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Joseph, the husband of Mary and surrogate father to the Lord Jesus Christ, is the person I spoke of in the last post that inspires this one.1 He is often treated as only a background prop in the Christmas narrative generally and to Mary in particular as the only essential character besides Christ. But nothing could be more corrupting of the narrative than to disrespect and treat Joseph’s roles as non-essential as do feminists with men in our times. God so makes Joseph in character and deeds a vital part of the birth circumstances as well as early life of His Son that he greatly merits the recognition this post gives him as an example of family headship God designed and has not changed!
To be clear, the virgin, Mary of Nazareth, is the undisputed central figure of the Christmas narrative behind the Son she was told by the angel she would by God’s grace miraculously conceive (Luke 1:26-35). Her centrality, of course, is due to this foretold miracle of being the virgin who conceives “Immanuel,” (Isaiah 7:14; Matthew 1:22-23, NKJV). She is and ought to be “blessed” by all for being of such humility and faith in character God chose Mary to bear His Son (Luke 1:36-48, NKJV). With total devotion, character is the prominent feature that causes God to graciously elect all of the godly personages that appear in the birth narrative of His Son; Joseph being no exception.
Of the royal line of David through Solomon, we are introduced to Joseph as the “husband of Mary” who was “betrothed” to him when he discovers she is “with child of the Holy Spirit,” (Matthew 1:6-18, NKJV). As I write in the post dealing with this, because he was a righteous man, he struggled with what to rightly do about the situation.2 From the text, Joseph was also merciful since he did not want to see Mary harmed in any way (Matthew 1:19). That he could be reached in a dream shows he was a man of faith and discernment too, who may have had previous heavenly visits due to his calm reaction. Moreover, Joseph was obedient as seen in his responses (Matthew 1:20-21).3
His initial obedient response to the directives of an angel was to take “to him his wife” without any further struggle in the matter recorded in Scripture. He also continued to honor his and Mary’s betrothal pledge to abstain from sex until after “she had brought forth her firstborn Son.” Finally, in obedience to the angel and agreement with Mary, he took his right of family headship and naming her Son, “he called His name JESUS,” (Matthew 1:24-25, NKJV). This right of headship a man has to name anything much more his children is expressly of God from creation (Genesis 2:19-20a, 3:20). God had already named His Son, but gave Joseph the respect of headship as His stand in.
That God would give Joseph any respect at all is a tribute to His character and perpetually firm commitment to His design of the human family. His design involves the roles and responsibilities He assigned to male and female in marriage that is the starting point of a family and its order. As educated and sophisticated as moderns are to interpret the pictographs on cave walls of ancient people’s long vanished, it is amazing that many including professed Christians cannot rightly interpret the picture of Adam being created first as God’s assignment of male headship in the family (Genesis 2:7-8)! This is because they willfully refuse in rebellion to do so and invent many false justifications.
One of the wickedly false justifications some Bible teachers and their devotees make is that male headship did not begin until after the fall of man and is a punishment from God. Are you kidding me? This demonically inspired line of reasoning corrupts even the supreme Headship of God since His is the original pattern for human male headship and from which Christ’s is assigned (Genesis 1:26; 1 Corinthians 11:3, 15:27-28; Ephesians 1:22-23; Colossians 1:15-18)! This false justification arises from a corruptly subjective reading into Genesis 3:16b which the proper objectively read instruction of the Lord Jesus Christ and His apostles easily refutes (Matthew 19:1-10; 1 Corinthians 11:4-12, 14:34-40; Ephesians 5:22-6:4; Colossians 3:18-21; 1 Timothy 2:8-15; 1 Peter 3:1-7).4, 5
Not only was Joseph given the right of headship to name Jesus, he led out as family leader under God fulfilling this and his other responsibilities (Luke 2:1-5, 21). He provided; securing lodging, food and the required sacrifice for Christ’s dedication to God at the Temple (Luke 2:6-7, 22-38). He protected (Matthew 2:13-15, 19-23) and taught his family out of the customary male head of household duties in God’s Word (Deuteronomy 6:1-9, 16:16-17; Luke 2:39-52). Joseph would have also taught his sons his “carpenter” trade as part of their preparation for manhood (Matthew 13:53-56; Mark 6:3, NKJV).6 Woe to the professed Christian pastors and leaders who have nullified God’s teaching on male headship in the home and churches by replacing it with your own (Mark 7:1-13)!7
1 See the January 15, 2023 post, Rachel’s Children Live!, under the category, Instruction.
2 Read the December 4, 2022 post, Christ Persecuted Before Birth, under the category, Instruction.
3 See the December 11, 2022 Post, Christ Persecuted To His Birth and the one following on December 18th titled, Christ Persecuted As A Child, both under the category, Instruction, to track how Joseph was obedient to God in all of the directives he was given.
4 Another related and equally ludicrous false justification some professed Christians make for rebelling against God’s ordained headship of men in the family and churches is it undermines the Gospel message and Christian witness because the world no longer honors it. In actuality, professed Christians making this false justifi- cation are undermining the Gospel and witness of the faith by their rank disobedience to the Word of the God they want the unsaved to believe in contrary to even com- mon sense (Titus 2:1-10)! They do this seeking to please people rather than God building their churches.
5 Learn how to objectively interpret and apply God’s Word for yourself through our layman’s Fruitful Bible Study Self-Paced Video Course the Lord led me to develop to help. Get an overview of the course in the First Session at https://youtu.be/uufAkc3aYSc on our Strong Man Virtual Institute YouTube Channel.
6 In the mission to restore men, I write about God’s design of the family, its order, roles and responsibilities beginning with male headship in many posts (type “headship” into the Blog search engine) and my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics available at your favorite internet bookseller or brick and mortar bookstore and the Strong Man Store.
7 Pastors, elders and any other ecclesiastical leaders having the authority to put women in authority over men in the local church is yet another false justification for side- stepping what God’s Word objectively interpreted and applied says about male headship in the home and churches. Leaders are nowhere given permission or authori- ty in Scripture to usurp Christ or disobey God’s Word. Or is the New Covenant a license to commit transgression, sin and iniquity? The guilty are doing so consistent with the lying tongue of their true head, Satan (John 8:44), and what Scripture foretells about them (Acts 20:29-31; 2 Peter 2:1-3)! Without repentance, their suffering and deaths in these times of trouble and persecution are not praiseworthy or rewarded, but punishment as was also the case for the lying prophets and elders of Judah as well as priests of Israel (Proverbs 15:10; Jeremiah 14:10-15; Ezekiel 8-9; Hosea 6:4-7:3; Matthew 5:17-20)! And just as He judges the corrupt teachers of His Word, God will also hold their followers accountable for greater loyalty to men and their doctrines than to Him and His unchanging Word (Jeremiah 14:16; Jude 5-11)!
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