🦞🦐🐡🐠🐟🐳🐋🐬🦈🦭🦀On January 1, 1977, Andrus, Blackwood and Co. came out with the hit gospel song, NEVER BE, in their debut album titled Grand Opening.
🦈In the song NEVER BE, the songwriter eulogized a very special Bible couple. Here is the specific part of the lyrics:
🦭“Never be another Mary to carry God’s own Son
Never be another Joseph to raise the Chosen One
Never be”
🦞🦐🐡🐠🐟🐳🐋🐬🦈🦭🦀A LOT OF TIMES
A lot of times, when we read or hear about Joseph and Mary, the couple through whom God brought His Son, Jesus Christ, into the world, we only see them as religious or spiritual figures. We rarely think of or consider their humanity. But that’s not right.
🐟Joseph and Mary were no superhumans; they were ordinary and natural human beings, just like you and I.
🦞🦐🐡🐠🐟🐳🐋🐬🦈🦭🦀JUST LIKE EVERY RED-BLOODED MAN
Joseph was no different from every other man. To use the words of Elder James, the writer of the Book of James, Joseph was a man subject to like passions as we are.
🐳He had feelings, emotions, expectations, weaknesses, personal struggles in life, etc., just like everyone else. This is all the more reason we can learn from his illustrious life as portrayed in the pages of God’s Holy Word, the Bible.
🦞🦐🐡🐠🐟🐳🐋🐬🦈🦭🦀WHO WAS JOSEPH?
Joseph was a member of the royal lineage of King David. If the captivity that befell Judah and Jerusalem, leading to the carrying away of thousands of Jews into Babylon, hadn’t happened, it’s very likely that Joseph would have been the King of Israel at the time Jesus was born.
🐋He was royalty and blue-blooded and knew it, yet he was humble, self-effacing, and meek, eking out a living from carpentry.
🐬So, what’s the lesson for husbands at this point? It’s simply this: whoever you are, and no matter how highly placed in life you may be, be humble. Why? Because you are actually ordinary like everyone else.
🦀We must not let the titles, medallions, accolades, conferments, and other honours and awards that we’re decked with make us see ourselves as some demigods who should be worshipped and who are entitled to tread down on others. No!
🦞Joseph was apparently great by birth and should have been a king, but for the circumstances of life, yet he was modest and unassuming. Is it any wonder that God chose him to raise “the Chosen One,” even Christ Jesus our Lord, just as Andrus, Blackwood and Co. sang?
🦐The meekness of Joseph calls us all to pause, examine our hearts, repent of our inflated feelings of importance, and empty ourselves of all forms of arrogance, haughtiness, self-conceit, pride, and pomposity.
🦞🦐🐡🐠🐟🐳🐋🐬🦈🦭🦀THE TOXICITY OF ARROGANCE
In several marriages today, one spouse is so bloated with arrogance and haughtiness that the other partner is almost dying from the toxicity of their boastful and peacockish behaviour.
🦈Sir/Ma, it’s time to shed off the air of superiority that has characterized you and become humble, because we serve a God Who hates pride in all its forms, as it is written:
📖“God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.” (James 4:6b)
🦞🦐🐡🐠🐟🐳🐋🐬🦈🦭🦀A MAN FULL OF SELF-CONTROL
As we have earlier noted, Joseph was no superhuman species. He was exactly like every other man. And one of the things men don’t brook is hearing that their wife has slept with another man. This is even more piercing when the wife gets pregnant from such an act!
🦭For men, it’s the most scandalous and treacherous thing a woman they’ve married could do. Most men would explode with uncontrollable anger on hearing the news.
🐟But Joseph was calm when Mary told him about her pregnancy after an angel of God visited her. For Joseph, there was no anger and no boiling rage. In fact, there were no hard feelings, even though he couldn’t understand such a mysterious tale as told to him by Mary.
🐠He just thought of silently walking away from the relationship, and he wanted to do so in such a way that Mary’s life and reputation would not be endangered.
🐡If Joseph didn’t raise his voice to shout at Mary for bringing a pregnancy from outside when he’d paid a dowry on her and fully married her, do you think there’s any other behaviour on Mary’s part that would be strong enough to provoke him to shout abusive words at her or, worse still, raise a hand to beat her when they later lived together as husband and wife? None!
🐳Thankfully, God stepped in on time to vindicate Mary and to disabuse Joseph’s mind of all the thoughts that naturally occupied his heart. God confirmed that the apparently strange pregnancy wasn’t the result of infidelity but was according to His divine plans and purposes.
🐋And Joseph didn’t put up a moment’s protest or argument as to why God ruined his plans of having a honeymoon like every other young bridegroom in Israel, as provided by the Scriptures in Deuteronomy 24:5. Joseph humbly submitted himself to the divine will.
🐬Do you still need to search for another man after God’s heart like King David? Joseph was it.
🐟Dear Husbands, please listen!
🦈Don’t allow the devil to set your heart on fire with rage just because you saw your wife from a distance being held by the hand by a man. His holding her hand may not be for extramarital affairs, as the devil always quickly suggests, just as Mary’s pregnancy wasn’t the result of lust and unfaithfulness, as the devil must have told Joseph.
🦭The man holding your wife’s hand might be her long-lost secondary school guardian or teacher who, in his excitement, holds her, drawing her into his embrace in joy, and she obliges him because it would be disrespectful to pull away from such an old benefactor.
🦀Seeing her from a distance and concluding that you’ve finally caught her with a man is, to say the least, most ridiculous, foolish, and completely immature. Yet, some men have actually divorced their fine wives for such unreasonable reasons.
🦞🦐🐡🐠🐟🐳🐋🐬🦈🦭🦀CONCLUSION
Joseph was a well-composed man who was not easily carried away by sentiments. He had rule over his spirit, just as the Bible says:
📖“He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.” (Proverbs 16:32)
🐟Joseph was an ordinary carpenter but was greater than many of the mighty men in Israel of his day because he had control over his emotions and impulses. He was considerate of others and avoided doing or saying anything that would break another’s heart.
🐳Yet Joseph lived his spiritual life under the Law and wasn’t even a member of the Levitical priesthood.
🐬If Joseph, an Old Testament believer, could live such an obviously saintly life, Christian husbands should do better.
🐋May his life both inspire and challenge us today and always, motivating us to live above self-centredness, pettiness, and small-mindedness.🦞🦐
💕♥️Tonight’s Bedroom Assignment:Re-read this devotional together just before bedtime and discuss it with open and sincere hearts.
✝️Altar Call:Jesus Christ is calling you! Come to Him today in genuine repentance. Believe in Him and be saved!
🧪⚗️Scientific Info To Boost Your Marriage:
🔬”A study tracking couples published in Psychoneuroendocrinology discovered that frequent sexual intimacy is associated with longer telomeres. Telomeres are the protective caps at the ends of our chromosomes that shorten as we age. Longer telomeres are a robust biomarker of a younger biological age, a stronger immune system, and a lower risk of chronic diseases.”🔬
📢HALLELUJAH!
🎷PRAISE THE LORD!