Dear Friends, �And Joseph . . .not wanting to disgrace her, wanted to send her away secretly.� Matthew 1:19
Dealing with Disappointment Matthew 1:18-25 18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: when His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit. 19 And Joseph her husband, being a righteous man and not wanting to disgrace her, planned to send her away secretly. 20 But when he had considered this, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, ""Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife; for the Child who has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. 21 ""She will bear a Son; and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.'' 22 Now all this took place to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet: 23 ""BEHOLD, THE VIRGIN SHALL BE WITH CHILD AND SHALL BEAR A SON, AND THEY SHALL CALL HIS NAME IMMANUEL,'' which translated means, ""GOD WITH US.'' 24 And Joseph awoke from his sleep and did as the angel of the Lord commanded him, and took Mary as his wife, 25 but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son; and he called His name Jesus. Try to remember a time in your life when you felt utterly disappointed, How did you feel? Did it affect your expectations for the future? Did you get mad, or did you quietly slink back and sulk for a while? Disappointment hurts. It is a painful irony that our level of disappointment is directly proportional to how much we want something to happen. In today�s passage, Joseph is seen as being extremely disappointed. And why should he not be? He was engaged to a young woman through a legal bond strong enough to require a divorce to end it. And yet, she stood before him, admitting a pregnancy that neither could fully comprehend. Being a gentleman, the disappointed Joseph decided to allow her to exit the engagement quietly. However, God called Joseph to a higher level of acceptance. Explaining the supernatural conception, the Lord called upon Joseph to rise up out of his fears and disappointment. Furthermore, God entrusted Joseph with an awesome responsibility: that of parenting the Savior of the world, God�s only Son. How differently this story would have ended if Joseph had refused to lay aside his disappointment! Today, pray that God will enable you to see past your initial disappointments to achieve the greater potential that He has in store for you. Copyright � 2000, IN TOUCH Magazine. In Touch Ministries. All Rights Reserved. Your's in Jesus, Biji James, Bangalore Everything you'll ever need on one web page from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com **************************************************************** This mail is generated from JOYnet, a Jesus Youth mailing list. To unsubscribe, send a mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe to this mailing list, visit http://www.jesusyouth.org/joynet For automatic help, send a mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] In case of any issue related to the mailing list contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] ****************************************************************
