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The Invasion Daily Devotional -22

by David Joynt on December 20, 2020


MATTHEW 1:18-20 | 18 Now the birth of Jesus the
Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. 20 But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.” 

God’s intention to enter the human story preceded Jesus’ birth. The genealogy connecting Him to the story of God’s work with the Israelites occupies the first seventeen verses of Matthew’s first chapter. The call of Abraham, the saving of Isaac, the Egyptian sojourn and rescue, the Davidic monarchy, the Babylonian captivity—it all led to Joseph. God’s great purposes and historical work hung on one confused and disappointed man, from a small Galilean town, a carpenter. 

How has God worked in your genealogy?

Have there been dramatic turning points in your family
history? 

Why was Joseph so shocked about Mary? 

Tags: family, joseph

About the Author
David Joynt

Dave Joynt began his service as a pastor at Valley Presbyterian Church in Paradise Valley, Arizona in September 2014. This meant a move away from the Northeast, where he has a long history, growing up in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and then serving congregations in Delaware and New Jersey for a total of 23 years.

Dave was nurtured in a great church in Bethlehem where his parents, Anne and Carey, served as elders. He graduated in classics from Lehigh University where his Father taught, and then from Oxford, where he met his wife Julia. Ordained in 1988, he completed a Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1993.

He and Julia have a son, Tristan, and a daughter, Madeleine.

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