St. Matthew 1:1-25
Why was the Son of God commanded to be named Jesus—the New Joshua? In this Advent reflection, Fr. Anthony shows how Christ fulfills Israel’s story by conquering sin and death, and calls us to repentance so that we may enter the victory He has already won.
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Homily on the Name of Jesus
Sunday before the Nativity
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
“They named Him Jesus, because He would deliver His people from their sins.”
(Matthew 1:21)
Names matter in Scripture. They are never accidental. A name reveals identity, vocation, and mission. And so when the angel commands that the Child be named Jesus, we are being told something essential about who He is and what He has come to do.
The name Jesus is simply the Greek form of Joshua. And that is not incidental.
So we should ask: Who was Joshua? And why did the angel of the Lord insist on that name?
Joshua was the successor of Moses, the one chosen by God to lead His people when Moses could not. Long before Joshua’s time, God had made a covenant with His people and promised them a land—a place of rest, inheritance, and blessing. But that promise had been obscured by centuries of slavery in Egypt, under pagan gods who claimed power but offered only bondage.
God sent Moses to remind the people who they truly were: not slaves, but God’s own people. Through signs and wonders, God revealed His power over Pharaoh and over the false gods of Egypt. The people were delivered. They were free. They were heading toward the Promised Land.
And yet, because of their disobedience and unbelief, that generation—including Moses himself—was not worthy to enter the land. And so God appointed Joshua to do what Moses could not: to lead the next generation into the inheritance God had promised.
Joshua defeated the enemies of God—not by his own strength, but by God’s supernatural power—and led the people into the Promised Land.
All of this matters, because it prepares us to understand the name of Jesus and the mission it announces.
“They named Him Jesus, because He would deliver His people from their sins.”
Now consider the situation at the time of Christ’s birth. In many ways, it looked very much like the time of Pharaoh. God’s people were again under foreign rule, again surrounded by pagan power, again longing for deliverance. The prophets had promised a Messiah, and the people waited for one who would set them free.
But here is the crucial difference: this Joshua would not come to conquer territory. This Joshua would come to conquer the true enemy.
Not Rome.
Not armies.
Not borders.
But sin itself.
In his homily on this Gospel reading, St. John Chrysostom says:
“He did not say, ‘He shall save His people from their enemies,’ but ‘from their sins,’ showing that this is a greater and more fearful tyranny than any foreign power.” (Homily on Matthew 2)
And this is precisely why the Son of God had to be born as a child.
In his homily on the Nativity, which, Lord willing, you will hear on Thursday, Chrysostom draws the connection between the Nativity and our salvation with striking clarity:
“He became Son of Man, that He might make us sons of God. He took what was ours, that He might give us what was His.” (Homily on the Nativity)
Jesus is the New Joshua—not leading one people into one land, but opening the Kingdom of God to all who would receive Him. He conquers not by the sword, but by the Cross. He defeats not nations, but death itself.
And we know how He did it.
By obedience where Adam fell.
By humility where pride ruled.
By offering Himself fully to the Father, even unto death.
As the Fathers remind us, the victory was not loud or coercive, but hidden and faithful—won through righteousness rather than force.
So what, then, is our situation?
It is tempting to compare our world to Egypt, or to the time of pagan occupation, and to imagine that we are still waiting for deliverance. After all, many of us know what it is like to feel tired, burdened, or trapped in patterns we cannot seem to break, even while outwardly everything appears fine. We live in a culture that constantly distracts us, that teaches us to manage our desires rather than heal them, and that quietly encourages us to accept forms of bondage as normal. Like God’s people of old, we forget who we are and whom we belong to, and so we begin to live as though freedom were still far away.
But the truth is far more sobering—and far more hopeful.
We are not waiting for the Messiah.
He has already come.
If we live as slaves, it is not because Pharaoh rules us.
It is because we have refused the Deliverer.
Christ has already opened the doors of freedom. Advent is the season in which the Church calls us to turn back, to repent, and to remember who we are—so that we may step again into the life He has already given us.
Christ lives within the heart of every believer.
He comes into the midst of all who gather in His name.
He is present here, now, in the Holy Liturgy—offering the same grace, the same power, the same deliverance.
He delivers us from the death of sin and leads us into the true Promised Land: the life of the Kingdom, the inheritance of the saints, communion with God Himself.
So let us give thanks for the Deliverer—Jesus, the New Joshua.
Let us praise Him, trust Him, repent, and return to Him, so that we may join Him in His victory.
And let us receive His supernatural grace and power here and now, as we prepare to welcome Him anew at His Nativity.
[For in the end, all of us must decide:
Am I a sinner – of whatever type; a fornicator, a gossip, a glutton, a miser, a coward, a bully – (are we a sinner) who occasionally does Christian things but repents and reverts to my chosen sinful form.
-OR-
Am I a Christian who occasionally falls into sin, repents, and reverts to his chosen path of holiness?
If we truly are sinners who only play at being Christians – if we only play at being holy – then when the Lord comes looking for a place to be born and dwell, there will be no room in the worldly varmint-infested inn our heart for him to lay and He will leave us to wallow and drown in the bondage of our sin.
-BUT-
If we are Christians who fall into sin but truly repent, the cave of our hearts is swept clean and He will be pleased to be born in our hearts and His glory will shine within and even from us.
Christ has come into the world to deliver us – how have we responded?]
To Him be glory, together with His Father and the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen.
