Family Values
Isaiah 7:10-16, Matthew 1:18-25
Barbara D. Rowe
December 19, 2004
What does the term “moral values” mean to you? The November exit polls reported that voters said moral values were especially significant in the presidential election guiding the way many marked their ballots. Was it an aspect of your thinking as you decided how to vote? Unfortunately, the meaning is not the same for all people which makes the term somewhat confusing and difficult to clearly define. For you, do moral values relate to specific views on abortion or war or stem cell treatment or pre-marital sex or gay rights or do they relate to poverty, housing or health care? The term is vague and for that reason may have been used as an catchall phrase without a common definition. For people of faith, there is a commitment that values are grounded in the lessons of their religion. For Christians, that means a basis in the Scriptures, the Hebrew and Greek writings that we hold sacred today. We hope that our choices and decisions are guided by the lessons, the thoughts and the faith models that we know of through the Bible. For most of us, that Scriptural guidance is a plumb line for our lives and our moral values. We hope to communicate its importance to our children as we live our faith in our family life and in community.
On this Advent morning, we look forward to the celebration of the birth of Jesus and continue to prepare spiritually. There are tensions in our nation and culture about the meaning of faith and values. Today, we take a closer look at two of our Biblical ancestors and how they struggled with political and moral decisions. These men are King Ahaz of Judah, who lived 700 years before the time of Jesus, and Joseph, betrothed to Mary, the mother of Jesus. Both men were of the royal line, descendants of King David, and they both knew the sacred Scriptures well. They could quote from the laws in Deuteronomy and were aware of the important moral values of their time. The way they lived their faith has something to say to us today as we prepare for the birth of Jesus.
At the time of King Ahaz, conflict reigned in the land of Judah as it does now. The strongest nation in the area was Assyria in the northeast. It threatened Judah and the surrounding small countries in this land so precious for its trade routes and access to the Sea. These minor nations formed a coalition hoping to fight off the powerful one but King Ahaz refused to join with them. Instead, he sought an alliance with the king of Assyria. Basically, he was protecting himself at all costs which included compromising his faith. From the Assyrian capital of Damascus, alters that were used to worship other gods were copied and built anew in Jerusalem, the capital of Judah. Ahaz hoped to please the Assyrian king and to save himself from harm and defeat. The Prophet Isaiah, not intimidated by royalty, challenged Ahaz and all that he stood for by telling him to listen to God. Isaiah commanded him saying, “Ask the Lord your God to give you a sign.” Ahaz wasn’t really in the mood to take direction from Isaiah or from God. He refused to trust the prophet or the promises made to his ancestor David and responded by pulling quickly from his memory a Biblical verse that would justify his behavior. He quoted a passage from Deuteronomy, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”1 Isaiah wouldn’t accept this attempt to evade him and instead harshly confronted him by saying, “You are a descendant of King David. It is bad enough for you to wear out the patience of human beings but do you have to wear out God’s patience, too? God will send you a sign anyway. A young woman who is pregnant will have a son and will name him ‘Immanuel’.” The moral values of Ahaz were flexible depending on what was most useful to him at the time. Rather than seeking guidance from God when in a politically threatening situation, he chose to be autonomous using Scripture to justify his actions. The prophet Isaiah communicated the strong message that deliverance will come not by alliances or military might but through intervention by God who keeps promises. The sign of the birth of a baby to be named “Immanuel” was the message that God would be with Ahaz and the world, that new life would grow regardless of the king’s behavior.
Seven hundred years later, Joseph, a descendant of King David and King Ahaz, had his moral values challenged but responded in a different way. Joseph was a man of faith and also a student of the Scriptures. In his betrothal to the young girl Mary, he had made even more of a commitment than an engagement is today. Betrothal was a legal bond that could be broken only by divorce. If he died, she would be his widow. If she had an affair, it would be adultery. Joseph knew the law from Deuteronomy that reads, “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, the young woman because she did not cry for help in the town and the man because he violated his neighbor’s wife.”2
We don’t have a record of the conversation between Mary and Joseph when she told him that she was with child. If she tried to explain to him about her experience of the miraculous conception, he certainly didn’t get it. Wouldn’t it be fascinating to know what she said to him and how he responded, what words he used and what expression was on his face? He was obviously a kind man, a just man. He would divorce her because that was the morally right thing to do by law. His religious obligation was to annul the marriage contract. It was not his prerogative to forgive her and continue the marriage because, in society’s mind, her crime was one against the community, not merely against him. However, he must have loved her deeply because he looked for a way to keep her from public humiliation and death, a discreet and honorable thing to do. Joseph had strong moral values in keeping with his religious beliefs and the culture of his family and community.
Imagine his surprise when an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and told him to do something completely different – something that went against the Deuteronomic law from Scripture, against his tradition and even against his moral values. The angel told Joseph to marry the girl and to name the baby. That act would affirm his fatherhood legally. The child would be called Jesus meaning, “God saves”. The Gospel writer, Matthew, related this event to the Greek translation of the Isaiah passage. It says “the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel which means God is with us.” We can only imagine what the response of Joseph’s family might have been to all of this. Would he have told them the details? Could the couple have been ostracized by his closest relatives? Is that why they couldn’t find a room in his hometown of Bethlehem? This turn of events didn’t fit with his moral values as he had known them all his life but he didn’t question the angel. He trusted what God asked him to do and was at peace about it. He took Mary as his wife and he named her baby Jesus.
So what do these stories mean for us? The Prophet Isaiah told Ahaz to ask God for a sign but certainly Scripture commands us not to test God in this way. Yet, the sign was God’s method of communicating with Ahaz, to give him guidance and direction and hope. Are there times when we should ignore specific lines of Scripture? Are there times when we are called by God NOT to take isolated passages literally, not to think they are applicable in all situations? Joseph was willing to ignore a law in Scripture and to follow God’s commandment to him in his very special and unique situation. It would be so simple, so clear-cut if we could believe that the Bible gives us answers to life’s questions, that the answers were all there, that they always apply and we just need to find the answers and follow them. However, Joseph found and Ahaz found that faith is not that simple. God can call us to do something entirely different than we are expecting and we are asked to listen and trust and follow. Are we willing to break the law for God, to hear God’s direction to us today, in our lives moment by moment, and respond to God’s calling to us now, in new ways?
In his adult ministry, the scholars of the law challenged Jesus. Trying to trick and test him, they asked, “Master, which is the greatest commandment of the Law?” Jesus responded, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. The second law resembles it: You must love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang the whole Law, and the Prophets, too.”3 I wonder what our world would be like if we in the twenty-first century used those two laws as our plumb line, as our guide in forming our moral values.
I am still struggling with the results of the recent United Church of Christ television advertisements. Three major networks rejected one ad. The commercial emphasizes that all people are welcome in UCC congregations and shows people of various ages, ethnic backgrounds, skin color, gender, economic circumstance or implied sexual orientation. Networks CBS, ABC, and NBC rejected it saying it was too controversial – the idea of welcoming churches is too controversial. I wonder what Jesus would say. An ABC spokesperson told CNN that the ad could not be accepted because it espouses a particular religious doctrine. Love your neighbor as yourself. So, again I wonder, what are the moral values that are important in our nation?
What are the moral values that are important to our own faith and life? Are there prophets or angels calling to us to reject the old and live in a new way this Advent season? I think they are there. Are we listening? Who are those prophets or angels for you? It may be surprising, unsettling, and uncomfortable to have God call us to do something that is different, unexpected, and maybe even unpopular with friends and family. Is our faith strong enough, like Joseph, to listen for God, to trust God that “Emmanuel,” God is with us, even in the midst of something wildly risky and new? This Christmas, let us shake up the world with faithful moral values from a baby in a manger. Let us listen for God’s word to us daily, trust God’s surprises and live our lives truly loving one another as we live our values in the world.. Amen.