By Sanya Onayoade
If Joseph exercised his manly pride and conjugal rights when he learnt of Mary’s pregnancy, he would have displayed an uncommon anger. “What nonsense,” “you think you can deceive me?” If Joseph were from Africa or specifically Nigeria where traditional patrimony is strong and unimpeachable,
Joseph would have initiated a community trial and obvious refund of the bride price. Imagine the jeers, the boos and the public shame of a freshly betrothed bride claiming a ‘ghost’ copulation. “Bring the man who did this ignominious thing to you,” the village head would have thundered.
Would you blame Joseph if he said NO? You met a woman you desired to spend the rest of your life with. A virgin, who is a rare breed in today’s world; you spent money, efforts and energy to formalise the union and looked forward to the first cuddly night, a passion desired by all men. And somebody, or rather a ghost, appeared to tell you that the night you looked forward to would never happen because the woman you called the bone of your bone had been intimately consumed elsewhere.
Even as the extraterrestrial being named Angel Gabriel appeared to Joseph in a dream, he could have cast and bound any message incongruent to his matrimonial aspiration. How do you explain it to family and friends that a prized virgin would be your wife, but mother of a child not fathered by you?
Even if Joseph said yes, and word got out that the pregnancy was not his, I try to peek into the the gist mill in Joseph’s carpentry shop: “Have you heard? Oga is a fool, Me, I cannot take that rubbish. “ “Let’s wait and see who the child would resemble in the neighbourhood when he grows up.”
While fathers are more subtle on issues of controversial pregnacies, Joseph’s mother would have hit the roof with queries and hysteria: “Joe, my generations have never brought this kind of shame to us.” Some in the neighbourhood would attend the naming, not to felicitate with the couple, but to satisfy their curiosity of a child fathered by ghost!
If Jesus were born in such manner today, how do you determine his DNA? What if Joseph were to be today’s guy?
And if Joseph had said no, there wouldn’t have been this Season of Light, Hope and Love. And the people cashing in with their merchandise and business on the Lord’s birthday would have looked elsewhere to make money.
But in the script authored by God Himself, all the processes were settled, even foretold, before the birth of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world.
This post, inspired by the Drama Group of RCCG Restoration Parish, highlights the implications of a Joseph rejecting the pregnancy, and the consequence of a ruinous world.
Christmas projects the power of one man’s obedience, a man who chose love over reputation. It speaks of the relevance of human obedience as a vessel for divine purpose. What if humanity, since the creation of Adam, had been hearkening to the instructions of God?
The Gospel of Matthew tells us that Joseph was engaged to Mary when he discovered she was pregnant “before they came together” (Matthew 1:18). In the cultural context of first-century Jewish society, this discovery was devastating. Engagement was legally binding, and pregnancy outside marriage carried severe social consequences. A man in Joseph’s position had legal and moral options—and none required him to stay.
The scripture describes Joseph as a “righteous man” who did not want to expose Mary to public disgrace (Matthew 1:19). He could have publicly accused her, protecting his reputation while destroying hers. Or he could have quietly ended the engagement, preserving his honour without provoking scandal. Either choice would have been socially acceptable. Either choice would have cost him far less than obedience.
Joseph’s eventual decision to take Mary as his wife came after an angel appeared to him in a dream, urging him not to be afraid and affirming that the child was conceived by the Holy Spirit (Matthew 1:20–21). Yet even divine reassurance did not remove the social cost. Joseph would live with whispers, raised eyebrows, and the permanent suspicion that he had married a woman who betrayed him—or that he himself lacked discipline.
Joseph’s acceptance did more than offer emotional support. It gave
Jesus legal identity. Through Joseph, Jesus was linked to the lineage of David—a connection the Gospel painstakingly records because of its significance to Jewish expectations of the Messiah (Matthew 1:1–16). Without Joseph’s name, protection, and presence, the Christmas story would have been socially and theologically fractured.
Joseph did not preach sermons or perform signs. He simply stayed. He named the child (Matthew 1:25), fled with his family to Egypt when Herod threatened their lives (Matthew 2:13–14), and returned to raise Jesus in obscurity. In a society that often equates masculinity with dominance and detachment, Joseph models something radical: quiet accountability.
This has urgent relevance in contemporary Nigeria, where conversations about fatherhood, responsibility, and male absence are increasingly unavoidable. From abandoned children to single-parent households struggling under economic pressure, the cost of men walking away is everywhere. Joseph’s story confronts the idea that manhood is about image rather than duty.
Christmas, seen through this lens, becomes a story about moral courage in the face of public pressure. It asks uncomfortable questions. What happens when men choose reputation over responsibility? When culture is used as an excuse for abandonment? When obedience to God is sacrificed to save face. Even Mary’s “yes” was not blind submission.
She asked questions. She weighed the cost. “How can this be?” she asked the angel (Luke 1:34). Faith, for both Mary and Joseph, involved risk. Christmas was not cancelled because two people chose trust over fear. God chose to enter the world not through power, but through a family sustained by courage and sacrifice.
Today, the sublime spirituality of the season has gradually eroded, giving way to mercantile interactions and the inanity of mind. But Christmas won’t have a full meaning without deference to the reason for the season, and the sacrifices made at its foundation.
Joseph did not give birth to Jesus, but he gave Him legitimacy, protection, and a name inspired by God. And in doing so, he preserved Christmas.