The FOurth Sunday of Advent, Year A
December 21, 2025
Isaiah 7:10-16; Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19; Romans 1:1-7; Matthew 1:18-25
Year A, Fourth Sunday of Advent
December 21, 2025
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
“Waiting for God”
Advent is a season of waiting. It is the time when the story of Christ’s coming has begun to move, but nothing yet feels settled. Advent lives in that uneasy space between hope and fear.
This morning’s gospel is not sentimental. What we are given is a man awake at night, turning something over in his mind that will not settle.
Matthew tells the story of Jesus’ birth through Joseph’s eyes. That alone should slow us down. Joseph does not speak a single word in this gospel. There is no song, no prayer recorded, no protest, no argument. What we see is his inner struggle, followed by his decision.
“Mary was found to be with child.” Matthew doesn’t soften it. He doesn’t explain it away. He names the crisis plainly. Joseph knows how children come into the world. He knows the law. He knows what society’s expectations are.
Matthew tells us he is a righteous man. That word “righteous” matters. In Matthew’s gospel, righteousness is not about being morally superior or rigidly correct. It is about being faithful: faithful to God, faithful to neighbor, faithful to the heart of the law rather than its sharpest edges. Joseph is righteous, and that righteousness shows itself not in punishment but in mercy.
He plans to dismiss Mary quietly.
That is actually quite a shocking plan. In a world where shame is public, and women bear the cost, Joseph chooses restraint. He chooses not to expose her. He chooses not to make an example of her. He chooses a path that protects her as much as he knows how.
But even that careful, measured, and compassionate choice is a way out. It is a decision that keeps his life intact. It would allow him to step away from scandal, from danger, from a future he cannot understand.
And it is right there, in that space, after Joseph has done his moral reasoning, after he has chosen what seems decent and responsible, that God intervenes.
“Do not be afraid.”
That phrase should sound familiar. Scripture uses it over and over, not because fear is rare, but because fear is the human default when God disrupts our plans.
“Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife.”
Notice what the angel does not say. The angel does not say, “This will be easy.” The angel does not say, “People will understand.” The angel does not say, “This won’t cost you.”
The angel simply names the truth Joseph cannot see on his own: God is already at work here. And Joseph is being invited, not forced, but invited into it.
Joseph’s fear is not irrational. Obedience will cost him his reputation. It may cost him relationships. Taking Mary as his wife means accepting a story that makes no sense to the world.
And Joseph wakes up and does it anyway. “When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him.”
That single sentence may be one of the most profound acts of faith in the New Testament. Joseph does not ask for proof. He does not request a second dream. He does not negotiate terms. He acts.
This is not flashy faith. It is not heroic in the way we usually imagine heroism. It is steady. It is costly. It is quiet. Joseph is not a priest, a prophet, or a hero of the faith. He is a tradesperson, a working man, trying to live decently, and that is precisely who God entrusts with this moment.
Because without Joseph, the story does not unfold the way it does. Without Joseph’s willingness to stay, to claim Mary, to name the child, to stand in the public square and say, “This is my family,” the Incarnation still happens but the people, protection, and courage God uses to bring it into the world fall away.
That may be the most unsettling truth in this passage and about what will become the Christmas story. God chooses to come into the world dependent on human courage. Not certainty. Not clarity. Courage.
Matthew tells us the child will be named Jesus, “for he will save his people from their sins.” And then, almost in the same breath, Matthew reaches back to Isaiah and gives us another name: Emmanuel. God with us.
Salvation, in Matthew’s telling, is not abstract. It is not primarily about escaping the world. It is about God refusing to remain distant from it.
Matthew begins his gospel with this promise—God with us—and he will end it the same way: “I am with you always, even to the close of the age.”
And Joseph becomes the first person to live as if that were true. Joseph does not understand the fullness of what is happening. He does not know how the story will end. He knows only what he has been asked to do next: stay. Protect. Name the child. Be present.
This is where Advent leaves us—not at the manger, not at resolution, but in the waiting. The promises are spoken, yet much remains uncertain.