Sermon – December 23, 2007 Rev Deborah Roof

“Refuse the evil and choose the good”

It was a few days before Christmas. A woman woke up one morning and told her husband, "I just dreamed that you gave me a pearl necklace for Christmas. What do you think this dream means?" "Oh," her husband replied, "you'll know the day after tomorrow."

The next morning, she turned to her husband again and said the same thing, "I just dreamed that you gave me a pearl necklace for Christmas. What do you think this dream means?" And her husband said, "You'll know tomorrow."

On the third morning, the woman woke up and smiled at her husband, "I just dreamed again that you gave me a pearl necklace for Christmas. What do you think this dream means?" And he smiled back, "You'll know tonight."

That evening, the man came home with a small package and presented it to his wife. She was delighted. She opened it gently. And when she did, she found - a book! And the book's title was "The Meaning of Dreams."

If we did a word association and I said “dream” what would you say? Would you say “nightmare”? Or would you say “Martin Luther King”? And if I asked you about dreams in the Bible, what would you say then? In the Hebrew Scriptures God spoke to Jacob in a dream. Jacob's son Joseph had many dreams – this is what caused his brothers to hate him enough to sell him to foreign traders. Of course, we know that he became the most influential man in all of Egypt because of his gift of dream interpretation. And Daniel had dreams and the gift of interpretation of dreams. In the new Testament dreams were the way the God communicated with Joseph, the human father of the baby Jesus. First, we hear the angel of the LORD telling Joseph in a dream: ‘Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.’ After the baby is born, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. "Get up, take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him." And then a third time, scripture says: After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, "Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child's life are dead." And then there's a fourth time but we don't hear exactly what the angel of the LORD said, scripture simply says: “Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth.”

Isn't it fascinating that nearly every scripture recorded about Joseph, has him receiving these 1^st century text messages from God? In the days of the Hebrew scriptures it was believed that a human couldn't survive a conversation with God. After all Moses just heard God's voice and all his hair turned white and he glowed as if he were radio-active. So how else would God communicate if not through dreams? What's interesting about Joseph's relationship with God is the directness of their communications. Remember the story of the other Joseph – the coat of many colors Joseph? His dreams were all these metaphors: “He and his brothers were binding sheaves of grain out in the field when suddenly his sheaf rose and stood upright, while his brother's sheaves gathered around his and bowed down to it." or “the sun and moon and eleven stars were bowing down to him".

With Joseph, husband of Mary, there aren't any metaphors; there are no codes; there is no mystery: do this – ok; go here – ok; return home – ok. Isn't he lucky? The one sentence describing Joseph in our scripture lesson today is simple: “Joseph, being a righteous man.” As a person who constantly seeks God's wisdom and direction, I find the clarity of their communication refreshing!

We've been studying God's Call these past few months. We've looked at different Call stories and Call situations – we looked at the great Call of the Prophet Isaiah – he had a vision, which some call a waking dream; Saul and Ananias, one heard a voice the other had a vision; and we looked at Mary. Mary also had a vision: hers was similar to Joseph's dream. Isn't it interesting that the Jesus' birth narrative doesn't appear in Mark or John? In the Gospel of Luke the angel Gabriel appears to Jesus' mother and in the Gospel of Matthew the angel of the LORD appears to Jesus' human father in a dream. In both cases, these angels greet their human charge with “Don't be afraid.”

What can we hear today? Perhaps some of you hear God's voice in dreams while you're asleep and for some perhaps you hear God's voice in a vision or waking dream. If you're like me God's voice has become an intuition or a sense of obligation: something that has to be done, for God's sake. Can we hear God urging us to refuse the evil and choose the good? No matter what venue God chooses to use to call you, may you remember the most important words that accompany message itself: Don't be afraid.

Don't be afraid, Joseph, as people whisper and talk behind your back, but you can refuse the evil and choose the good.

Don't be afraid, Mary, you will never experience that wedding you dreamed of, but you can refuse the evil and choose the good.

Don't be afraid, my child, life is temporary and my love is eternal and with my help you can refuse the evil and choose the good.

Don't be afraid, my beloved, what other people think is not your reality.

Don't be afraid, you can refuse the evil and choose the good because Immanuel, God is with us.