Knead Your Dough

 

Service of Worship

Eastern Parkway United Methodist Church

December 20, 2020

Rev. Natalie Bowerman, Pastor

 

Let us pray:

Creator, we thank you that you have made all that we see, and have ordered it according to your purpose and plan.  We acknowledge that you fashioned this world and all the stars we see in the night sky. You named the stars as you hung them in the heavens; yet you care far greater for us.  Help us to embrace the purpose and plan that you have for our lives; to embrace the order of our days, so that we can walk with you every step of the way. May we delight in your creation and give glory to your name for all that we have in all that you created.  For your beautiful name we pray, amen.

Matthew 1: 18-25

Joseph Accepts Jesus as His Son

18This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. 19Because Joseph her husband was faithful to the law, and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

20But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

22All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23“The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”).

24When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. 25But he did not consummate their marriage until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.

A Message

“Knead Your Dough”

Y’all, this Advent season the image of preparing and baking bread has stayed in the back of my mind throughout all my scripture reading and reflecting. We read in Matthew and Luke that Jesus was born in the city of Bethlehem, a word that means “house of bread” in Hebrew. We read later in the Gospels that Jesus is the “bread of life”—so the bread of life emerges from the house of bread, through a long and difficult journey, and any of you who have ever baked bread from scratch know all the careful work you must do in order to have a tasty, nutritious loaf at the end. First we prepared our table, then we gathered our ingredients. This week, we’re kneading our dough. I invite you to hold that image in your mind, I’ll come back to it later on.

Last week I talked at length about Mary, and we read from her perspective in Luke’s birth narrative. This week we’re switching gears and switching Gospels. We’re looking at Matthew’s birth narrative and considering the perspective of Joseph.

For how important this man is to Jesus’s life and upbringing, as well as to the overall Good News story of the Gospels, we don’t know anywhere near as much as we’d like to about Jesus’ earthly dad, and even the things we think we do know are subject to debate. There’s two prevailing theories about Joseph’s age; one holds that Joseph was much older than Mary, that he had been married and widowed before, and had children with his first wife. That same theory maintains that Mary was ever a virgin throughout her life, that she had no biological children with Joseph, and that Jesus’ brothers and sisters referred to later on in the Gospels are Joseph’s children from his first marriage. I take the time to explain this to you partly because some of you may have grown up hearing this version of Jesus’ birth story in Sunday school, and partly because if you look at Joseph the way I will invite you to, his age, parental, and widower status are a big deal.

The second theory about Joseph’s age is the one I personally adhere to: Joseph was a little older than Mary, in his late teens or early twenties, at the typical age of marriage for a young Jewish man of his time and place. He’s young enough that he hopefully has many years of life ahead of him (though the typical peasant lifespan was quite short in these days), but old enough that he has completed an apprenticeship under his father, has learned a trade (wood working), and is prepared to support a family. If this was Joseph’s first marriage, then he and Mary would have been betrothed as children, and their betrothal would have been a casual agreement between Joseph and Mary’s dads. When they got older, around the age that they presumably are at the beginning of Matthew’s Gospel, their betrothal would become a legal matter. Matthew tells us that Mary was “pledged to Joseph”, but that they weren’t living together yet. While in today’s society that might mean that Mary has a flashy diamond solitaire on her left ring finger and she and Joseph are busy planning a wedding, in First Century Palestine this means that Mary and Joseph have now signed their marriage contract, called the ketubah. They are now legally bound to one another, pending nothing but a marriage ceremony. If Joseph got cold feet, he would have to file for divorce from Mary. This also means that Joseph’s parents have paid a bride price to Mary’s parents, called the mohar. The mohar was an enormous amount of money, approximately the value of a small house. It was meant to “compensate” Mary’s parents for taking a daughter from them, as in this society Mary would cling to Joseph’s family after marriage and not be available to care for her aging parents. The mohar would also protect Mary if, heaven forbid, Joseph died young, or decided to divorce her. Without Joseph around to support her, Mary would depend on the mohar to provide for herself and her children. In addition, Joseph has at this point gifted Mary something called the mattan, a sum of money equal to a few months of pay. If Joseph backs out of the betrothal, or if he leaves her later on or passes away, the mattan is Mary’s to keep.

That brings us to this morning’s story. The flour, the sugar, the yeast, the salt, and the oil have all been thrown in the bowl and stirred to a great consistency. The dough is sitting on a flat counter, and the divine breadmaker is kneading out the lumps and bumps in the dough to make something that will be the Bread of Life for all the world. Joseph didn’t anticipate much kneading would be required here (nor, following this image, would Joseph have even been aware there was bread baking), but, plot twist, a bump has been discovered: Mary has a bun in the oven! Sorry, couldn’t resist. Since those drugstore tests weren’t invented yet, Mary must be rather far along for Joseph to know, to the point that she can no longer hide this pregnancy from anyone. This is a crisis for Joseph, and for Mary. We learn a ton about Joseph based on how Matthew tells us he had planned to handle this catastrophe before the angel talked to him, and though Matthew wraps it up in a few words, we need to understand that Joseph had decided to risk everything for Mary’s sake. Joseph decided to divorce Mary quietly. This goes way against local custom for such a situation as this. Since, prior to his dream, Joseph assumes Mary cheated on him, the Law is 100% on his side. “Divorcing Mary loudly” would mean publicly declaring Mary as an adulteress. The ketubah would be null and void. Mary and her parents would be required to pay back the mohar and the mattan, and live in financial ruin for the rest of their days. Mary would be labeled a harlot, and no respectable man would want to come anywhere near her ever again. She would live and die alone. If she has younger siblings, they would also have a very difficult time finding spouses with their family name tarnished. Joseph couldn’t live with that. So he decided instead that he was just going to say “you know what, never mind, I don’t want to get married right now.” The ketubah would be ripped up, and Joseph would be labeled an oath breaker. Mary and her family would keep the mohar and the mattan, and as a consequence Joseph and his family would be financially and socially ruined. Joseph was willing not only to take this outcome upon himself, but also upon his parents and younger siblings, even though he had done nothing wrong and he believed Mary had, just to spare Mary.

I have a theory: what if God wasn’t originally going to keep Joseph in the picture? Afterall, God didn’t need Joseph in order to allow Mary to conceive this baby. Maybe knowing Joseph’s heart, and learning that Joseph was going to sacrifice himself for Mary, was what made God change the divine mind and say “You know what—I’m going to keep that guy around. I think that’s exactly the kind of man Jesus needs in his life, the kind who will teach him about selfless love.”

As we think about this story this week, I invite you to consider a few things. First, what are you kneading out of your dough right now? What challenges are you facing, and how can God help you overcome them with selfless love? Second, who needs that love from you right now? Who’s out there in the world somewhere, someone who doesn’t need you in order to live, but who needs you in order to thrive? Whose life could you bless just by being there even though you don’t have to be?

May God form your dough, your clay, into something that will nourish another.

Amen.

I invite you to receive the benediction: Our God, our Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, will guard your going out and coming in, from this time on and forevermore. And as all of God’s people we say together: Amen.