Today, we come across one of the most significant events in the Bible—the birth of Jesus. While this story is familiar to most, the character of Joseph stood out to me. He is engaged to Mary, but Mary is found to be with child. As you can imagine, this was beyond awkward for both of them. Mary has a far-fetched story about how this happened, and Joseph isn’t buying it. He hears her, but he decides to divorce her. Culturally, for Joseph and Mary, their engagement was as binding as marriage, and breaking it off was considered a divorce.
But Joseph is not a knee-jerk reaction kind of person. He is not vengeful. He is not even as concerned about how he feels betrayed as he is about Mary’s humiliation and potential death. Keep in mind that adultery in their day was punished by stoning. Notice Joseph’s reaction.
Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise: When as his mother Mary was espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost. Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a publick example, was minded to put her away privily. (Matthew 1:18–19, KJV)
As I considered Joseph’s character, two thoughts came to mind: not everything is as it seems, and discretion is a valuable virtue. We see this in the following two verses.
He that answereth a matter before he heareth it, It is folly and shame unto him. (Proverbs 18:13, KJV)
Discretion shall preserve thee, Understanding shall keep thee: (Proverbs 2:11, KJV)
Because Joseph exercised discretion, he had time to hear the whole matter. Sure, he heard Mary’s side of the story, but he hadn’t heard God’s side. How easy it is to go public with opinion and judgment! Yet discretion was of great value in preserving this situation.
But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. (Matthew 1:20, KJV)
Is this a good pattern to follow? Imagine what wouldn’t be on Facebook and other social media platforms if we practiced this discretion. Imagine how many situations could be saved or preserved if we simply didn’t send that text. In our culture of instant everything, where it’s easy to tell the whole world whatever comes to mind, discretion is needed now more than ever.
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