Mankind’s history is the tale of two men: the first Adam and the last Adam. The former linked humanity with sin, condemnation, and death. The latter links them with righteousness, purity, and immortality (Rom. 5:12-21; 1 Cor. 15:46-57). This second man was not merely a man but was also God “manifested in the flesh” (1 Tim. 3:16)1. Deity and humanity were perfectly united in the incarnate Christ.
Teaching regarding the Lord Jesus’ person frequently oscillates between extremes: people either overemphasize His humanity or His deity. To be our kinsman-redeemer, He needed to be both God and man (Heb. 2:9-18). As man, Christ could assume our debt of sin; as God, He could sacrificially offer an infinitely valuable life. Fully God and fully man, His virginal conception was the means of His incarnation: “The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us” (John 1:14, FWG).
A Glorious Entrance
Both Matthew and Luke make it clear that Christ’s coming was supernaturally accomplished by divine power. The human father was set aside in favor of the Holy Spirit accomplishing the eternal Son’s coming into Mary’s virgin womb.2 “And the angel answered and said to her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Highest will overshadow you; therefore, also, that Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God’” (Luke 1:35). Similarly, Gabriel told Joseph: “. . . do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit” (Matt. 1:20). Horlock explains: “The holiness of the child was secured by ‘the Holy Ghost’ . . . He shared our human nature but not our sinful nature.”3 God was clearly separating Messiah from the common descent of fallen Adam. Our Lord was a true man in every sense; yet He was “sin apart” (Heb. 4:15, JND). Another remarks: “Virgin-born, he did not inherit the guilty twist called original sin: his manhood was untainted, and his acts, attitudes, motives, and desires were consequently faultless.”⁴
The Long-Promised Seed of the Woman
Although He looked just like other men (Phil. 2:7-8; Rom. 8:3), He was uniquely the only begotten, incarnate Son of God. In Galatians, Paul describes His incarnation in specific terminology that implies something distinct from normal conception and birth: “But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law” (Gal. 4:4). D. F. and J. S. Wright point out the difference in the words for birth: “… ‘God sent forth his Son, coming (genomenon) from a woman’. By contrast, in 4:23 Ishmael ‘was born’, gegennētai (from gennao).”⁵ The terminology alludes to the virgin birth that is detailed in the Gospels. Darby emphasizes this teaching’s importance: “It shows how completely Christ met the whole case. The woman brought in sin, and the law brought in transgression, and Christ meets both: come of a woman, and made under the law.”⁶ Satan appeared to triumph by inciting man to sin, but the last Adam crushed the serpent’s head at the cross.
The Lord Jesus’ entrance into the world was different from any other human being. He fulfilled two great salvation promises in becoming “seed” of the woman (Gen. 3:15) and in being “born of the seed of David” (Rom. 1:3).
Behold, A Virgin Will Conceive And Bear A Son
Throughout history, unbelieving people have vigorously opposed the virgin birth out of a naturalistic skepticism that rejects miracles. The noted apologist, Norman Geisler, explains this doctrine’s momentous testimony in these words: “…if true, the virgin birth establishes beyond question the life of Jesus as a supernatural intervention of God. If anti-supernaturalists concede at this point, they have no case left.”⁷ Even during Christ’s ministry, adversaries inferred that His paternity was illegitimate (John 8:39-41). In the second century, Justin Martyr and Trypho had an intense debate over it, with the latter propounding the slander that Jesus was actually the offspring of a Roman soldier, named Pantera. But well before the actual event, Isaiah 7:14 foretold the virgin birth, saying: “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel” (Isa. 7:14). Critics correctly counter that the Hebrew word for “virgin” could also be rendered “young woman.”⁸ But Orr reminds us: “But . . . if the word does not necessarily bear this meaning of ‘virgin,’ it may, and indeed usually does, bear it. In fact, in all the six places in which, besides this passage, the word occurs in the Old Testament, it may be contended that this is its meaning …”.⁹
Moreover, the ancient Jewish Septuagint translation of Isaiah 7:14 used the Greek word “parthenos,” which means “virgin.” Matthew 1:23 uses that same word in quoting Isaiah’s prophecy; therefore, the Scriptures’ commentary on itself upholds the Lord’s virginal conception.
Enter The New Man
Just as Christ entered the world miraculously, so He also exited by the supernatural means of the resurrection and ascension. Through His work, God’s image in the first Adam – fallen, defaced, and corrupted by sin – has been replaced by God’s image in Christ, the last Adam. Christ’s virginal conception assures us that He is impeccable and incorruptible. He is not more of the same type of human. Rather, He is the paradigm of the new humanity. Through His saving work, believers are new creatures in Him (2 Cor. 5:17), “and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him” (Col. 3:10). Accordingly, humanity’s future is bright. The purity that Christ exhibited from His miraculous birth through His ascension to heaven is now the birthright and destiny of the many sons that He is bringing to glory. At His coming, we will meet Him in the air and live forever with Him in the Father’s house (John 14:1-3).
Endnotes:
1 Unless otherwise noted, all Scriptures are from the New King James Version.
2 “It is irrelevant, and indeed impossible, to give any explanation of the virgin birth in terms of biological parthenogenesis; it cannot be brought within the framework of any natural process. Here God is supremely at work, and the only human agency was that of the submissive maiden of Nazareth who said; ‘Behold, the handmaid Precious Seed 12:6 (1961); accessed here: https://www.preciousseed.org/articles/our-lords-incarnation-and-virgin-birth/ [Boldface mine].
3 Malcolm Horlock, Day by Day through the New Testament, ed. Denis Clapham and John Heading. (PSP, 1979), p. 8. [Italics original].
4 J. I. Packer, Growing in Christ. (Crossway, 1994), pp. 47-48.
5 D. F. Wright and J. S. Wright, New Bible Dictionary, ed. D. R. W. Wood et al. (IVP, 1996), p. 1226. [Italics original].
6 J. N. Darby, Food for the Flock 5 (1878), p. 234. [Italics original].
7 Norman Geisler, Baker Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics. (Baker, 1999), p. 759.
8 Hebrew scholars like J. A. Motyer ably answer this objection in their exposition of Isaiah 7. See J. Alec Motyer, The Prophecy of Isaiah. (IVP, 1996), pp. 84-86.
9 James Orr, The Virgin Birth of Christ (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1907), 133. [Italics original].