Saturday, December 05, 2009

A Model of Faithfulness

Matthew 1:24-25
(24) When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife,
(25) but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.

I think that there are a couple of interesting things in this passage. One is part of the reason I'm a Protestant. I just can't buy the idea of the perpetual virginity of Mary given this passage. The word "until" is straight from the Greek here. That tells me that after Jesus was born Joseph did "know" Mary. After all, the Bible does speak of Jesus' other brothers later on.

The other interesting thing is the model that Joseph gives us for faithfulness. Imagine not being able to consummate your marriage on your wedding day. For those of you who are single and faithful, I suspect that this is pretty much unthinkable. Yet Joseph was willing to wait because of Jesus. He knew that there was something much bigger at stake. After all, he had waited as long as he had. What would another few months be?

Do we have that attitude about physical pleasure? Sex is a big one for sure, but there are plenty of other things that distract us too. How focused are we on the Savior rather than ourselves? I am not a Gnostic. I do not think that physical pleasure is bad. However, I do know that there is nothing on this world that can compare to knowing the Lord.

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