“When Herod died, a Divine Messenger came to Joseph in Egypt in a dream saying, ‘Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel. The one who wanted to kill the child is dead'” (Matthew 2.20).
Joseph, again, dreams. This is the last one recorded and, in Matthew’s account, the last we hear of Joseph. It’s thought that he died while Jesus was still young, slipping out of the story and leaving an unknown but surely significant mark upon the boy who would grow up to become the man who would turn things upside down.
I wonder if this dream, at its outset, frightened Joseph. The Messenger’s words begin exactly as they did in the warning that sent this little family on its late night run to the south: get up, take the child and his mother. Time had passed. The three of them probably lived an anonymous life in a quiet Egyptian suburb. They told none of their neighbors about who their child was or who had come to visit him. Joseph may even have begun to let his guard down, believe that the child was safe from Herod’s reach.
But with that beginning, I imagine Joseph’s heart began to race. Oh no, he might have thought, they’ve found us. At that moment, Herod’s hand-picked hunters were already at the outskirts of their little town. They’d have to run, again. They would, again, have to leave everything—the business Joseph had just begun to turn a profit on, the friends they’d made, this little place they’d come to call home. Where would they go now? Would they be running forever?
The next word was different, though. Before, the Messenger had told him to flee, to escape. This time the Messenger said to go, to take a trip. The urgency was gone. No one was after them this time. Herod, at least the Herod who had been willing to kill a child, was dead.
This message must have let Joseph and Mary breathe a sigh of relief, one they may not have realized they’d been holding. The danger had passed.
But with it, I imagine, came sadness. They were leaving. They would have time to tie up their affairs, perhaps find someone to buy Joseph’s business and sell the house for a decent price, but they would have to leave, start over. And even though they were going to their own country, they’d be strangers again.
Disasters and heartache are not the only things to propel us into the new and unfamiliar. Sometimes, it’s good news that sends us on a new and unexpected journey—either physical, spiritual, or emotional. But we are still encountering change, having things uprooted for planting elsewhere. This is what happens in this Time Being.
But, for what it’s worth, we’re reminded that we do not go alone. Even before he began his wandering, itinerant ministry, Jesus was on the road. He knew and knows what it is to leave behind friends, familiarity.
And he goes with us, wherever the Way may take us.
Jesus our companion, be with us in all the places this life takes us.