A virgin will have a baby?

“Therefore, the Lord Himself will give you a sign. Look! The virgin will conceive and bear a child, and shall call His name Immanuel (meaning, God with us).” Isaiah 7:14

This is outrageous. Virgins don’t have babies. This phrase in the Bible book of Isaiah must be a misprint or a mistranslation. Of course, we are pondering this idea during Advent, the traditional time in the church calendar when we read this passage and think of that wonderful and frightful moment when the angel Gabriel appeared to the virgin Miriam and told her she would conceive a Son. Medieval painters add the white Madonna lily, the lilium candidum, to the setting, in order to trumpet Miriam’s purity at this announcement. She would become pregnant, not in the ordinary way with a man, but through the power of the Holy Spirit.

But this seems impossible. And yet, the biblical record has hinted at this since time immemorial. You see, this concept of the messiah being born of a virgin is a deeply held concept in the Hebrew scriptures. In fact, the very first messianic prophecy, uttered by God himself, predicted the virgin birth of the messiah.

 Genesis 3:15 records that there will come a ‘seed of the woman who will crush the serpent’s head.’ What this says also contains what it doesn’t say. The text tells us that the serpent bruiser will come through a woman only, not a man and a woman. That’s the normal route for babies. It hints that is, a virgin. As a result, Satan’s plans would be crushed, and God’s purposes would prevail.

This is, therefore, the significance of what we see in Luke chapter 1 when Gabriel comes to declare that this promised one would be born of Miriam. She will be the virgin who gives birth to the messiah.

And he will, as Gabriel announced, ‘be called the Son of the Most High God’. Though God gave him earthly parents, his true Father was God himself. And his whole life would be dedicated to his eternal father and doing his will.

‘And the Lord will give to Him the throne of his father David’. David, though a great King could never accomplish what God truly wanted for mankind. Thus, he pointed to the need of someone else who could accomplish all of God’s purposes.

Gabriel said, “And of his kingdom there will be no end.” Because of his unshakable obedience to God, even unto death, and death on the cross, Yeshua, our Messiah, provided the way in which we could move from death to life and by doing so enter his eternal kingdom. A kingdom in which there will be no end. This is our ultimate hope. Our hope is not in anything this world has to offer. In this life we will have trouble and uncertainty. But through Yeshua we are assured of eternal life and security. This is because through him, we may enter this ‘kingdom that has no end.’