Joseph, Mary's Betrothed 1

INTRO. On Wednesday we'll commemorate the birth of Christ. I don't want to begin anything new until the new year and so this message is to prepare us for the Christmas message. From 1994-1997 I preached through Matthew chapters 1-2. Later I preached through the Christmas section of the early chapters of Luke. Besides those, I have done a number of individual messages like, "Should Christians Keep Christmas?" As I considered this Christmas, I thought I would go back to Matthew's Gospel, and go through this section again, having gained further insights over the years and since nobody here will remember those.

I made some slight changes to my outline. I don't know how many Christmas messages I might do yet in my life and so I'm not sure how far I'll get. But if I should preach for some time, here is the outline. As I went over this chapter again, I realized it is all about Joseph, Mary's betrothed. Let me just mention that when Luke wrote his Gospel, he deals mostly with Mary. So the account in Matthew is about Joseph and I outline it like this:

I. THE DESCENT (1:1-17)
II. THE DILEMMA (1:18)
III. THE DECISION (19)
IV. THE DREAM (20-21)
V. THE DOCTRINE (1:22-23)
VI. THE DECISION (24-25)