Sermon for Sunday, December 21, 2025

December 21, 2025

By Kristin Berkey-Abbott



Matthew 1:18-25


When I think of all the Christmas pageants that I’ve seen through the decades, I’m struck by how much has been left out. In the Nativity story for child actors, we get angel choirs and shepherds and animals in a stable—and of course, the starring role of Mary and Joseph, who get to look adoringly at the doll in the manger. But we don’t get this story about Joseph.

I’m not surprised; it would make me deeply uncomfortable to see elementary school kids acting out today’s Gospel. But as an adult, I find this part of the Nativity story may have more to say to us in our non-Christmas lives than the rest of the incarnation story.

Let us consider Joseph, as we so rarely do. Even on his feast day, March 19, we rarely focus on the aspect of Joseph that we see in today’s Gospel. Often in March, we celebrate Joseph in his role as a stepfather. In contrast, in today’s Gospel, I can almost hear Joseph thinking, When did my life get so messy?

Here’s Joseph, preparing for marriage, and his bride-to-be is pregnant with a baby that he is certain is not his. Even today, with our modern sensibilities, it’s not hard to sympathize with Joseph, to feel the bewilderment that one feels when facing a problem that isn’t going to magically fix itself. Even today, this situation – our beloved has been with another – is enough to make us feel shame. Now take that level of shame and magnify it; as a male in an ancient patriarchal culture, most men in this situation would have personal shame and shame about his betrothed and subsequently, some unpleasant decisions to make.

By law, Joseph could have decided to have Mary stoned—that was one of the prerogatives of a man in his position. But instead, he decides to disentangle himself quietly, which shows us an important aspect of his character. He still has a hope of that conventional life: marriage to a faithful woman, a family, some stability, a chance to leave scandal behind. But into this decision, God steps in with an option that almost no man in Joseph’s culture would consider: to stay with the woman who is pregnant with someone else’s baby.

Matthew is the Gospel of dreams and visions. The angel choirs and big announcements during waking hours—we find those stories in the Gospel of Luke. The student in me wants to know if the dream that Joseph had was of a different quality than his normal dream life, and of course, what I really want to know is whether or not God still speaks to us in dreams and how can we be sure that it’s God talking and not some by product of what we’ve been reading or watching. Of course, maybe that’s a way that God speaks to us now, by prompting us to feel inspired by what we’ve been reading or watching.

Joseph emerges from his dream ready to show us a new way to be faithful. He takes Mary for his wife and Jesus for his child.

As I read the text again on Saturday morning, the words of the angel in the dream jumped out to me. “Be not afraid.” Unlike the angel visitations that we’ll hear about on Christmas Eve, Joseph has other reasons to fear. He thought he was headed for one kind of life, and now he’s being asked to go in a different direction, a direction that might bring scorn and derision. He thought he knew Mary and thought he could anticipate their lives together, and now? He’s headed off into an unknown direction. Even the lives of the patriarchs and prophets, the teachings of the Torah and the law—all that has come before isn’t going to be a guidebook now—Joseph will be the first to be stepfather to the Divine.

You probably know at least one person who treats the Bible as a guidebook, the one that has a Bible verse tucked away for every situation. They’re the ones who would tell us how we could dream like Joseph and be convinced not only that God is speaking to us, but what God is saying.

However, as we look at the wide diversity of call stories across the Bible, the one thing we see is that through the ages, God calls people to step out in faith without a complete guidebook. Joseph doesn’t know what every step in the journey will be. Joseph doesn’t receive the divine plan as a series of choices to make with outcomes that will be perfect. The angel tells Joseph the first step: take Mary as your wife.

Across the Bible, we see stories of God calling people to a path they never would have predicted, and may not have ever considered, and perhaps would not have chosen by themselves at first. Think about those first Jewish patriarchs: Abraham onward to Moses, David the shepherd who becomes Israel’s greatest king. Think about the prophets. And in the new Testament we have Mary and Elizabeth, all the disciples, Saul who became Paul, and the earliest believers.

The story of God’s revelation and call doesn’t end with the Bible, of course. Across centuries of church history, God invites people to step outside of convention and to dream bigger dreams.

The angel tells Joseph not to be afraid, and we need to remember that he has plenty to cause him fear: fear of what his friends and neighbors will say when he decides to join his life to Mary’s, Mary who is pregnant with someone else’s child. Does Joseph have anyone who will hear about his dream and not doubt his sanity?

And then there is the fear at the scenario that the angel describes: Mary is carrying the child who will be the fulfillment of the ancient prophecy? There’s no childcare manual for that scenario! If there was, surely it would begin with the angel’s directive to Joseph: Do not be afraid—and do not abandon the woman carrying that baby in her womb!

God still calls to those of us with ears to hear, and God calls us to destinies that don’t have how-to manuals attached. God calls to us even if we come from families scorched with scandals—maybe it’s ill-advised relationships or addictions or other choices gone wrong. God calls to us even if we’re in the midst of messy lives. God doesn’t wait for us to pull ourselves together to show that we’re worthy. God does encourage us to work on relationships of love even if it means a risk of embarrassment.

No, God comes to us in the midst of that messiness, and invites us to be part of something that will be even stranger and more wondrous. From his first appearance, Jesus shows us a different way to be human. We see it in today’s story, Jesus acting even before he is born, his existence prompting Joseph to step away from Joseph’s plan for a conventional and traditional marriage. In the middle of a scandal not of his making, Joseph struggles with his instinct for self-preservation and ultimately shows his openness to God’s plan, for his life, and for the world.

We live in a world that is increasingly messed up, messy, chaotic, in disarray. In some ways, it’s a world that bears resemblance to those Sunday School Christmas pageants, with children pretending to be something that they’re not, and for some of us, it’s a place where we learn shame for what we can’t do, like sing or stand still in an animal costume. But for some of us, it’s a place where we first learn the amazing story of God’s love for us and for the world.

In both the childhood Nativity pageant and today’s Gospel, we that God is not finished with humanity, and that message is still relevant today. The Nativity story is not constrained by that manger 2000 years ago. God still comes to us in times of wonder and in times of scandal, asking us to take the first faithful step, asking us to do the faithful thing, shaping us as we become more faithful people.

Listen! God still speaks to us in the 21st century, by way of dreams, by way of angel choirs, by inspiration, by all the ways we support each other. Across the centuries and today, God still comes to us insisting that we move beyond our self-interest and telling us not to be afraid to do what will lead to the salvation of the world.