Choosing Mercy Over Judgment

What if deliverance starts with a baby, a whisper, and a man who chooses mercy over judgment? We step into Advent with a different clock—one that forms us in the slow, sacred work of waiting—guided by the quiet strength of Joseph and the costly yes of Mary. This conversation traces how Matthew’s “genesis” of the Messiah reimagines righteousness as protection of the vulnerable, not performance, and reveals why gentleness can be the bravest response when fear and shame demand a spectacle.

We look closely at Joseph’s decision to shield Mary before any angel explains the mystery, and we learn how mercy can rewrite a story mid-sentence. From there, we talk about dreams, openness, and the holy capacity to change our minds. Naming and adoption emerge as powerful practices: claiming people as ours, speaking belonging over them, and recognizing that words create worlds. In a Jewish frame, sin is both personal and systemic; Emmanuel speaks to empires and inner lives alike, promising presence where power harms and hope feels thin.

The winter solstice becomes an embodied parable of Advent hope: on the darkest day, creation keeps singing. We make space for calm, listening to birdsong as our bodies remember safety. Then we move to action. Lighting the love candle is not a show to watch; it’s a commissioning to become the steady light someone else needs. Whether you’re learning to play a supporting role, adopting those who need a protector, or practicing one small act of inconvenient kindness, this is how deliverance takes flesh—through people who love on purpose.

If this speaks to you, share it with a friend, hit follow, and leave a review so others can find the message. Want to help us keep these conversations going? Visit firstlovchurch.org to support, and tell us: where will you choose mercy today?

Chapters

• 0:00 Advent, Waiting, And God’s Timing
• 2:15 Mary’s Yes And Costly Faithfulness
• 4:10 Choosing The Supporting Role
• 6:20 Matthew’s “Genesis” And A New Beginning
• 8:20 Joseph’s Mercy Over Judgment
• 11:30 Dreams, Openness, And Changing Our Minds
• 14:20 Sin, Systems, And Emmanuel
• 16:20 Adoption, Naming, And Belonging
• 18:40 Obedience Without Words
• 21:00 Mercy, Solstice, And Hope’s Return
• 23:10 Be The Light: Love In Action
• 25:40 Prayer, Birdsongs, And Calm

Transcript

SPEAKER_01: 0:00

Welcome to the First Love Church podcast. This is a collection of Sunday teachings inspired by the revised Common Lectionary and recorded weekly in Ocala, Florida. Would everyone like to welcome my mom and dad as they share the word of God today? Blessed third, I'm sorry, fourth Sunday of Advent. We have the fourth Sunday here. This love Sunday, and it's our joy. It's our joy to be able to share this part of the story with you. One of the things that Advent reminds us of is that a large part of our life is waiting. I know it's not what you wanted to hear. We want a miracle, we want it now, we want everything fixed now. And the people of the earth, of the world, have been calling out and had been saying, come to us, deliver us, save us. And God sent a baby. What an inefficient way to deliver anyone. A baby. So we look at this and the story tells us something. Not just that it's a baby, but that waiting is absolutely essential in all of our lives for the formation of what God is doing.

SPEAKER_00: 1:20

Yeah, and in the example of uh that you wait for that baby to grow up, for us to have Messiah, um, you know, it just doesn't really compute in most of our minds that uh God has a different time frame than we do. We want it now. And I think that's most of our struggle is that we we ask God, I can't figure out why He didn't fix everything. Why isn't it done right now? Uh and there really needs to be for us an awareness of that uh time frame that's different than maybe what we would think. You know, we have this finite life. We live on a planet that's been existing for quite a while now. And uh so for us we we want things to happen, but in the scheme of things, there's a there's a pattern to that. And I I think if you and I can learn to get in that flow with with God and trust that that in in the right season, in the right time, the things are gonna come to pass, and we can just live in a place of peace and trust. Amen.

SPEAKER_01: 2:13

Amen. The past few weeks we have been um paying attention to John the Baptist. In this particular part of the liturgical season, we look at the story of Joseph, and we only pay attention, not we should pay attention to Joseph all the time. Big, big person in the story, and very often it is the one that we miss the most. And this particular Sunday brings us to the story of Joseph. And I remind you that the story of Joseph cannot really be understood without the story of Mary. And so we hold Mary's words, this magnificat that we read together, that God has chosen me to do this work. And it really feels like if you would read the story, that God really came and messed up her life quite a bit. Like the angel says that God is going to come and God is going to use you. Are you in? And she says yes, and then things get difficult. And sometimes that feels very much the same way for us. We say yes to love's plan, and then things get really difficult.

SPEAKER_00: 3:15

And I'd like for us to pay attention to this because uh I I think oftentimes we we uh cast ourselves in the starting role of everything.

SPEAKER_01: 3:24

And uh say more about that.

SPEAKER_00: 3:26

Uh well, for most of my life I felt like uh, you know, I got this job as a uh as a pastor and I got this thing to do, and God's brought me this woman to help me. And uh and and how wrong I am with this mentality because I I realized that I have uh uh burdened her uh with the responsibility of of crossing all my T's and dotting all my I's while I gallivant around and do uh the things that I want to do and never really fully understanding that my role might be in uh in uh propping up this amazing woman to shine. Who would have thought that that would be my role? I want the starting role in this thing. But what if all of our roles are that? Right, but what if everyone is that? What if we could step out of that limelight or that place of wanting to find and and finding out where is the place that you can be just content and how beautiful that you are raising a family? That you're quietly in the back just making sure the clothes are clean and that and that uh the that we're getting to the appointments. What if we what if we could find what find the fact that that there's such glory and joy and contentment in that place? And so as I find that I can be not the star of the thing, but be the executive producer, or what if I could be the one who really uh builds the set for the show? What if I can do and and find such joy and satisfaction in escaping the struggle and finding the place of rest and finding the place of real energy. Amen. Does that make sense on anybody else's level, or you just stretch your hands and out towards me going, thank you, he finally got it. Maybe this is for all of us.

SPEAKER_01: 5:21

The invitation of Advent is this that every one of us would birth the holy, that every one of us would be able to see the sacred in the ordinary, and that we would practice living our lives and seeing the holy in everyone, in seeing the holy in everything, the invitation to see the work that is among us, in even the work that seems invisible, to notice it, to support it, to celebrate it. We read in verse 18 of Matthew's Gospel, and I want to remind you that Matthew is written to the Jewish believers, to Jewish people. And so, if you were going to say, What is the Jewish, the most Jewish of all the books that in the Gospels, Matthew is the one. It's written to people who already have the groundwork, who already know the story. And so in the original language, it doesn't say this is the birth of Jesus. It begins to say, now this is the genesis of the Messiah. And he's reminding us this is the new world that God is creating, this is the new way that is being worn. They knew a way, they heard a story, and now God is actually giving them eyes to be able to see the story differently. Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit, and her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly.

SPEAKER_00: 6:54

Well, this is a powerful uh passage because I think that we can read this with uh hindsight. You know, we understand the story. Oh, how awesome Joseph's uh uh wife is giving birth to the Messiah. But no, this is uh a guy who's engaged to be married to a woman and she turns up pregnant, and he was not involved. And there's a couple of ways that could go down. Uh and I uh can tell you that a lot of people want to get in that seat of self-righteousness and and really expose somebody else from their sins and their errors and their mistakes, but he makes a choice here to do something very gentle and very loving. And uh, you know, we we do uh you know bring attention and praise towards uh the mother of Christ and the example that she set. But this is a tremendous example of how one could behave in a situation. I mean, you you don't have all of the facts, but with the information you have, we're so quick to you know let the iron fist come down or or the hammer of justice. And what if we were able to take uh an example from this? That what if in every situation you and I could find the way to be gentle, to cover uh what appears to be a sin, to what uh appears to be a betrayal. What if we could still find in our hearts a way to behave in a right manner?

SPEAKER_01: 8:40

There's so much in this particular text that I think draws us to this beautiful invitation that Joseph shows us that righteousness is being shaped by mercy. Now we know the story. We know angels are gonna come and they're gonna tell him, you know, there's a different way of seeing things, but right now he doesn't have any of that invitation, any information, and he's still merciful. This is whom God chose to father Jesus, a man who was full of mercy. I remind you of the prophet Micah who said, God has showed you, oh man, what is good and what does the Lord require of you. You know this verse. But that you would do justly, that you would be a person of justice, and that you would love mercy, and that you would walk humbly with your God. This is what manhood looks like. This is what it looks like for us to be people recognizing our full humanity is to be people who do justly, people who walk humbly, but also people who love mercy. I remind you of another of the sacred text, and it says, mercy triumphs over judgment. When we want to judge, there is mercy that triumphs over that. And we see this in the story of Joseph, who that the writer tells us this is the genesis, this is the new beginning. I want to tell you the genesis of God. And I want to remind you that he says this is the story of Joseph. And to the people and to the culture that they were writing from, they would have said, Oh, we know the story of Joseph. Joseph was sent to deliver us. You know the line that he's probably most famous for in our culture, which is what the enemy or what the people meant for evil, God turned it around and made it for your good. Joseph was the person who had brought them, reminded them that in this place of famine and in this place of lack and horror, and in this family where there is such a trauma, I love that the story actually gets told by a mess. Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery. Joseph could have had a vendetta. Joseph could have said, been like, that was your choice, bros. Now you're suffering and you shouldn't have done that. But instead he said, I can see now. Joseph became known as the interpreter of dreams. So again, listen to who Jesus is coming in this story and being retold, the story of Joseph that these people loved. And now here's the story of Joseph. And Matthew Writer is saying, There's another way to hear the story. There's a rewrite that is being issued. And it's so essential here where we see he was unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, and he planned to dismiss her quietly. But just when he had resolved to do this, I'm also always questioning things like that. Couldn't the information have come yesterday when we didn't have to make this decision without it? But when the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph, son of David, it's important that we recognize this is not just a title. He reminds him whose son he's of. This is your lineage, this is who you're from, these are who your people are. Son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary to be your wife. For the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. We have talked about in the past few weeks what the scriptures tell us that we should not be people who judge because we cannot. Not just because it's not a good idea, we can't because we don't know all of the details. You could have been a neighbor and said, Well, we know what the law says about this, and we have permission from the law to be cruel, we have permission from the law to be angry, we have permission from the law to end this life, and still the invitation is choose mercy, choose mercy. And Joseph, who was a dreamer in the original story, and Joseph, who is a dreamer here in this new story, don't be afraid to do the merciful thing.

SPEAKER_00: 13:19

One of the things that I think is to I don't know, just for the past couple years, it's just been so exciting to me that one of the greatest things about being a human being is the ability to change our minds. I just I love that that we're not just programmed and you know, the dog's gonna be the dog. You know, it's gonna bark, it's gonna scratch. What if uh you could really see in this story the beauty of somebody believing one thing, having made a decision, but allowing uh that new information to come in and change them. I I love that because if you are open, and unfortunately some of you aren't. You're set in your ways, you're stubborn, and you're just gonna do things that way. And uh I I'll tell you a kind of a funny little thing, but I think it's very relatable to most people, is I've always kind of had this doctrine that Heather and I were in a partnership, 50-50, so I don't see any problem with when I go in. I had it in the past, let's just say, before you stone me, women.

SPEAKER_01: 14:30

We're not gonna stone anyone here. We're following the example. We're gonna be so merciful.

SPEAKER_00: 14:35

Saw a problem with the 50-50 relationship with the toilet seat. When I go in, I have to lift it. When you go in, you have to put it down. Sounds like a real fair trade in my mind. And I would argue this point to uh till I'm blue in the face. And and it's and to me, it's so amazing that just at one point something can switch in my mind, and I can see a simple act that nobody else will ever notice besides Heather. It's an opportunity for me to show love, to show respect, to show consideration. That something that I would have died with the belief that this is fair and this is how it ought to be, to throw fair out of the window for something that's greater than fair. And it's being someone's uh servant, being someone's, you know, just in such a tiny, in such a ridiculous way, that's why I bring it up. It says it's such a tiny little thing, but it to me it represents that something that in your mind that you're convinced can be changed if you will crack that window or open the door slightly to the Holy Spirit. And so I think that it's important that we see that the man that God chose to be uh the father uh of Jesus was someone that that would have that level of compassion and consideration and kindness, and also be the kind of person that can be open to see some things differently, because there are some of you under the sound of my voice, you need to see some things differently. You need to allow the Spirit of God to open up your stubborn belief system. How do I know this? Well, you're looking at one. A work in progress, amen.

SPEAKER_01: 16:39

Amen. I also remind us that some of the hardest thoughts that we think and the ways that we express judgment in the most cruel ways are often at ourselves. And this is an invitation of the Spirit to learn how to allow God to tell a better story. Here's the invitation for all of us. Here is a better story. In the original scriptures, uh, Joseph, in the very beginning of the story, um, not Joseph, the mother uh the father of Jesus, but Joseph who saves the people from a terrible famine. And this invitation that we would hear this idea of dreaming, and what is really a dream, and there are many things that make up dreams, but that we have a different consciousness, that we can think of something outside of this particular way of learning or saying. In fact, the very first thing that God asks Adam and Eve in the story in the beginning was, who told you that? And that needs to be a question that we ask ourselves over and over. Who told me that I had to behave like this? Who told me that I had to think like that? Who told me that I was programmed or I was only allowed to do these things and allow the Spirit of God to challenge the way that we think? Sometimes you can only think what you think because you only know what you know. And there are times when you need to have a good friend to challenge the way that you think. You need a church community to remind you there is still hope, there is still beauty, there is still love in the world. And sometimes you need a good therapist to help you figure out patterns of thinking that are limiting you from being all that God intends for you to be. But this is what the angel says to him, she will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. I remind you too that in this Jewish tradition that the story is being told to, and the people who have this particular set of beliefs, they understand that sin is not just personal, but sin has to do with empire and culture, and sin has to do with systems of oppression. And all this took place to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet. And again, if you were in the original hearer, you would have heard the prophet Isaiah. We've been studying those texts, and Isaiah keeps challenging what people think they know about God, what they think they know about vengeance, what they think they know about their liberation. Isaiah keeps coming up and challenging. And here the prophet Isaiah says, Look, a virgin shall conceive and bear his son, and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means God is with us. We pause here for a moment to thank you for joining us today. If you're finding this episode meaningful, would you take a moment to share it with a friend? This podcast is made possible thanks to the generosity of people just like you. If you would like to support the ongoing work of First Love Church. And the continued work of our podcast, visit us online at firstlovchurch.org, reminding you to like, follow, and subscribe.

SPEAKER_00: 20:09

And I think an important uh thing too when we're looking at the life of Joseph is you know, he's instructed to name Jesus, which means he's claiming Jesus as his son. He is uh demonstrating adoption here, you know, and that heart, you know, to me, it's just amazing. It's having that we're preparing and talking about this message this week. These are things that I don't know about about you, but I just read past all that. Just, you know, he's Jesus' you know stepfather, and so it's whatever. But how important that that we recognize that that gentleness of of protection and that that willingness to change his mind and that uh ultimate place of going. I will raise this child as my own, I will adopt him, you know, that with that willingness to love in that generous way and sacrifices the example that he uh set for Jesus and for us. Amen. I thought it was cool. Everybody's staring at me weird.

SPEAKER_01: 21:20

They're thinking about it. They're they're pondering. We've had a week to ponder. They're pondering and and and there's a lot of power in what you asked us to think about, in the power of naming. It is, in fact, what God gave us as human beings, the ability to do even in the garden. God said, now explore and name the things. And we have power in what we name things. Do we name it blessed or do we name it cursed? Do we name it holy or do we name it profane? Do we name it one of us or do we name it another? And so the invitation is to learn, like the way that Joseph shows us, to practice naming ours, all as ours, every one of us as God's children. And this is the part I think that is a profound path for all of us. When Joseph woke from his sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him. There's the difference between many of us. We've heard it and we think it's a great idea, but we do as we please. And Joseph actually did as the angel commanded him, and he took her as a wife and had no marital relationships with her until she had borne a son, and he named him Jesus. He claimed him for his own. He said, This is my son. The people around would have said, We don't think so. And they probably would have given the side, I'm assuming, I don't know. And Joseph said, No. I name him as mine. All the goodness that comes from my family will be given to him. And we see throughout Jesus' life. Jesus, when we come back and are able to hear the witness of other portions, is already in his 30s. His father has died, but people still call him son of David. They still name that adoption. They still say, This is who you are, this is who you are shaped by. This man who heard a dream and said, Yes, I will do it. We're also very glad that this man, Joseph, who became an immigrant, who had to flee his own homeland because of an oppressive empire that meant to destroy him. And he takes his wife and baby and he goes into Egypt because of another dream. And we see Joseph as a man who not only sees righteousness that is shaped by mercy, but a man who does as he feels, as he understands the word of the Lord to come to him, at great risks for himself, at great in uncomfortable things for himself, leaving his home to be able to protect Mary and the baby. He goes to Egypt and he begins this path that God chose that invited him into if you want to be the greatest in the kingdom, then you become the servant of all. And we listen to the words of Joseph that are actually none. How can someone say a lot of things and yet say nothing? He doesn't have speaking lines. And yet his words to us are his actions. Beloved, the things that you do speak to people. How you behave speaks to people, how you live your life speaks to people. We're often really confident that we have to do a lot of talking. And beloved, no. Less talking, more loving. Less talking, more doing righteously, less talking, more living humbly and doing justly, less talking and more loving.

SPEAKER_00: 25:19

You know, we're lighting the love candle today, and and uh this adoption is such a demonstration of love. Um it's not about signing the adoption papers, it's about taking the child as your own, providing protection, uh moving to a foreign place, making sure that things are are are cared for. You know, that's that demonstration of love. And so for for you and I, uh years ago, it was a long time ago too, I went on this uh bike ride with a bunch of other bikers, and they said, Let's get all the young people in the middle to pray for them. And so I got in the middle, and then they threw me out. They go, You got gray hair, you're not the young people. I oh I I thought I was. Thanks. Um, but it was like it was like at that moment, you know, I I I just had this revelation, you know, I can either think of myself as a young person or I can be one of the older guys that are looking out for the younger people. You know, I was wanting that prayer, I was wanting that that younger guy blessing, the one the younger guys get to do the stuff. And it's like, no, there at some point, when are you going to just take that role? And and so when I came back to the church, I I looked towards people differently. How can I adopt somebody? I'm not signing any papers, but if I can love them and care for them and help them, I'm gonna do that. And so there are people that uh obviously bear our last name that we love and care for, but there are people that though they have different names, I consider them the family. And I wonder if you could begin to see yourself in just a different role instead of the one who's just needing to get by, needing the strength and grace from God just to make it keep your head above water, to the one that could go around distributing love and support and kindness and assurance and protection. Isn't that amazing to think that it wouldn't be just a life of, I'm Jimmy, what can you give me? Because some people live their entire Christian life just scratching for what they can get, never realizing that the transformation comes, that you can become the person who is the light. Not just constantly in darkness hoping for a flash of revelation, but that you can be that person that is like Joseph. And maybe that's a supporting role and we want to be the star. What if we have to shift a little bit in our understanding? And you're fighting me now real hard, but remember we talked in the beginning. Wouldn't it be good if we could be the kind of people that were open to some change? Amen. And how beautiful just to be that place of loving and serving. Do you see it? Can you see it?

SPEAKER_01: 28:17

God's great act of deliverance for people begins not with force, but with compassion, with mercy, not with certainty, but with a practice of trust. God's great act of deliverance ends not with a sword, but with a cruciform to shape love, with not threats of death, but recognizing that death is defeated in love. What used to be the final word no longer is the final word. And this understanding that mercy allows us, that we are to be people shaped by mercy. Certainly Jesus was. We see Jesus practicing mercy over and over again. And everything we see Jesus doing, we know God does. Jesus told us that I don't do anything unless I see the Father doing it first. Mercy is who God is. God of mercy, God of all mercies. In fact, God tells us God's own name. And this understanding that his mercy, God's mercies, are new every morning. In the book of Lamentations, in an entire book of grief, there's a passage. There's a little bit of light in the darkness. Today is the winter solstice, the 21st. It's a really important day, has been since humanity had awareness. Because it is the day in the solar year where it is the darkest night. If you were to be an ancient person and you didn't have clocks and calendars, but you took awareness of the stars and of nature that told us the seasons that we were in, and you would watch for the past month the sun getting smaller and smaller, further and further away. And on the 21st, it is the farthest away that it can be. And that could induce panic in us, anxiety. When will the light ever come? And then it stays there for three days, in this very dark place, in this very deep place. And then on the 25th, it has a different place in the sky. It comes back. And then we begin to see this cycle again all the way until June when we have the summer solstice. But this day, intentionally, when it will be the darkest, do not lose hope, beloved. The light is coming. And it may be a slow work till you get to the full light again, but it is coming. And so this practice of mercy reminds us this is how we stay in hope. This is how we witness love. This is what the good news is that no matter how dark the darkness, light is coming. The light will return, and it will bring us not just illumination, but it will bring us peace.

SPEAKER_00: 31:16

Now, how does that light return? Because uh you know, we we light the love candle today, and then many of us sit back and want to watch a show. What's God gonna do? And I ask you, what's God gonna do through you? You know, when I think the love candle's lit and it's reminding me of the light that's on the inside of you and I. And so what is gonna happen, uh, it remains to be seen. That is exciting, it's scary because it depends on you. How you respond to it. You know, will you accept that invitation, will you make the decision to serve when you want to be served, will you make the decision to love and prefer somebody else, or will you demand your own way? What could happen for our world if we decided to love? If we decided to surrender to God in this way. And and for those of you that are waiting for God to do something, I would uh ask you to consider that God is perhaps waiting on you to do something. Amen? And that transformation is painful, but it's beautiful. It's difficult, but it is so worth it that you and I would move from the place of selfishness to selflessness. That we would recognize that that that uh light has been lit, that love is uh there on the inside of us, and we can choose that path, and we don't have to choose the path of darkness. We don't have to stay in darkness, and we don't have to have that kind of life and and energy in our families and in our relationships and at our workplace because we are that spark, you are that transformation that you've been waiting for, and it's Christ in us, the hope of glory, amen. I don't think they're that excited, oh there's a couple.

SPEAKER_01: 33:24

They're pondering.

SPEAKER_00: 33:25

Oh, well, that's good.

SPEAKER_01: 33:27

Yes, treasured it in her heart. I want to pray over us. You don't have to close your eyes, sometimes it's helpful. But I would ask that as we sit in silence for a minute, we are gonna be quiet in here. But the birds are really loud and beautiful outside. So I'm gonna ask that we would all pay attention and listen for a moment to what the birds are saying to us. God of mercy and of new beginnings. You come to us not with accusation, but with compassion wrapped in the flesh. Teach us that righteousness protects the vulnerable. And give us courage to choose mercy when fear is loud. Form us into people who embody your deliverance, who carry your presence into wounded places. As you entrusted your son to human care, entrust the healing work of this world to us. Make us signs of hope and mercy in a world that is desperate for us. Until all of creation knows and testifies that you are God with us. Amen. Science tells us that listening to the bird songs actually decreases cortisol in our body. It actually causes us to release anxiety because we do understand at a very basic level that when the birds are singing, there is no eminent threat. There is no bear that is chasing you when the birds are singing. And sometimes we need to remind our bodies that we are not an eminent threat, that we are not in danger, that there is Emmanuel God with us. We are not alone, that we are protected, that we are invited into love. We hope you've enjoyed this week's sermon. If you would like more information about us, visit us online at firstlovechurch.org.