There is no substitute for the preaching and teaching of God's Word.

Each weekday on enjoying the journey, Scott Pauley leads us in a brief study of Scripture.

Today, on the weekend pulpit, we are happy to share a full-length Bible message given through

Scott's pulpit ministry.

These messages were recorded live in a local church or gospel event in recent days.

It is our prayer that the message will be a help to you today. Let's begin with a classic passage, Matthew chapter number one, first page of your New Testament.

This, of course, is Matthew's inspired story of the birth of our Savior.

And I love the fact that in all of these passages, Mary is not the

emphasis. Christ is the emphasis. And as it should be, that in all things, he might have the

preeminence. But in the story, there are certain supporting characters, we might say, in the

divine drama. Only Jesus is the star, but there are people

that the Lord uses, and I want to show you one of those tonight. Look at Matthew 1, beginning in

verse 18. The Bible says, now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise. When as his mother, Mary,

was espoused to Joseph before they came together, she was found

with child of the Holy Ghost. And Joseph, her husband, everybody take your pen and mark that in your

Bible. Notice it's not Joseph, Jesus' father. He had no earthly father. He had an earthly mother, but he had only a

heavenly father. He is the God man. He's not 50-50. He's 100, 100. But it's very important that

you see that the Holy Spirit identifies Joseph here as Mary's husband. Being a just man and not willing to make her a public example was minded to put her

away privately. I've often thought what it's going to be like when we get to heaven and we meet

certain Bible characters. People that we read, but we don't really know. I think Joseph is one of them. Mary, this time of year,

gets a lot of attention for her role. How many of you fathers know that moms always do the

hard job, yes? And I was in the room and all three of our children discovered America and

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