If you came to church today to hear something about the Madonna and child, if you came prepared for a Christmas story featuring a picture of Mary in her classic blue robe, holding that chubby little rascal Jesus on her lap, you've come to the wrong service. That's tomorrow night. Today, the luck of the lectionary draw stars Joseph. Personally, I'm a little more used to the mother-and-child motif for Christmas, and I know I'm not the only one. Joseph is more typically a backdrop in the Christmas scenery. It was only this week that I saw my first picture of Joseph holding the Blessed Babe at the nativity.

But our new banner suggests that we think differently. Obedience. Mary more commonly comes to mind when we hear 'obedience" at Christmas. As we think about what this particular sign of the times means, I'd invite you to try to imagine yourself as each of the characters in our story. How would you have felt? What would your response have been to what that character is asked to do?

Mary shows up first as the betrothed bride. She's at home, busily putting hems on dishtowels and learning the secret to her mom's piecrust. This is her last year at home, and she's doing all she can to get ready to move in with Joseph's family. Matthew doesn't tell us how it happens - it's all passive here - but Mary is 'found to be with child." No one else knows whose child yet, but Matthew makes sure we readers know. The agent of this pregnancy is the Holy Spirit. Now, if we've read anything in the Old Testament, we know that one of God's best tricks is when a childless old woman, long past the appropriate age, suddenly gets pregnant. Mary's situation is a new twist on God's old theme. If you thought it was hard for a barren woman to have children (someone like Hannah or Sarah or Elizabeth, for instance), imagine how hard it is for a virgin to have a baby! There are plenty of winks and nudges around town as Mary's condition becomes known. Her father hits the roof. Her mother carries on about the family name. Everyone writes to Dear Abby about it.

And Joseph--! Joseph knows the rules. If he ever wants to hold his head up in the synagogue, if he ever wants a reputable place in the Chamber of Commerce, he has to make it clear he isn't the party responsible for what was going on with the so-called Virgin Mary. She's a nice girl, and maybe it wasn't all her fault, but her partner should take responsibility for what he did. Then the dream comes. Like his Old Testament namesake, this Joseph has dreams. The first Joseph's dreams help save his brothers. This Joseph's dream is about the monarchy. No one called him 'son of David" since his bar mitzvah, but here the angel uses the title that summarized the hopes his family had handed down generation after generation: a legitimate heir, chosen by God, to sit on a legitimate throne. None other than God had made that promise to King David. The prophet Nathan said that God would be father to David's son and that David's son would therefore sit on the throne forever. A son of David to rule forever. The way the angel tells it, right now it looks like the whole thing depends on Joseph's obedience in accepting the trust of legal fatherhood to Mary's baby. The catch is that Joseph is righteous. A righteous man follows the law. The law said, a betrothed couple were as good as married. If one of those as-good-as-married people committed adultery, the law said that person and his or her partner had to die. In the practice of mercy, sometimes a woman could be divorced by her betrothed, so that the real father could step up to do the honorable thing. The point of this wasn't so much marital fidelity, as it was showing that one loved God more than one's spouse. God was always faithful to the covenant with Israel, whereas Israel was notorious for infidelity. And now it all - the law, the monarchy - it all depends on Joseph. What a dilemma! What a decision to have to make!

Then there's the child. He's not born yet, but we already know his name. We don't know how much babies participate in choosing to be born, but we do know there is an understanding in scripture that Jesus consented to his role in God's plan of salvation. God is very respectful and never forces obedience. But imagine Jesus' choice: into the hands of human beings - cruel hands at the end of his life. And in total vulnerability to human hands at the beginning of his life. God incarnate, putting God's Self into the hands of these people. Consenting to diapers and tiny hands and feet, consenting to hunger pangs and no way of saying, 'Please feed me." Who could obey with such full knowledge of the vulnerability and such humility of love? Vulnerability was part of the deal. Even though, as you were currently, you could blast the whole planet to kingdom come, you consent to total and absolute vulnerability to the people you are going to save. Who could be that obedient?

The whole story is about obedience. Obedience as in 'loving someone," not obedience as in 'do what I say." Obedience as in loving so much that you know the only thing that will make you happy is making the other happy. Mary's obedience in receiving the child. Joseph's obedience in acting on behalf of the child. Jesus' obedience in being 'God with us." There is a kind of obedience that says 'yes" and just remains with open hands. It's the kind of obedience that receives the gift and consents to its stewardship and care for God's purposes. There is also a kind of obedience that calls for action. Joseph isn't clued in yet to as to the details of the plan. He is just told the first action to take, and given the option to obey or not. 'Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife." Unlike what we usually get, Joseph is told why he is being asked to act. He is told 'the child . . . will save his people" and it's clear that he can choose to act or not. We aren't always given the rationale behind what we are asked to do, but we are often asked to take a step.

One manageable step. Given one manageable step, one thing to do, one way in which we can be obedient. It happens all the time. God uses us, needs us, to accomplish the work of the kingdom. It's not that God is lazy. It's that, for some unfathomable reason, God's plan uses us as partners. Sometimes we know about it, sometimes not. Sometimes God asks our obedience with the obvious visit of an angel in a dream, but more likely our obedience is in response to a quiet sense that 'this is the right thing to do." Sometimes we don't know how crucial our obedience was until after a whole drama has played itself out. And there are times we never even know about our obedience. We just know that we took the high road, or we reached out to someone in love.

Right now we are being invited to say 'yes" to God. It isn't that God 'requires" obedience so much as God's plan needs our obedience. Who knows what our 'yes" to God today will mean for the fulfilling of God's promises in the kingdom. The invitation to obedience is an invitation to be in love, to act in love. Obedience. It's a sign of the times. All it takes is a 'yes" to God.