“THE ANGELS OF ADVENT: Guardians of our Lord”
Saint Matthew 1: 18a-25; 2: 12-14, 19
Midweek Two: Saint Joseph, Guardian of our Lord: 14 December Anno Domini 2023
Fr Jay Watson, SSP
If some Lutherans dislike The Mother of God, they equally eschew, ignore, and never think about the Ever-Virgin’s husband—Saint Joseph.
People will opine that he is not mentioned very often in Scripture. Neither is Enoch, and HE, walked with God. “Joseph is given too much attention by Roman Catholics” people will warble. Well, that is partly because they take the “communion of Saints” and the “great cloud of witnesses,” you know—Holy Scripture more seriously than we do (sometimes). Also, Catholics give a lot of attention to The Lord’s Prayer and The Nicene Creed. Do we want to take these two parts of our Liturgy and place them in the basement with our plastic statue of Saint Joseph…only to be pulled out for the Christmas Creche once a year?
You have heard it said that in one way, Moses is more unique and special than the Evangelists themselves. Well, there was only ONE Moses—Old Testament Prophet, Priest, and King, while there were four Evangelists.
But note, Saint Joseph’s Feast Day is celebrated in The Lutheran Church (L.C.M.S. too) as well as in the other large Church-Body communities every March 9th. He has been designated by The Church with the supreme honorific: “Guardian of our Lord.” What have you done for Jesus lately? Okay, that was a “cheap shot” or was it? The Law of God says that you should do what you vowed to do, first by your Sponsors at Holy + Baptism, and then with your own voice at the ceremony of confirmation: confess Christ Crucified clearly and boldly; and suffer all rather than fall away from The Faith! You are to be “guardians of our Lord.” Not that God needs your protection but His Body does—the Church, your fellow Saints. His doctrines and teachings do. His light to the world needs your polished mirror-like bodies (buffed by your good works and your patient suffering for His Gospel) to reflect Him into al the blackened corners of Satan’s decaying world. It is The Lord’s world. The “prince of the air” only temporarily seems to dominate it.
Joseph’s genealogy is given in Matthew 1. His lineage is traced back to Abraham—the “Father of nations,” including the Gentiles. He is a descendant of Judah, just like King David and Greater King Jesus. Matthew also informs us that after Mary was found to be pregnant—by God The Holy Ghost—Joseph was willing to let The Virgin go away privately (probably back to convent she had been at—according to suppositions that this pastor subscribes to). Why. Because the Evangelist tells us: “he was a just man.” Fitting that the word is “dikaious” for only Jesus is truly righteous—right with God. And Joseph, already guarding and protecting the in-utero Christ, is judged righteous by THE RIGHT ONE!
In a dream, Joseph is told by Gabriel to take Mary as his wife and to name The Child Jesus: Savior.
So, he even guards and protects The Lord’s Sacred Name—a Name above all names; at which every knee in heaven, on earth, and beneath will bend.
After the Magi came and departed on Epiphany, The Guardian is visited again by Gabriel in a dream warning them to flee from Judea. Here, Joseph shows his true courage and obedience. No time is wasted: “he arose, he took the young child and his mother by night, and departed into Egypt” [Mt. 2.14]. Joseph helped The Virgin with the Child, Joseph guarded them both on the way to the Land of Ham, Joseph made sure they were fed, housed, clothed, and protected from Satan’s attempts to kill The Boy! Joseph: Guardian of our Lord.
Remember last week? Saint Joseph: Patriarch brough Israel/Jacob to Egypt to be guarded, protected, and saved from famine and death, before going back to Judea. So too, The Triune Holy Family—they were in Egypt “until the death of Herod: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of The Lord by the prophet, saying, ‘Out of Egypt have I called my son’” [Mt. 2.15].
Joseph takes God and His Mother to Nazareth. And it is in Galilee that The Christ is raised. Like you were, Jesus is raised by a faithful “house-father” in the Word of The Lord. Jesus was catechized by Joseph. The church is eternally grateful. Matthew says no more of the “carpenter” [Mt. 13. 55]. We know that as an adult even The Christ is referred to as a carpenter [Mk. 6.3]. Fitting indeed for “The Word” made everything that was made writes John in chapter 1.
Saint Luke in chapter 2 recounts the journey of Joseph with The Virgin to Bethlehem for our God’s Nativity in the stable. 40 days after Christ’s birth when He is presented in the Temple, and The Virgin is ceremonially “purified” Simeon chants the Nunc Dimittis—filled with Gospel—for after all, Simeon is holding in his aged hands: God in the flesh. The same God which Joseph has held countless times in his own calloused hands. Not just The Virgin, but “and Joseph and his mother marvelled at those things which were spoken of him” [Lk. 2.33].
Joseph’s last brief appearance in Holy Writ is when Christ is 12 years old, and is found by His Guardian in the Temple after three days of being lost. But Emmanuel is never lost. He is with us. Joseph is not Christ’s father—God the 1st Person is. Messiah is always doing the work of His Father. Jesus’ work is for you and on your behalf. Jesus guards and protects you from going to hell. The Lord does so by obeying what you break and paying the ultimate penalty you should bear for your disloyalty, treason, and attempt to murder God.
But Saint Joseph, Guardian of our Jesus, did what God asked him to do—not perfectly—but faithfully, empowered by the same Spirit that caused The Virgin’s pregnancy and by The Same God/Man’s Presence that he was entrusted with for…at least a dozen years. Joseph guarded and protected the Christ for 12 years. After Jesus’ Ascension to the right-hand of majesty, Jesus’ own “12” (and their successors) were tasked with guarding and protecting Christ’s doctrine, by teaching/Preaching and administering The Sacraments.
Our Book of Concord says we should remember the Saints, Like Saint Joseph. He is set before us as an example to be emulated and followed and as a picture of Christ’s Mercy and Grace shown to one just like us. The Guardian of our Lord loves you because he loved Jesus. He does both because Jesus first loved him. We may forget and not remember or not honor Saint Joseph as we should. But Jesus never forgets. He never forgets the man that helped Him grow from a baby into a man, The God/Man.
Amen
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