The Point of the Stories

Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit.  And Joseph her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly.  But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.  "She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins."  Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet:  "BEHOLD, THE VIRGIN SHALL BE WITH CHILD AND SHALL BEAR A SON, AND THEY SHALL CALL HIS NAME IMMANUEL," which translated means, "GOD WITH US."  And Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took Mary as his wife, but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus. (Matthew 1:18-25 NASB)

Why compress 80+ verses of Luke into 7? The easiest and most obvious reason is that Luke and Matthew each made the same point from different perspectives.  The point in this abbreviated narrative is that Jesus was not born of Joseph and Mary, but to Joseph and Mary.  It's the same point made by Luke in his 80+ verses of Luke 1 and 2.  The reason this is an important point is the union of deity and humanity that is Jesus; He's the Son of God.  If He were the product of Joseph and Mary, He wouldn't be divine.  He's not "some guy from Nazareth", He's the Eternally Existent Son of God; He just happens to have grown up in Nazareth.

But there is more difference here than compression of Luke's account.  Joseph is mentioned here as a very involved party, which is very different than Luke.  The plan to "send her away secretly" is an element that is missing from Luke, but must have happened in the Jewish culture.  The way God speaks to Joseph consistently through an angel in dreams is another missing element from Luke.  Clearly, here the perspective is Joseph as Luke's is Mary.  So, enough with the obvious, what's the point?

Of the several points possible from this observation, I think my Master is pulling on me in one.  Any work of my Master is multidimensional, and requires the help of others to understand.  I need both accounts to understand better the work of my Master in bringing salvation to me and everyone else.  Why?  Wasn't Luke's long, involved, beautiful, and detailed account enough?  No, Joseph was missing.  How about this abbreviated version, wasn't that enough?  No, the difficulties and joy of Mary are missing.

Mary is such a prominent figure, especially in the death of Jesus that to leave her out would leave a huge hole in any understanding of Jesus' divine origins.  Joseph is so left out of Luke's account that without Matthew's I might suspect that he wasn't really involved or knew nothing about it at all, which would be very unlike my Master.  I would know nothing of Magai if all I knew were shepherds.  I would know nothing of Shepherds if all I knew were Magai.  The lowly arrival is in Luke, the royal reception is in Matthew.  The connection of Jesus to the life of the people of Israel and their history is only complete between the two accounts, not with either one or the other.

So, why would it surprise me that the work of my Master around me takes more to understand than my meager perspective?  Why would it perplex me that my Master brought a lot of people to this place rather than just me?  The story of how my family was brought to this place is not unique at all.  I don't get it, the reason we were brought here, and why should I expect I would get it without the added understanding of others?  I have my piece, my perspective, but I need the perspective of others to truly see the hands of my Master at work.  It's knot-hole theology as a model for life (one of these days, I'll actually define knot-hole theology in this blog).

What should be clear but because of pride, self-focus, and fear isn't, is that my Master has created me and His world to require multiple human creatures together to relate to Him.  If I am honest with what I read in Scripture, I don't find people living their lives with God alone.  Abraham didn't, David didn't, not one of the prophets (even Elijah found out he didn't), and not even Jesus.  So, if all these required others because of how my Master related to them, why should I believe otherwise?  The only reason is that I've let my American, self-reliant culture impose a requirement on me rather than accept my Masters.

The answer to this dilemma is to get involved with others and learn from them.  Others, who disagree with me, don't love my perspectives like I do, have problems I don't, don't have problems I do, and constantly want what they want rather than what I want; these are the ones on whom I'm dependent.  Ironically, they are also dependent on me.  I complain about how dependent I have to be, whining about others, when what I need to be doing is focusing on how dependable I am for them!  But what about me?  What about me?  The question "about me" needs to be, "do I want to know my Master or not?"  Because if I do want to know Him, He requires my interaction with others to gain His multidimensional perspective.  Oh my heavens, I've just defined "knot-hole theology".  I need the "knot-hole" view of others to to better understand the whole "scene" of my Master.  Okay, later I'll work up a more involved definition, but that will suffice as a "knot-hole" view for now.  I have people to listen to and learn from...so do you, I'll warrant.