Advent 4

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Over the last few weeks I have been watching the Bible on Channel 5. It has been a march through the Old Testament I have not yet finished watching it, and yes it has been quite violent but that was the world of the Old Testament at times. And even if we were to write a modern history we could also say the same of our own time. But, what it has showed me is that throughout history we have had God with us. He has spoken through his prophets and people.

There seems to be an increasing disquiet among many parts of society that God does not speak to this generation. These people have not really understood and today’s central messages of today’s Gospel.

We notice first of all that at this moment of history in our world the prophets are beginning to be fulfilled. God is at work in the world and changes the course of human history. This is shown in the Phrase “Emmanuel” God is with us. This is not just a promise for the human life of Jesus. It is a promise that God is always with us. So where does he speak to us. He speaks to us through others. Those who care and look after us in times of need. We maybe also need to look towards the prophets of our own time. I am sure that we can all think of prophets in our own time and life where people have spoken to us about God either directly or indirectly.

If we are ever in doubt that God is with us we can see this through the person of Joseph. He can teach us something about what it means to have God with us. Here was a man under pressure. He was bet roved to a woman who was pregnant under so she said by the Holy Spirit. He was scared, he loved Mary but did not want to cause embracement for her so he had plans to divorce her on the quiet. We meet him today probably scared and anxious about the future. In this dream he gets a message of what he must do. Realising that God is with him he puts total trust in him and without question does what he is asked.

 
Through the example of Joseph we can see that God is always with us. Maybe we do not hear him quite so clearly because of our noisy and busy lives. Putting his trust in God he was able to move on and be helped. He was able to see the way ahead more clearly. St Joseph does not get a big billing in the Bible he goes very quickly after the infancy narrative. But we should under estimate his importance his strength and trust in God teaches us a very important lesson to listen to the lord, put our trust in him and realise always that “God is with us”

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