Obedience can be tough.
At times it will feel like climbing a mountain.
What if your fiancée told you she was pregnant but that she hadn’t been sexually involved with anyone? You knew you hadn’t been sexually intimate with her, so how did this pregnancy happen if she hadn’t had sex with someone else? It would be tough to believe her, wouldn’t it? At least in today’s technological age, we might could discuss something such as in vitro fertilization, but that wasn’t available back in Joseph & Mary’s day.
Mary told Joseph that she was pregnant. He knew that he wasn’t the father because they were engaged and had not yet had sex. And so when Mary shared that she had remained faithful to him, but that she had become pregnant by the power of God, he could not believe it. He determined that she had concocted some false story, and he decided he would “break off the engagement” quietly.
Joseph could have cried out to the religious community and said, “This woman that I love, this woman that I have trusted, this woman that I pledged to marry has had sex with another man. Then she tried to tell me this preposterous story about what happened.” But he didn’t. Even though he didn’t believe her, he loved her and chose not to disparage her.
I believe Joseph was heart-broken. The woman he loved had cheated on him (she hadn’t, but that’s what it looked like to him) and then she probably cried her eyes out telling him that it was a supernatural pregnancy from God. But who could believe that? So Joseph just determined that his fiancée whom he loved was lying to him and would not come clean, so he decided, “I’ll just end this quietly.” And his breaking off their marriage certainly also broke Mary’s heart. Can you imagine how many tears both of them shed over how this was all taking place?
But then God sent an angel to Joseph to tell him that Mary had been completely truthful. Can you imagine the scene as Joseph ran back to Mary who is still crying tears over her upcoming divorce (because in those days the breaking of a “betrothal” required a divorce certificate). As he enters the room and sees her crying, he apologizes and says, “Mary, I believe you! God sent an angel to me. I’m sorry I ever doubted you. Please forgive me.” And then Mary’s tears of heartache were turned to tears of joy as the two of them embraced and prepared again for their upcoming marriage.
But then came more difficulty, because now Joseph would have to explain to others about what had occurred, because if he was anything like me, I would not want anyone to tarnish my wife’s reputation, especially when she was simply doing God’s will. Mary is going to “start showing” that she is pregnant by the great big bulge that baby Jesus is going to cause. It is obvious to everyone that Mary is pregnant before the wedding. And now Joseph and Mary are telling a story that they didn’t have sex, but that Mary is miraculously pregnant by the hand of God. Everyone is thinking – what an ingenious (and ridiculous) excuse.
God called Mary & Joseph to a difficult task. Mary, you are going to give birth to the Messiah, and Joseph you will raise Him as your son. And yet it will be difficult because people are going to call Mary a loose woman and call Jesus an illegitimate child (both were probably called much worse). Yet Mary and Joseph both chose to submit to God and follow through in difficult obedience all the same.
They had hearts that said: “Whatever you ask God, we will do. We are Your servants.”
God has not called you to such a difficult task. But he does expect you to be faithful to what He has commanded you to do. He does expect your obedience. You know something that He has impressed on your heart to do. Will you do it? Will you say, “Whatever you ask God. I am your servant”?