Updated: July 31, 2022
I am a devotee of Saint Joseph and yet I know very little about him. In the Bible, there are no words attributed to him. He was there at the birth of Jesus and then there was a story about him and Mary looking for Jesus when he was about 12 years old and finding Jesus in the temple. After that, there was no mention of Joseph. I don’t know how old he was and how and when he died.
So I wonder…
- How he felt when Jesus was born…did he cry?
- How did he help Mary, her pain and all other things associated with childbirth
- What was he like as a father…was there ever a time when he had to discipline Jesus?
- Did he give Jesus a sheep instead of a dog as a pet?
- How he taught Jesus his trade
And mostly, I wonder what and how he prayed. Were his prayers filled with gratitude and praise? Or did he question God why He allowed His Son to be born in a stable…did he tell God that all that was happening seem so absurd and didn’t make sense. Did he asked “God, what are you doing!?
I guess we’ll never know. And I guess what and how he prayed is not really as important as what he did — He OBEYED and TRUSTED God.
We can identify with Joseph. Like him, there are times when things don’t seem to make sense and you wonder what God is up to. But like him, let us obey and trust God. He knows what he’s doing and He knows what is best for us. He has a plan for us and although we cannot see the whole picture, we just have to trust Him because He loves us.