Section 9
Circumstances of Jesus' birth explained to Joseph
Nazareth
Matthew 1:18-25
18Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19Her husband Joseph, being righteous and not willing to shame her publicly, intended to send her away privately. 20But as he thought about these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, Son of David, do not be afraid to receive Mary as your wife, for the child that is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21She will give birth to a son, and you shall name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” 22All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken through the prophet: 23“Behold, the virgin will conceive and give birth to a son,and they will name him Immanuel”(which means, “God with us”). 24When Joseph awoke from his sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him. He took his wife, 25but knew her not until she had given birth to her firstborn son. And he named him Jesus.
Notes
Nazareth
The bustling city which seems to swarm like a beehive of activity around the Basilica of the Annunciation does not seem to fit our mental image of the insignificant village in which Jesus grew up.
One look from those hillsides of the Nazareth Ridge will erase a lifetime’s worth of impressions from sermons about the isolation of Nazareth. Here you have a panoramic view of the northeastern part of the Jezreel Valley. These hillsides witnessed the battles of Deborah and Barak against Sisera and the Canaanites from Hazor (Judges 4 5), Elijah’s raising of the widow’s son from the dead at Shunem (2 Kings 4:32-35), and Jesus’ similar raising of the widow’s son at Nain (Luke 7:11-15).
Nazareth is next to, but not directly on, the most important road through Israel. This is hardly the “out of the way” place that many people expect to see. In Jesus’ day, Nazareth was a village nestled in the “bowl” created by the higher hills surrounding it. The village could never sustain a large population, as it had only one good spring and the soil was not very fertile. The spring trickles from a limestone crypt; it would have been here that Mary drew water for her family.
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The Name “Jesus”
Nazareth
Footnotes
Matthew 1,23
Isaiah 7:14