real.
That's how we know God'spresence.
We know it because it feels likekindness, it feels like justice,
it feels like comfort and peace.
Maybe the bigger question, thechallenging question, especially
(10:50):
here at Advent, the final Sundaybefore the big day, the final
Sunday before the big day is howgood are we at responding to
that evidence with faith?
Are we even looking for thatpresence?
(11:12):
Have we trained our eyes to beable to see when it happens in
the world around us?
Have we trained our eyes to lookfor that evidence, that
inspiration, that God is hereand God is living and breathing
through God's world and thepeople in God's world?
Are we vigilant about lookingout for that?
(11:34):
Finding the strength that comesfrom that.
I find that even when we haveGod's presence made evident
right in front of us, we caneven kind of divert ourselves
from it.
We might see acts of faith rightin front of us.
And what are some of the thingsthat we say to divert ourselves
(11:59):
from actually responding infaith to that presence?
Here's one right here.
Wow.
She really has a kind heart forothers.
I wish I had that.
Why can't you have that?
Why can't you respond inkindness as well?
(12:21):
God's given that capacity toyou.
But you hear that diversion thatwe do?
Oh, I'm just not built likethat.
That's not what the gift thatGod gave me.
Presence, inspiration, hopediverted.
Here's another one.
(12:42):
I know it's the right thing todo.
But A, B, C, D.
Have we been there?
We know it's the right thing todo, but there's all kinds of
good reasons not to do it.
We see the presence of God, thatevidence that's supposed to
(13:03):
shape our faith, that's supposedto inspire us not only to live a
life of abundance in our ownselves, but to be able to share
that life and be the blessing toothers.
And yet, we've got this reasonand that reason.
And you know, Christian, youknow, sometimes it's hard.
Sometimes, even as bodies offaith, institution, groups of
(13:27):
people, it gets even easier tosay things like, well, we just
can't afford to follow Christhere.
The rest of the world's doing itthis way, and if we do the
Christ way, there could bedangers.
Way, way too risky.
(13:51):
Presence, inspiration, hope,peace, divert.
Turned away from.
This is where the weight of thestory of Joseph, at least to me,
needs to be acknowledged.
(14:13):
God doesn't promise to us aneasy journey.
In fact, it's often not an easyjourney.
Being Christian, living a lifeof abundance, living a life that
we share what's been given tous.
(14:34):
But what God does promise isEmmanuel.
God is with us.
The journey might be difficult,but it will always be blessed.
Blessed with God's presence.
(14:54):
As we approach Christmasmorning, a time where we
acknowledge and we celebratethat we know a loving God, and
that that God loved us enough tosend his son to be with us that
we might know how much God lovesus.
(15:15):
I think in that season, theinvitation to us is to sharpen
our capacity to see God'spresence, to see God's presence,
to discern God's presence amongus, and then to respond in
faithfulness, to trust that wecan live into that presence and
(15:37):
live into those, into that,those entities, those feelings,
those experiences that God hasgiven us to experience.
We talk a lot about how we wantto be changed by our faith.
We want to be transformed.
We come to church looking forsomething.
(15:57):
How much of it is just havingthat heart at peace, having that
different attitude about the waythe world works.
We want to be transformed, andwe want to be transformed every
year at Christmas in a way thatbrings us peace, that brings us
a self-esteem, that brings us aninspiration to be part of making
(16:21):
our world a better place.
Well, for Joseph, that journeystarted with seeing the signs of
God's presence and responding infaith.
Go and do likewise.
(16:42):
Amen.
So I'm curious doing sort of an informal poll
in this uh season of giftgetting and gift uh giving?
I'm wondering how people feelabout surprises.
How many of you like a reallygood surprise at Christmas?
(00:24):
Right?
How many of you can give or takea surprise at Christmas?
How many of you just reallydon't like to be surprised?
Don't you?
I just saw the tech guys, I sawPaul's hand go up and don't give
me a surprise.
You know, in in in uh in myhouse, my wife and my daughter
(00:49):
really like the surprises,right?
They're gonna work over, youknow, bending over backwards to
make sure nobody knows.
I mean, they purposefully don'ttell me or my son that certain
things are happening because wejust have sort of a blind spot.
We'll just start talking aboutit.
Not to reveal the surprise, butjust because it's in our brain
(01:09):
and needs to get out.
I don't know if anybody elselives lives in in that uh in
that world.
But yeah, they get all fussyabout making sure everything is
wrapped and it's hidden, right?
So that surprise is is keptauthentic.
And I'm over there going, allright, here's what I want to get
(01:32):
you, but I don't want to get youthe wrong thing.
Blink once if you want this.
Blink twice if you don't, andthen I'll surprise you at
Christmas, right?
And anybody in that boat, or isthat just me?
Right?
I I you know I hate getting thething, and then it's all the
(01:54):
work, and maybe it's even a bigthing with a little bit of
money, and I'm like, I want tomake sure it's the right thing.
That's kind of how I uh kind ofhow I operate.
You know who uh who reallydoesn't like surprises?
The leader or the projectmanager of anything.
Those people do not likesurprises.
(02:16):
We hate surprises like that.
You know who likes to surpriseme?
Vinnya in the church office.
Right?
The boiler's broken, you're notgonna have heat for three
Sundays.
Surprise.
No, surprises, right?
But that's what Joseph gets,right?
(02:39):
He gets this big surprise.
And we know who he is.
He's the earthly father toJesus, presumably the man who
raised him.
We don't have very many storiesabout Jesus being raised.
Uh, but it's one of theinteresting things about Joseph
is that we don't know a wholelot about him.
(03:00):
In our four Gospels, right?
The the stories of Jesus, theGospels, Mark doesn't mention
him.
In fact, Mark doesn't even havethe birth story.
Mark gets started when theministry gets started with the
baptism, right?
And then John, John onlymentions him two times and kind
of lightly, just a throwback to,you know, Jesus' father.
(03:23):
Luke doesn't do much more thanthat either.
Just reminds us that he had afather and his name is Joseph.
Matthew is really where we learnmost of what we know about
Joseph.
And what you just heard is kindof it.
That's who Joseph is.
(03:43):
Right?
And Matthew, it's important tohim.
He's the guy who wrote thegospel that had the value for
connecting to the older faith.
Right?
And Joseph was the connection tothat life, that bloodline that
went through David all the wayback to the forefathers.
So Joseph's important to Matthewbecause that connection is
(04:04):
important to Matthew.
But pretty much what we learnabout Joseph can be summed up
pretty quickly.
He set to marry Mary, probablyas much as a financial agreement
as anything else, right?
As a lot of marriages werearranged back then, and it was
(04:24):
an arrangement that relied a loton what was being transacted and
what who was going to take careof who and what values were
going to be enhanced by thatparticular marriage.
But then she becomes pregnant bythe Holy Spirit, right?
And what uh we learn is thathe's going to dismiss her
(04:47):
because, as far as the worldoutside understands, the Holy
Spirit isn't making babies, andMary just showed up pregnant,
and it was a bad thing backthen, because that would suggest
that she'd been unfaithful, andnot only unfaithful, but
unfaithful before she was evengoing to get married, on her way
to getting married.
(05:08):
So he was going to dismiss herquietly.
But then the angel of the Lordcomes and lets Joseph know who
exactly this is that is comingand who's behind all of this,
who is Jesus' divine father.
And at that point, uh Jesus, uhJoseph wakes, he agrees to
(05:29):
marry, uh to marry Mary.
They go with uh to Bethlehem forthe birth, and that's pretty
much it.
That's Joseph's thing in anutshell.
It's kind of interesting thatyou feel like you got a pretty
important role in the movie, andyet that's your little blip in
the whole story.
(05:52):
I guess I figure, you know, whenyou're when your other dad is
God, you know, when you're justthe second dad, you're gonna get
second billing.
You know, that's just how it'sgonna you're gonna move into a
support role and not necessarilya starring role anymore.
But what we do know is Josephgets this big surprise.
(06:17):
And it's a surprise that's wayworse than the boiler going out.
It's a surprise that hisbetrothed is pregnant before
they are getting married.
Our United Methodist Materials,they develop materials for us to
help us get started and thinkingabout sermons on Sundays, and uh
they lay it out pretty good.
(06:38):
They lay this whole dilemma outpretty good.
Joseph has a plan A, they'regonna get married, and then plan
A gets all messed up with thatpregnancy.
So then plan B, he will dismissher quietly, which actually is a
kind move on Joseph's part inthose days and times.
(07:00):
He was um, well, it was open tohim to actually punish her, and
some would say it's evenmandated that she be punished
for this crime of lack offidelity.
So his dismissing her quietlywould have been a kind thing in
that context.
So then we move to a plan C,right?
(07:21):
And uh um that kind of gets setup by the angel visiting Joseph
and letting Joseph know whoexactly is on his way.
Jesus Emmanuel, which means Godwith us.
Jesus is going to be here.
(07:43):
He will be the embodiment ofGod's presence here with us.
And he will save us from oursins.
Right?
Save us from our sins.
I know that's a big phrase andit feels really heavy.
For many people, that's just adifferent way of saying we know
(08:05):
a God of grace.
We know a God of forgiveness, weknow a God of love.
We're not gonna be defined bythe sins that we do, or at least
only by those sins.
We're gonna be grounded in graceand forgiveness.
This is what Jesus is going tomean.
This is what Jesus is gonnabring to humanity.
(08:27):
And so when Joseph hears that,he gets back into this plan C,
which is really plan A, to marryMary, and they head off to
Bethlehem.
To me, the point of the storyfor us, or at least the message
that we might pull today, isthat Joseph sees the signs of
(08:53):
God's presence.
In this case, he gets he gets adream where an angel appears to
him, right, in this dream andactually tells him what God
wants him to hear.
It's a sign for him that pointsto God's presence, points to
God's uh uh omniscience andomnipotence.
(09:15):
And then he does maybe the mostimportant thing Joseph responds
with faith, with trust.
The angel came to him, he didn'thave to do what the angel said,
he didn't have to trustsomething that happened while he
was asleep, but he did.
(09:39):
He recognized God's presence andhe responded in faith.
It sounds pretty simple andstraightforward, but how good
are we at doing that same thing?
We get signs too, don't we?
We get signs of God's presencein our world.
They may not come as angels inour dreams, but they come.
(10:02):
If we're talking about evidenceof the presence of God in the
world, for us Christians, werecognize that presence when we
see kindness, when we seejustice, when we see comfort,
when we see peace.
For we Christians, that'slargely how we experience God.
(10:28):
Is when those those the thethose uh entities, those
feelings, those experiencesbecome real.
That's how we know God'spresence.
We know it because it feels likekindness, it feels like justice,
it feels like comfort and peace.
Maybe the bigger question, thechallenging question, especially
(10:50):
here at Advent, the final Sundaybefore the big day, the final
Sunday before the big day is howgood are we at responding to
that evidence with faith?
Are we even looking for thatpresence?
(11:12):
Have we trained our eyes to beable to see when it happens in
the world around us?
Have we trained our eyes to lookfor that evidence, that
inspiration, that God is hereand God is living and breathing
through God's world and thepeople in God's world?
Are we vigilant about lookingout for that?
(11:34):
Finding the strength that comesfrom that.
I find that even when we haveGod's presence made evident
right in front of us, we caneven kind of divert ourselves
from it.
We might see acts of faith rightin front of us.
And what are some of the thingsthat we say to divert ourselves
(11:59):
from actually responding infaith to that presence?
Here's one right here.
Wow.
She really has a kind heart forothers.
I wish I had that.
Why can't you have that?
Why can't you respond inkindness as well?
(12:21):
God's given that capacity toyou.
But you hear that diversion thatwe do?
Oh, I'm just not built likethat.
That's not what the gift thatGod gave me.
Presence, inspiration, hopediverted.
Here's another one.
(12:42):
I know it's the right thing todo.
But A, B, C, D.
Have we been there?
We know it's the right thing todo, but there's all kinds of
good reasons not to do it.
We see the presence of God, thatevidence that's supposed to
(13:03):
shape our faith, that's supposedto inspire us not only to live a
life of abundance in our ownselves, but to be able to share
that life and be the blessing toothers.
And yet, we've got this reasonand that reason.
And you know, Christian, youknow, sometimes it's hard.
Sometimes, even as bodies offaith, institution, groups of
(13:27):
people, it gets even easier tosay things like, well, we just
can't afford to follow Christhere.
The rest of the world's doing itthis way, and if we do the
Christ way, there could bedangers.
Way, way too risky.
(13:51):
Presence, inspiration, hope,peace, divert.
Turned away from.
This is where the weight of thestory of Joseph, at least to me,
needs to be acknowledged.
(14:13):
God doesn't promise to us aneasy journey.
In fact, it's often not an easyjourney.
Being Christian, living a lifeof abundance, living a life that
we share what's been given tous.
(14:34):
But what God does promise isEmmanuel.
God is with us.
The journey might be difficult,but it will always be blessed.
Blessed with God's presence.
(14:54):
As we approach Christmasmorning, a time where we
acknowledge and we celebratethat we know a loving God, and
that that God loved us enough tosend his son to be with us that
we might know how much God lovesus.
(15:15):
I think in that season, theinvitation to us is to sharpen
our capacity to see God'spresence, to see God's presence,
to discern God's presence amongus, and then to respond in
faithfulness, to trust that wecan live into that presence and
(15:37):
live into those, into that,those entities, those feelings,
those experiences that God hasgiven us to experience.
We talk a lot about how we wantto be changed by our faith.
We want to be transformed.
We come to church looking forsomething.
(15:57):
How much of it is just havingthat heart at peace, having that
different attitude about the waythe world works.
We want to be transformed, andwe want to be transformed every
year at Christmas in a way thatbrings us peace, that brings us
a self-esteem, that brings us aninspiration to be part of making
(16:21):
our world a better place.
Well, for Joseph, that journeystarted with seeing the signs of
God's presence and responding infaith.
Go and do likewise.
(16:42):
Amen.
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