On the first Sunday of January, we opened Matthew 2:13-23—the story of Joseph, Mary and Jesus’s midnight flight to Egypt and the massacre of the innocent children of Bethlehem by Herod’s army. While naming the atrocities of the text and recognizing that the desperation and death found in this text are the real stories of too many people in our world today, we also lightened up the text to ask a few questions of ourselves.
As we begin a new calendar year, will we be more like Joseph who acts in response to God-given dreams or Herod who acts out of paranoia and fear?
Joseph. By the time chapter two closes, he has had three dreams in which a messenger of God appeared to give him instruction. First, he is told that the child in Mary’s womb was conceived by the Holy Spirit, he is to stay committed to her and name the child Jesus. Then, a couple years later, he has a dream in which a messenger of God tells him to wake up and flee to Egypt without delay.
Finally, in dreams he learns it is safe to return to his homeland. Each time he dreams, he wakes up and responds. It’s not easy. We shouldn’t confuse dreams with joy and peace—sometimes, oftentimes, the work of the Kingdom of God is not easy or without challenges and risks.
Herod. After a group of wise men made mention to him of a young king, he becomes paranoid and afraid. When the wise men do not return to report to him about the child, he begins writing his own scripts. (Could the wise men be secretly returning home to gather an army and fight for this child-king? Will this king threaten his family’s political power? Will Caesar learn about this child and have Herod’s head for not quashing an uprising?) We don’t know exactly what Herod thought. We do know he acts foolishly, and dangerously, out of his paranoia and fear. He orders the massacre of all two-year-old children in Bethlehem.
Which leads me back to the question—in 2015, will we be more like Joseph or Herod?
Will we be like Joseph? Will we allow God to guide us, give us dreams, shape the direction of our lives and our church? Often God’s leading can be challenging and filled with risks (it was for Joseph). Often we have to move forward with but a hint of God’s guidance (Joseph had only a few lines from three dreams to guide him). But this is the way of the Kingdom of God, the way of life with and for the sake of Jesus and the good news of salvation and grace.
Will we be like Herod? Will we approach our lives and the life of our church out of paranoia and fear about our present and our future? When we act out of fear, we usually end up making foolish choices that will ultimately lead to death and destruction.
So what will it be? Are we ready to dream with God, dangerous as that might be, or are we going to shape the year ahead out of paranoia and fear?
Journeying Together,
Rusty
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