A copy of this painting by George de la Tour hangs in our home. It’s a beautiful representation of the child Jesus holding a light for His father Joseph in the carpenter shop. I learned from the keen artistic eye of my wife that the lighting of Jesus’ face is unnaturally bright, illumined more than the candle might provide, as you can see by looking at the shadows and lesser illumination on Joseph’s figure and his work. That unexpected light on Jesus’ face hints that there is actually a light within Him.
Our text for this Sunday, Matthew 1:18-25, gives us the birth of Jesus from His foster father’s perspective. Joseph quickly fades from the Gospel story and does not even appear when Jesus is grown, except for references to his occupation as a carpenter. Yet as a carol we will sing Sunday surmises, it is very likely Joseph’s “hands which first held Mary’s child.”
We don’t have much detail about Joseph, but verse 24 of our text says a great deal about the man. Confronted with social embarrassment both by and for the woman to whom is engaged, Joseph nonetheless, “did as the angel of the Lord commanded him.” He took Mary as his wife and by implication took her Son as his own. And he is still faithfully there at the end of Luke 2 when Jesus is twelve years old.
Our Lord doesn’t really ask any more of us than to do as we are commanded and faithfully stay the course to which he has directed us, whether that is a marriage, a place of service, a friendship or whatever. Joseph represents for us the key place of quiet, often unnoticed and unsung faithfulness to God’s will. Out of such lives the unexpected grace of God will appear, grace which saves.