A Christmas Intervention

Matthew 1:20-21

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We know where babies come from, so we understand why Joseph was considering divorcing Mary. They were engaged, but they hadn’t been sexually intimate. And yet Mary was pregnant.

Joseph knew where babies came from. And so being a righteous man, he was going to divorce Mary quietly. As he was considering this, Matthew, in his first chapter, records that an angel appeared to Joseph in a dream and said,

Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins. (Matthew 1:20-21)

When Joseph was considering divorcing Mary, God intervened. God sent an angel to change Joseph’s mind and show him not only Mary’s innocence, but his will for Joseph and Mary. Mary was going to give birth to a son. Joseph was to give him the name Jesus. The angel even revealed why the son had to have the name Jesus, because he would save their people from their sins. God intervened in Joseph and Mary’s life. But there’s a greater intervention going on. It’s an intervention in your life.

Jesus was to be born of the Virgin Mary so that God could intervene and take away your sins.

God became man in the person of Jesus, lived the perfect life, died an innocent death on the cross in full payment for the world’s sins, and rose triumphant on Easter morning. That was God’s undeserved gift to you and to the world.

God didn’t like the direction your life was going because of your sins, so he miraculously intervened. He came in flesh, lived and died for you, so that now the doors of heaven stand open to you. That is God’s gift to you at Christmas. That is the gift that he wants you to possess today, so that you can know that God loves you and is going to do everything he can to get you to heaven.

So this Christmas, as you ponder again the story of Mary and Joseph and Jesus and all of the things around it being born in a manger and so forth.

Remember, the miracle is that God was intervening for you so that you could be with him in heaven forever.

Amen.