After the men had saddled their camels again and turned to leave, Joseph turned back into his home. “Joseph,” Mary said, looking up at him as he approached her, “What do we make of all this? Isn’t The Highest One amazing? He sends angels, shepherds, Simeon and Anna in the temple, and now these travellers. But what do these gifts mean? Gold makes sense for a king. We can always use it. And I suppose frankincense fits in with worship and offering respect. But myrrh?” Mary did not even want to voice it but all she could think of was that this was something sometimes used to embalm the bodies of the dead. But these men knew they had come to worship a newborn. So why bring something that seemed to have to do with death? There was still so much she did not fully understand.
But then Mary remembered something else the men had said and piped up, “Do you remember what else they said? It is written in the prophets that the Messiah is to be born in Bethlehem! I did not remember that prediction. So, our having to come to Bethlehem seems now to be part of God’s plan! Isn’t our Lord wonderful? Who knows what might have happened to us if we had been back in Galilee? Surely, Jehovah is reinforcing with us what we have been chosen for - and who this little one is,” she added, looking fondly down at her son. “But then she looked up again with an expression of grave concern, “But now King Herod knows there is a special baby here. Someone we keep being told is destined to be the Messiah, our saviour and ruler. Are we safe?”
Joseph sighed as he lowered himself down beside her, “I just don’t know, Mary, our life certainly seems to be out of our control, doesn’t it? We have been told who this child that was given us is, but we have no instructions as to how to raise him safely or what we are to look for to help him grow up to fulfil the purpose he is born for.”
“Well,” Mary responded with quiet resolution, “we have been told much already. We must just wait on Jehovah and he will surely tell us what we need to know in his time. Now, we need to sleep.”
They drifted off to sleep when Joseph had a feeling he thought he had experienced before. Indeed, he seemed to be surrounded by brilliant light and there at his feet stood an angel again! “Joseph,” the angel was speaking softly but urgently, “Get up, take the child and his mother and flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to look for the child to kill him (Matthew 2:13). I warned the wise men from the east in a dream not to return to Herod so now he is going to be enraged and come after you (Matthew 2:12)!”
Joseph shot up from his cloak. He blinked, again – all was dark and still. It was another dream. But what the angel said confirmed their worst fears. They were not safe before King Herod.
“Mary, Mary,” he called, grabbing her arms and shaking her awake.
“What, what, what is it,” she asked, troubled by the alarm in his voice.
“An angel just came to me in a dream again. He told me we have to flee to Egypt – now – because King Herod is going to come and look for our son to kill him!”
“Oh, no,” Mary cried, “what shall we do? What about our families?”
“We will just have to send word to them later,” said Joseph. “We have to go now though. We have no choice. Do you think I would choose to do something like this?” He was gathering up the gifts and beginning to wrap them up in their blanket. Mary moved to let him finish and began to gather some things together to take along to eat.
“Mary,” Joseph said, “You feed the children and I will go and pay our landlord what we owe in rent and buy one of his donkeys. We will need it for the trip. I will explain as much as I need to but of course I will not say where we are going. We can’t let Herod find that out.” With that, Joseph vanished into the darkness.
It wasn’t long before he was back. “The Highest One was with us,” he said, “I got the donkey with no problem and not too many questions. And since he knows your parents, I asked him to send word to them that we had to leave but would communicate with them later, to tell them that we are doing what The Highest One is telling us to do. Let’s get ready and go.”
Joseph helped Mary and Jesus on to the donkey and slung all their possessions over its back. Talking Mary’s hand in his he raised his eyes to the dark sky and quickly sent up a plea to the Lord for wisdom, guidance and safety on this journey they believed he had sent them on. Then, grabbing his walking stick, he began to lead them all down the road and out of the town. They were tired but fueled by fear, and with the growing conviction that Jehovah was with them, they made sure they were well out of the region of Bethlehem before they stopped by the side of the road to get some sleep.
The sun was already up when they woke next morning. Joseph quickly helped Mary and Jesus back on to the donkey with their possessions and the rest of them began trudging on foot towards Egypt. Now, of course, this was somewhere they had never been before. However, Joseph knew that if they continued on this road to the sea they would find their way to Egypt.
At the same time, Joseph especially was concerned for his family back in Nazareth. At one travel stop they met another traveler heading past Nazareth on his way to Syria. He agreed to take a message to Joseph’s family, so that was a relief. Joseph could not say exactly where they were as they could not trust that King Herod might not pursue them. However, Joseph promised the message-bearer that he would send further word to his family when things were more settled.
“Joseph,” Mary asked eventually, where in Egypt will we stay?”
“I really don’t know,” Joseph replied. “However, I do know there are many Jews in Alexandria. Maybe we will find a welcome there. It is on the sea so it should be easy enough to get to. And,” he added, looking back at their things, “we have those gifts that should come in handy to help us get established there until it is safe to return to Judea.” Of course, Joseph had no idea how far it was, but he would find his way.
Eventually, some two weeks later, they knew from fellow travellers they had met by that time and were sharing the road with, they were approaching Alexandria. They could see buildings appearing on the horizon. Far to the right they could see a large intriguing structure that they would later learn was a famous landmark of the city – its magnificent lighthouse.
They made their way into the city and after a number of inquiries found a place in which they could stay. They were relieved with that. Finally, they could settle down again, at least for a while.
The family did not take long to establish connections with the Jewish community. Mary made some friends as did the children and Joseph was able to get some work. Somehow, the Lord always seemed to be looking out for them. They could not help but conclude that it had something – everything? – to do with the precious child they bore.
Joseph was invited by one of his associates to go with him to synagogue one Sabbath Day. It was a much larger and more grand structure than any synagogue he had ever seen before. They found a place to stand among their fellow-worshippers and the service began. His friend alerted him to the fact that some of the service and reading would be in Greek. At first this somewhat surprised Joseph – worshipping their Jehovah in a foreign, a Gentile tongue. But then he remembered that he had heard that in Alexandria where the scriptures had already been translated to Greek because so many people used that language.
So, it was not surprising then that Joseph found he could not understand a lot of what was going on. But his ears perked up when he heard the leader begin to read passages in Aramaic from the prophets, and particularly when - and he could hardly believe his ears - he heard the words, “out of Egypt I have called my son (Hosea 11:1).” He could hardly wait to get home to share this with Mary.
“Mary, Mary,” Joseph called when he got home, “Let me tell you what I heard at synagogue today! The prophet said Jehovah called his son out of Egypt.”
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