I am pregnant.
How many stories start like that? What comes next?
Every time I heard it I had to sit down and catch my breath, trying not to hyperventilate.
The Christmas story in Matthew begins with an at risk pregnancy, a young woman with child who is about to be quietly abandoned.
A story full of fear.
But then there is the dream.
A blessed moment of sleep, in that vulnerable place of dreams where anything can happen, where all the barriers are down, we are visited, a way out becomes clear, all the pieces come together.
In the place of dreams, sometimes the Lord can speak, sometimes that is where we are open to the new possibilities that God brings, a new thing, a new creation, a way out, a way through, the dead end becomes the beginning of life.
God’s dreamers.
When they arrive it means something is about to happen, the impossible suddenly becomes possible, what was dead rises to life.
Joseph, the dreamer, visited by the Angel of the Lord.
Do not have fear, marry her; the child will free his people from their sins.
The episode that begins in fear ends in promise and mystery.
And it ends with a name, the name, Jesus.
Jesus, the name that means God saves, God’s salvation.
What a dream on a scary day.
No fear.
God saves.
Jesus.
The name.
And so it begins.