The Beginning: Where everything starts

Thinking back to my earliest memories of Sunday School, the earliest I can ever remember hearing about Jesus was always in Matthew, in the New Testament. I never remember hearing about Him in the OT, so my obvious thought was that Jesus just kind of appeared in pretty sweet fashion (Come on, the dude was born from a girl who had never had sex! That's kinda awesome). Turns out Jesus is mentioned beforehand In the Book of Isaiah (also in other books in the OT but I'm specifically using Isaiah). Isaiah first mentions Jesus in chapter 7.

"14 Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign.  Behold, the  virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name  Immanuel.  15 He shall eat  curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good." (Isaiah 7: 14-15)

From that Isaiah tells us the very base of Jesus. In Luke  Jesus is born from Mary. A virgin. 

Bit of a back story on Ma and Pa. Mary was a young girl, I've heard between the ages of 13-15. She was set to marry Joseph a carpenter by trade who was between 35-40 (The thought of a 40 year old dude with a 13 year old girl just kind of makes me feel weird...as probably the same with most of you, but we've got to remember the times. That stuff was the culture. Thank God I can choose to love somebody who loves me back...I believe I have chosen wisely. I love her, she loves me we're in love...back to Mary and Joe) Mary was visited by an angel one day when she was alone and he told her that she would give birth to a son. 

30 And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for  you have found favor with God. 31 And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and  you shall call his name Jesus. 32 He will be great and will be called the Son of  the Most High. And the Lord Godi will give to him the throne of his father David, 33 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.”  (Luke  1:30-33)

Imagine just being in your house, chilling by yourself and this dude with wings shows up and tells you your eggo is preggo. Not only does he tell you that, but also that the kid will come about with out you having sex, but don't worry you'll get preggo from  the Holy Spirit, but  no one will know thats how it happened. Oh and in case that isn't enough to process, the baby will be God's Son and he's going to save the world. 

Now after hearing that I feel that my reaction would be something like this:

"Ok so Wingman. I hear what your saying, but let me point a few things out to you. I'm like 13. Almost 14 but thats a big almost. I'm engaged, so if nobody knows that this is God's do you know what could happen to me? And what if this kid doesn't save the world? What if he ends up like everyone else?"

Mary doesn't react like that. Mary says right on. Lets do this thing. Thats faith. Faith in the fact that God knows what He's doing and that He'll take care of everything. Thats obedience. Obedience is one of the reasons God chose Mary. She took what God's telling her to do and ran with it. Think about us today. When God tells us to do something we say "That sounds good God it really does but I can't do that. I just can't." We turn into Moses the KING of "I can't". 


Now let's look at Joseph in this. Put yourself in his shoes.  He starts to notice that his future wife has put on a bit of weight. He probably doesn't really think to much on it. Then he starts to notice she's put on even more weight and people start talking. He finds out she's pregnant. This has to be extremely disheartening for Joe. His first thought is that Mary cheated on him with another guy. Now in that culture, Joseph could have easily flipped out and would have been in his rights to drag her into the streets and have her stoned (not injected with a hallucinogenic drug, but have rocks thrown at her. Harsh? I think so) but Joseph doesn't do that. He has a very good heart and decides to divorce her in private. This protects her life, and her dignity. Its not long before the same winged fellow appears to Joe in a dream and says "Dude, Mary didn't cheat on you. This kid is the son of God, and was conceived through the Holy Spirit, and your gonna raise him. So go ahead and relax"


The rest as they say is history. Mary and Joe ( I wonder if thats where we got the name 'Mary-Jo'...hmm...odd) journey to Bethlehem, Jesus is born in a manger in a stable, shepherds and wise guys come to visit him and give him gifts, Herod gets pissed and orders the slaughter of babies, but they escape to Egypt where the story really gets good.


Now all of this I've learned over the years, but now I'm really thinking about it. Heres whats going through my mind.

1. BEFORE HE WAS BORN Jesus was making the faith of those He impacted stronger.
• Mary and Joseph did not know for sure what was going on. There really was no way of knowing. But they knew their God. They knew that He would protect them. They knew he was in control of it all
2. Joseph is a compassionate guy
• Joseph would have been completely with in his rights (in that culture) to stone Mary to death. It isn't about what really happened. Its what it looks like. The appearance of evil. Imagine hearing your future wife (ladies pretend your a guy for a sec....there? ok good) comes to you and says that she got pregnant from God. Laughing in her face would be the appropriate thing to do. there is no way.  It sounds crazy. But Joe didn't do that. He pretty much said look I really down't want anything to do with you now. Your on your own. I don't want anything to do with this. Then God gets ahold of him and...yeah
3. MARY IS A BEAST!
• Mary had more courage than anyone. She took the fact that she had a story that was not believable, the fact that she could die, the fact that nobody would believe her at all and rolled with it! She pretty much sacrificed her life for the Lord. Yeah...She's a beast

This story has been dubbed the Christmas Story, But I'd like to think of it as a story of Faith, because with out Faith none of this would be possible. Because of the faith and obedience of this story Jesus was born.