A World Full of YESES
I know you’ve had that dream… you know, the one where you wake up suddenly, sit up and bed, and ask yourself “WHAT WAS THAT ALL ABOUT?” Yah, I’ve had that dream. Many of them, actually… and usually the most outlandish of them all are the ones that stick with me for years. I try to analyze them for some deeper meaning, but all I can usually come up with is that I have an overactive imagination. But I LOVE TO DREAM! I look forward to falling asleep because what awaits me on the other side of my eyelids is an opulent movie created by my deepest joys, fears, and excitements. My brain gets a break from reality and gets to play without consequences with the most extreme of circumstances. Dreams are funny like that. Often tied to real life events, past memories, and emotions, you likely have no control over the content of your dream. I’ve actually tried to translate those hours of day dreaming about a character from the most recent Netflix binge, or about a situation I wished I could have handled differently into “night” dreams so that my brain could spend more time with them. The last few moments before I fall asleep, and unlike Griff and some others out there, I have no problem falling asleep. I tell people I am a ”head, pillow, sleep” kind of gal., But those last few moments before I fall asleep, I think really hard about whatever content I’d like to have show up in a dream. Ya, that never works for me! My brain always takes me down a different adventure, creating vivid scenarios and interactions with people I’ve never met before. Rarely do I have nightmares or wake up in fear that my dream will become a reality. I guess I am one of the lucky dreamers out there: restful sleep, and entertaining dreams.
Not only are dreams fun, humorous and entertaining, dreams play an important role in the function of our brain. Dreams usually happen during REM sleep because your brain is more active. The activity within your brain as you dream helps us “coordinate new opinions, learn new tasks and update our emotional outlook.” REM sleep stimulates the area of the brain that is associated with learning and memory. I guess this is why sometimes we can question whether or not a person is upset with us in real life due to an argument we had in a dream. Dreams feel so real, so vivid.
In the ancient world, dreams played a very important role in the practices and beliefs of ancient cultures. Many cultures believed that dreams were a way to communicate with deities and were the link between the holy and living. The ancient Egyptians believed that their gods showed up in their dreams so they took dream interpretation very seriously. The Egyptian Dream book was found in 2000 B.C. and it contained lengthy examples of dream interpretations. The good dreams were written in black, and the bad ones, which meant a bad omen, were written in red. Here is an example: If a man sees himself eating crocodile flesh in his dream, this is good and is a sign that he is acting as an official amongst his people. However, if he sees himself drinking a warm beer, this is a bad omen to mean suffering. (I mean, yah! Warm beer is bleh) …. I wonder what the ancient Egyptians would have to say about the dream I had where I was at HEB and no one was wearing a mask and I was trying to run out of the store as quickly as possible. Would that be considered a good or bad omen?
Throughout our Biblical texts, dreams are an important way God communicates with humanity. We see this with Joseph, son of Jacob, in Genesis. Daniel is also a dream interpreter when he cracked the code on King Nebuchadnezzar’s dream in Daniel 2. Gideon and Zechariah, and Ezekiel and Jeremiah all had “visions.” And in the book of Matthew, our text this morning, Joseph, the father of Jesus has four different dreams from an angel of the lord.
Who was Joseph? Obviously he was an excellent sleeper. But aside from his abundance of clear-cut and directive dreams, we don’t know a whole lot about Joseph. He only appears in Matthew and Luke’s gospels and he disappears after Luke’s account of the Passover visit to the Temple in Luke chapter 2. We know he is a descendent of David, the line of Abraham, which is important for Matthew to establish for his Jewish readers, who will be looking for a genealogical chain to David. The text in Matthew describes Joseph as a righteous man, someone who was diligent to follow the letter of the law. He meticulously followed the commandments and sought to live out God’s will in his life. And when we meet him in this text, he’s engaged to Mary.
Engagement looks a lot different than what we think of modern day engagement stories. (Josh proposed on the beach in South Padre. It was romantic.) In Biblical times, a man and woman (or should we say a preteen girl?) entered into engagement, which can be thought of as a contract between the two fathers. This arrangement lasted about a year and then the wedding ceremony would occur, and the girl would move out of her family’s home and into her husband’s. The couple would be considered married during engagement despite the fact that no one had said “I do.” So you can see why when Joseph learns that Mary is pregnant, and he was certainly not the father, that he has to divorce her. The commandments are very clear about that sort of thing. But being a God-fearing rule-follower and a compassionate man, he’s made up his mind to protect Mary from the deadly consequences of breaking the law by quietly dismissing her.
Just when Joseph thinks he’s washed his hands of this dreadful situation, an angel appears to him in a dream and tells Joseph to “take Mary as your wife…she will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus.” And when he woke up from his dream, he did it. He married Mary. No questions asked. Joseph’s moral dilemma, which was his fear to accept Mary as his wife or risk breaking the law, didn’t get in the way of God’s new commandment, a higher law, a greater righteousness that wasn’t going to be achieved solely by following the letter of the law. Joseph said YES.
Where can we find God’s dream for us in the midst of death, loneliness, suffering, and sickness we are facing in our world right now? How do we reconcile the corporate sins of humanity with our responsibility to love one another? How do we catch God’s dream and astoundingly respond “YES” to what God has for the world, like Joseph did?
Let’s look at what we know about Joseph again. We know he’s righteous and of good morals, compassionate. We also know that he is smart, someone who works with his hands and is good at what he does. The Bible describes him as a carpenter, a τέκτων in Greek, which is better understood as someone who is an artisan, a wood-worker, mason, or engineer. Think of Joseph as a creator, someone who sees potential in raw materials, who invents order out of chaos, who makes beauty out of the mundane like a Clara Newby, an Elizabeth Chapin or a Lyle Adair.
As he raises his son Jesus, he teaches Jesus how to use tools, how to build and assemble, how to “measure twice, cut once.” He teaches him how to fix the leak under the sink and how to unclog a toilet. He shows him how to change the oil in his car, how to grill a perfect steak, and how to tie a tie. He models how to treat people by the way he speaks to his neighbors and lends a hand when they are in need. He teaches integrity and honesty by the way he runs his business. He exemplifies the sacrificial love of a step father who made the choice to stick around, knowing it wouldn’t be easy.
And just look at the way Jesus turned out. While the scripture never says this, I’d like to think that Jesus learned so much about how to be a human by the example of his father, Joseph. Sure, the holy Spirit coming down to ordain his earthly ministry likely flipped some “aha!” switches in Jesus, but I have to imagine all those ride-alongs from job site to job site in the company truck, all the family meals and discussions, the way Joseph loved Mary when he thought no one was looking all had an impact on who Jesus was as a man. Jesus grew up with an earthly model of a father who reflected the love, the grace, and the righteousness of God all because Joseph said YES.
Joseph is transformed by his encounter with the divine and it changed the course of human history forever. His faithfulness to say “yes” to what God was dreaming up transformed his life, his family’s life, and frankly, our lives. Now we have Jesus, Emmanuel “God with us” whose mission is to put God’s salvation into action… and God invites us to partner with him.
Joseph is our prime example of true righteous and obedience. He listened for the voice of God and immediately responded. He knew there was too much at stake to decline. For us, following Joseph’s example means we have to reinterpret the law or the status quo. We have to struggle with what faithful discipleship looks like because God is dreaming up new ways to call us into partnership with Godself. Being righteous means, “wrestling with the complexities of a problem, listening for the voice of God and then doing God’s thing.” (Long, 14)
And it doesn’t always look like what you thought it would. It looks like a virgin birth. It looks like a zealot changing his ways on a road to Damascus. It looks like confronting our white privilege and doing the hard work to challenging our biases. It’s listening to antiracist educators and uplifting and supporting BIPOC movements and causes. It looks like God loving someone who doesn’t look like you, talk like you, smell like you, or vote like you. It looks like putting your need for comfort away in favor of standing up for the oppressed. It’s continuing to invest your time and money into justice work even if you don’t see immediate results.
God’s dreams don’t always follow a template. God’s dreams are bigger than we expect, surprising at every turn, and always challenging our beliefs.
Following God’s call on our lives means sometimes we have to throw out the rule book that we once knew… and that includes some of our traditions, and sacred cows. It’s 2020 and God is calling us to think outside the box and imagine a world full of YESES. Imagine the possibility of a world of Christ followers that actually look like Christ- filled of mercy, compassion, and humility.
What is God dreaming for your life? Are you willing to do it? As our poet KB says in their advent poem for today, “Find what feels true and breathe into it.”
May we all have the faith and trust of Joseph, to be righteous in our willingness to participate in God’s work in the world. It won’t always be easy, but God will never leave our side.
*artwork: Advent Triptych, by John Swanson
On the Importance and Mystery of Dreams (advent poem 3)
By: KB
To dream is to conjure up a world. One
where you can be the milk in a bowl of cereal,
or the miracle that drives us to love again.
The elasticity of our dreamscape is informed
by our lives. Who we are is whatever
we can dream. In last night’s scenes, we
may have whisked our worlds -- the ones
we create and the ones created for us --
together in a way that we recognize. Or:
our minds told us that the floor is now
the ceiling, the walls now ooze blue at every
turn of our heads, and the sky is now etched
in the face of a loved one that is gone from
one reality but still alive in another. Or:
you may see nothing memorable, and every
world you create is one that exists somewhere
far away from you. In any case, dreams are where
time and space are only there if you say it is, or
fate says it is; and every thing that has the power
to stir our heart until we burst awake, live as fluidly as
we should, and as close to reality as it chooses. Quickly.
Find what feels true and breathe into it.
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