The Joseph Factor 101

Introduction

Christmas is a beautiful time. We get to sing and listen to all the beautiful Christmas songs. We see different renditions of the Christmas story depicted through movies and modern technological gizmos. All of them aiming to show us the great entrance of our Lord’s coming into the world- that the King of kings and the Lords of lords will step down into time and wrap himself up in the flesh.

The world has no choice but to stand in awe, celebrating the gift God gives us through Jesus Christ, the gift of salvation and eternal life. BUT be careful – the reason being that amid all the joy, pageantry, excitement, exchange of gifts, the wonderful food, drinks and all the wonderful things we do to reminisce the birth of the Lord- you must know that the first Christmas was not as beautiful and as exciting as the ones we see today. This is mainly because a good number of the characters in the original first Christmas story did not fully comprehend what was happening at the time. In addition, most of the populace had no idea the first Christmas was happening in real-time. The first Christmas was not filled with all the excitement and wonderment we attach to it now. We appreciate it now because we have the full story from the birth of Jesus to his resurrection. It was, however, very tough for some people who were directly affiliated with the birthing of Christ, our Savior.

I firmly believe that we must move beyond just discussing the birth of Jesus Christ from the historical perspective, as wonderful as it may be, and extract from this one-in-a-zillion historical event some contemporary words of wisdom and lessons that we can learn from all the characters involved in the first Christmas story—wisdom and lessons that we can use to face the challenges we encounter today.

FACT NO. 1

The reality is that most of the time, with God’s gifts, we only have joy in retrospect as we look back and see his plan was better than ours. When God gives you a gift, it does not always evoke joy, praise, and splendor – it often causes confusion and mayhem, and you wonder whether it’s really a gift from God or a plot from the enemy to destroy you. Let me use some examples to break it down so you understand that everything you have and own is a gift from God. Your life, vocation, education, work, wife, marriage, children, parents, siblings, car, house, etc., are all God-given gifts. A time will come when these gifts will not evoke joy and praise but will cause confusion and mayhem in your life. During these times, you must be careful not to give up and walk away from the gift that is giving you a hard time.

Mind you, I am not a prophet of doom; I am just stating the fact of life. A time will come when your marriage will give you a hell of a time. It could be right after you tied the knot, or some years after, or getting to your last days. A time will come when the vocation you have chosen will give you some trouble. A time will come when life itself might seem like a nightmare and a burden, and all you want to do is walk away from life (commit suicide). When these hard times come, don’t be too quick to decide to walk away from these gifts of marriage, children, vocation, etc.  Even if you want to walk away from your gifts, I propose you do that when everything is going well.

Using Joseph, the foster Father of Jesus Christ, as a case study, I want to introduce you to this SERIES I will be running for the next couple of days leading up to Christmas. The title of the series is “THE JOSEPH FACTOR”*

I pray the Lord will teach and bless you through this series. Stay tuned for the next edition.