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MARY AND JOSEPH (3 OF 3)

by Scott Maze

Scripture: Matthew 1:18-25
This content is part of a series.


Mary and Joseph (3 of 3)
Series: The Characters of Christmas
Scott Maze
Matthew 1:18-25


Merry Christmas to your family and you! Christmas is just three days away - are you ready? Everything wrapped and under the tree?

When I stop to think about it, it is still funny eleven years later... ...but Virgin Mary gave birth to 7.7 pound baby Jesus on Christmas Day in Peru eleven years ago. Can we show their picture on the screens? Then, 20-year-old Virgen Maria Huarcaya delivered her newborn son, Jesus Emanuel, in the early hours of Christmas in Peru's capital of Lima, Reuters reported. The baby's father, Adolfo Jorge Huamani, is a carpenter as well. Reuters reported that the boy wasn't placed in a manger.

Today, we continue our series, The Characters of Christmas. For a number of years, people have believed a myth that depression and suicides spike at Christmas time. But actually, the opposite is true according because this time of year often sees the lowest numbers of people taking their own life. Plus, a 1981 study reports a decrease in the number of visits to the psychiatric emergency service during the days and weeks before Christmas. Nearly everyone experiences this ''buoyant joy joy'' around Christmas time. Still, I think you would agree that people still have real problems at Christmas time. Listen to a 24-year-old young lady named Caitlin for a moment: ''Every year, there is extra pressure to be happy, to have love surround you - and for me, it feels the loneliest because of this. The media create this 'perfect' vision of a family Christmas - and it's an ideal that has hung over me and made me very miserable. My depression and anxiety always gets worse in December.''

Again, not everyone experiences a Hallmark Christmas. Some people have problems and in the moments to come, we'll discover one of the original characters of Christmas has big problems. All throughout the story of Christmas, there are major and minor characters who play an important ...

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