All In a Reputation

During this awesome season, when we buy and receive gifts, it is funny how we want our gift to be special and I want the person to like it alot!!! if truth be known, I want them to like my gift the best! I have a friend who is awesome at gift giving, it is because she listens to people and can remember what they say they like all through out the year, I wish I was like that .
I have been teaching the story of Jesus birth for the past two weeks at pre-school and I have heard it many times. This year I have thought alot about Joseph and what he must have felt and thought.. Here is the woman he is going to marry having someone Else's baby. Joseph had a reputation, He had plans for his family...... Matthew1:24-25 Joseph.. took to him his wife and did not know her till she had brought forth her firstborn son. And He called His name Jesus.
Wow, Joseph did not worry about his reputation with others . He had to let his own plans for his and Mary's life go.. you know now a days if a man was in this position, he might try to make money off the story, and make a name for himself, but not Joseph, he gave it all up for Jesus..
I am faced with this challenge, will I be willing to lay it all down? my plans? my reputation? instead of making a name for myself, will I make a home for Christ ,as Joseph did??
It is a wonderful thought that Joseph ,a man from a small town , a blue collar worker ,was the first to to say the name of "Jesus". What if, he hadn't laid it all down, He would have missed the greatest gift of all... Jesus!