Advent: A Family in Poverty

They were a faithful couple, doing their best to adhere to God’s word, and now especially because of the little Emmanuel they had in their arms.

Down through the centuries, artists have often portrayed Joseph, and particularly Mary, in symbolical ways, richly appointed in gold and beautifully draped fabrics, sometimes with gems, embroidery, velvet, and lace, to evoke a sense of spiritual splendor. But the truth is, both had very little money, as Luke’s Gospel reveals. Compare the Levitical law for sacrifices required in thanksgiving for a new child which what Mary and Joseph actually brought to the temple.

Purification of Women After Childbirth

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the Israelites, saying:

“If a woman conceives and bears a male child, she shall be unclean seven days; as at the time of her menstruation, she shall be unclean.

“When the days of her purification are completed, whether for a son or for a daughter, she shall bring to the priest at the entrance of the tent of meeting a lamb in its first year for a burnt offering and a pigeon or a turtledove for a purification offering. He shall offer it before the Lord and make atonement on her behalf; then she shall be clean from her flow of blood. This is the law for her who bears a child, male or female. If she cannot afford a sheep, she shall take two turtledoves or two pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a purification offering, and the priest shall make atonement on her behalf, and she shall be clean.”

Leviticus 12:1-2, 6-8 (NRSVUE, emphases added)

Mary’s Purification Sacrifice

When the time came for their purification according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord  (as it is written in the law of the Lord, “Every firstborn male shall be designated as holy to the Lord”),  and they offered a sacrifice according to what is stated in the law of the Lord, “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.”

Luke 2:22-24 (NRSVUE, emphases added)

The Shame of Poverty

In first-century Judaism, God’s blessing and favor was seen in wealth, health, and community standing. By all appearances, then, Joseph and Mary did not enjoy God’s good graces. An unexpected pregnancy, a hurried marriage under the cloud of shame, a forced relocation from their families in Galilee to Joseph’s ancestral home in Judea, the fear of conscription into the army, and the heavy burden of greater taxes on their already meager resources left Joseph and Mary near the bottom of their social strata.

The Stigma of Poverty

Wealth brings many friends,
    but the poor are left friendless …

Many seek the favor of the generous,
    and everyone is a friend to a giver of gifts.
If the poor are hated even by their kin,
    how much more are they shunned by their friends!
When they call after them, they are not there.

Proverbs 19:4, 6-7 (NRSVUE)

From Mari:

“Joseph and Mary’s financial status was only obliquely referred to in the Gospels. Joseph, being a stonemason and woodworker, was a tradesman, someone with a marketable skill. However, he had also just uprooted his family to come to overcrowded Bethlehem for the census. An offering of two birds was reserved for people who were unable to afford the greater cost of a yearling lamb – and as we already know, Joseph and Mary were not the kind of people to try and cheat the Law. What is more, this event would be publicly held at the Temple.

“Joseph and Mary’s poverty was exposed for everyone to see.”

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Mediations for Advent

So, I have prepared an Advent Devotional that will take the reader through each of the four weeks of Advent, beginning the Sunday after Thanksgiving, with a special reading for Christmas day. I wrote it this way so this devotional could be read in any given year

The first part of this devotional pairs Hannah’s Prayer with Zechariah’s Prophecy, and the names of the Son of God that come out of their prayers.

Hannah’s Prayer

Hannah was the mother of the prophet Samuel, who was the last of the Hebrew Judges and the first prophet to anoint a king of Israel. It was Samuel who anointed King David, recognizing in the young shepherd boy that God does not judge by what the world sees, or by the world’s standards, but rather God looks in the heart. The heart and soul are what matter to God for eternity.

Zechariah’s Prophecy

Zechariah was the father of John the Baptist, who was the last of the Hebrew Prophets, and the Hebrew prophet who heralded and baptized Messiah Jesus, the King of all kings and Lord of all lords. John the Baptist was able to identify the Messiah in the unassuming carpenter and stonemason by God’s direct revelation in the form of a dove resting above Jesus’s head. Israel was looking for a royal king but God intended to save the world for eternity.

The second part of this devotional pairs Mary’s Magnificat with Jesus’s Beatitudes, and the names of God the Son which arise.

Mary’s Magnificat

Mary was the birth mother of Jesus, the first to experience the extraordinary reality of God’s very life growing within her. As any mother might do, Mary surely sang lullabies to her baby, and taught Him the scriptures and stories of His people as He grew. It was Mary who heard her Son’s first word, and rejoiced over His first step. It is no wonder she “pondered these things in her heart.”

Jesus’s Beatitudes

As His ministry grew, Jesus’s teaching became famous, and His Beatitudes continue to engage us thousands of years later with the wonder of the Lord’s wisdom.
As you and I meditate on these words, let us think about the names all heaven and earth gave to this tiny, vulnerable baby Who is God the Son. From eternity into our world and then returned to the glory from whence He came, Jesus now opens the way for you and me to be with him in glory forever.

Lamp photographs from the Getty Museum (Menorah lamp) and the Metropolitan Museum (Chi-rho lamp), public domain.

[Image: Turtle Dove Streptopelia turtur, Hayarkon Park, Tel Aviv, Israel | By alon rozgovits Pikiwiki Israel, CC BY 2.5,