Bad for Business

Inside story

Do you belong here?

And where’s the donkey?

The Dry Land Swimming School

At Ease

Seeds

Soft Soap

The picnic

And where did you say...?

Goliath

Joseph looks back

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A meditation suitable for Christmas

It'd been a hard road,

But now his journey was nigh done -

He'd not see another Passover.

Proudly he watched his eldest son

Ply his adze and shape the timber -

That skill he had taught him,

Though in this, as in all other gifts,

He far outstripped his parent.

"A fine carpenter, and a fine son,"

Could he have wished for more?

Wryly he remembered his first response

When Mary announced her news:

"Joseph, God is giving me a baby son,

And we will call him, Jesus."

He'd dropped his mallet and stood agape;

Disbelief, anger and shame robbed him of speech,

But the bitter thought surged through his head:

"No son of mine, and we will call him nothing."

He'd walked away in silence:

"How could God do this to me?"

He could hear the gossip,

The whispers at the well,

The practised disgust of the self-righteous,

And the unbearable pity of the generous.

He could not face it.

He would provide for her and send her away.

Then came the dream

"Joseph, Joseph," (he was called by name!)

That within Mary is holy.

I have chosen you to be his father.

Fear not to marry her."

So it was true.

He would act as father to the Messiah!

The hard road to Bethlehem,

The cave and the manger -

Hardly a decent start for any baby,

Let alone the First-Born.

And yet the shepherds with the glow

Of angels still on their faces

Proved it was the perfect birth.

Now at journey's end in Nazareth,

Joseph watched his borrowed son

Hefting the timber,

Stretching his arms along the crossbeam,

And heard, a soft whisper echoing his own:

"A fine carpenter, a fine son,

Could I have wished for more?"