"Joseph of Nazareth"
- Intern Pastor Katie Insalaco
- Dec 22, 2025
- 3 min read
Updated: Dec 26, 2025
Fourth Sunday of Advent December 21, 2025
Sermon by Intern Pastor Katie Insalaco
As many of you know, I am an adoptive mother. My son joined our family when he was four years old, third in birth order but fourth child. Very shortly after his adoption, another mother approached me on the playground and innocently asked how my "real" children felt about my son's adoption. I rather snarkily replied, "I don't know what you mean, I don't have any imaginary children". I would guess that I'm not the only adoptive parent or adoptee to have had encounters like this one where well-meaning people speak about adoptive families versus "real", meaning biological, families. Let me assure you, they are all real. And in so many commentaries I read about todays gospel, I heard echoes of this kind of unconscious ignorance when scholars talked about Joseph. They said things like, "Joseph accepted Jesus as his own son". But, as every adoptive parent knows, to Joseph, Jesus was his own son, regardless of who fathered him biologically or miraculously.
I love today's gospel because I hear it as a love letter to Joseph. Let's just recap here. Joseph finds out that his fiancée is pregnant and it certainly wasn't from him. Now, without getting wrapped up in the circumstances of Mary's impregnation - one theologian I listened to said, "it's about theology not gynecology"1 Joseph knows that Mary's fate is in his hands. In the ancient world, engagement was a legal contract so simply walking away wasn't an option. Joseph also likely knew his scripture, as all righteous Jewish men did in Joseph's time, so he would have known Deuteronomy's instruction that "if there is a young woman, a virgin already engaged to be married, and a man meets her in the town and lies with her, you shall bring both of them to the gate of that town and stone them to death" (Deut. 22: 23-24). To expose Mary's pregnancy was a death sentence for her so he decided that he'd figure out a way to end the engagement as quietly as possible. Don't you wonder about how hurt he must have felt? I do. But only after Joseph has already wrestled with what to do with his pain, he gets the divine message through a dream that God is at work and needs his help. That a miraculous thing was happening and God needs Joseph to raise God's child. And Joseph says, "ok". Which is what adoptive parents do. God sends them a miraculous child and they say "ok". They may not ever recognize their own eyes or nose or laugh in their child, but they do plainly see God in them.
Joseph of Nazareth doesn't get a lot of airtime in our biblical studies, which is understandable given that we never hear him speak and he isn't around during Jesus's ministry, death, and resurrection. But I think it's naive to think that Joseph's influence on Jesus was minimal. Yes, our story tells us that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit, fathered by God. Jesus often refers to God as "father", perhaps most famously when he teaches us to pray "Our Father who art in heaven ..�' But Joseph was Jesus's Dad. I don't think God wiped Jesus's snotty nose or taught him the Torah. Joseph gets his family to safety in Egypt and Joseph frantically searches for 12 year old Jesus when he gets a little too independent and stays behind at the temple. (I'd venture to bet that Joseph also had a hand in disciplining Jesus for his little adventure.) In ancient custom, when Joseph names Jesus, he legally adopts him. Jesus becomes his son. His real son.
Jesus was the cornerstone on who Joseph built his family. Although today's gospel very clearly says that Mary was a virgin when Jesus was born, Scriptures suggest that Jesus was Joseph and Mary's first son, not their only. In the chapter just preceding today's gospel, Matthew lays out the ancestral lineage that gets us from Abraham to David to Jesus and it runs through Joseph. You may have noticed that this connection to David is important - it was mentioned in each of today's readings. Isaiah says, "Hear then, O house of David" (Isaiah 7:12), Paul talks about "the gospel concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh" (Romans 1:3), and then the angel in our gospel calls out, "'Joseph, son of David" (Matt. 1:20). That Jesus was descended from David was really important in Matthew's storytelling. Theologian Marcus Borg posits that Matthew wrote to contradict criticism that Jesus-following Jews weren't Jewish enough2• Matthew argues that, actually, Jesus-following Jews were the most Jewish of all! He makes sure listeners know that Jesus's family could be traced all the way to Abraham - Luke goes even further and connects the dots from Jesus all the way to Adam and therefore to God Godself. Matthew also relates Joseph of Nazareth, Jesus's dad, to Joseph of the Hebrew Bible. Like his namesake, Joseph of Nazareth is a prolific dreamer. Both Josephs are moral, upstanding guys who obediently respond to God's call in bold ways. Matthew's listeners would have noticed the similarities. You may have also noticed that Matthew basically quotes the Isaiah reading from today pointing to Jesus as the fulfilment of Hebrew prophecy. I'm not convinced that Isaiah was talking about Jesus but Matthew's audience would have recognized the obvious links. Also, in telling the story of Jesus's birth, Matthew retells the story of Moses. Moses and Jesus are both first born Jewish males endangered by a heartless ruler, raised by dutiful biological mothers, and were both adopted. Matthew's message is clear - like Moses, Jesus is bringing in a new era for the people of Israel.
Many ancient Jews expected the messiah to be a royal descendant of David, so the link to David is crucial to Matthew's story. But the Davidic bloodline that establishes Jesus's undeniable Jewish heritage runs through Joseph and flows into Jesus through adoption. There is no break in the family tree just because Joseph didn't biologically father Jesus. Of course, Jesus would be from the house of David, because his dad was. Both Matthew and Luke make that clear. In this way, Joseph is again upheld as Jesus's dad. And children are the children of their parents - and parents are those who parent their children.
I think it's safe to say that Jesus was parented. We have no idea what happened during those lost years between when we encounter the tween Jesus in the temple and when Jesus starts his ministry. But I believe Joseph was there for at least part of it. I wonder how many of Jesus's teachings were influenced by Joseph. I wonder how Jesus's interpretation of what a father is was shaped by who Joseph was. It's pretty widely accepted that Jesus drew from his lived experience in his teachings. So, I think it stands to reason that Jesus's ideas about who God the Father is might be a reflection of who Joseph the Dad was. Jesus paints a picture of a heavenly father who is expectant but merciful, all-knowing and respondent, powerful yet gentle. A father who loves us unconditionally no matter how many times we forget that we need him. A father who mourns when we mourn, who loves to hear our laugh, and who will never give up on us. I wonder if Joseph modeled those things for his child, Jesus. And Jesus continues to model those things for us.
Right now, Zoar's Evangelism team is collecting money to fund an adoption for a local family here in Clackamas County. I can't help but see this as intimately tied to today's gospel. For those of us who have adopted children and for those of us who've been adopted, the families created from that willingness to answer God's call and realize God's dream in this way can be holy. Today's gospel tells us so. After all, the Holy Family is an adoptive one. I love this gospel because it tells the story of adoption itself in many ways - it can be really scary, fully
faith-filled, and the realization of a dream for so many parents and their children. God was Jesus's father but Joseph was his dad. His real dad. With that in mind, I'll end today's sermon with a very short video that made me love Joseph a little bit more.
1 Com.au. "A204 Advent 4." Accessed December 14, 2025. https://bythewell.com.au/episodes/a204-advent-4.
2 Borg, Marcus J. Reading the Bible Again for the First Time. HarperCollins, 2006.
3 vanceelliottcomedy. "If Jesus Went to School #Jesus #christian #christiancomedy #skit #school." Youtube. Accessed December 14, 2025. https://www.youtube.com/shorts/WrHNTn4xV9w.
