The virgin birth was a miraculous event that has taken place only once in all human history, at the time when Jesus Christ was born. This event has become so important that it is still celebrated every year at Christmas. According to Luke’s Gospel, a devout young Jewish woman named Mary was engaged to a man named Joseph, but they were not married yet. An angel broke the news to Mary that she was specially chosen by God to conceive and bear a son whom she should name Jesus. Mary was of course very perplexed how she could ever conceive when she remained a virgin. And the angel replied that the Holy Spirit of God would work this great miracle in her.

Matthew’s Gospel provides more evidence that Jesus was born of a virgin. Joseph found out that Mary was pregnant, before they could come together (Matthew 1:18). He naturally thought that Mary had already violated the terms of their engagement. As he thought about what he should do to Mary, an angel appeared to him and revealed to him the same news that Mary had received. He said, "for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost" (verse 20). Joseph obeyed God and made Mary his wife, in order to protect her good name, as well as to be a foster father to Jesus. Both of them must have been grateful to God for the privilege of being part of His great miraculous work of bringing the divine Son of God into the world!

While this may have seemed very new to Mary and Joseph at that time, it was actually not new at all. This miracle of the virgin birth had already been planned by God from the very beginning. This can be seen in the prophecies of the virgin birth that were given many centuries before it took place.

The earliest prophecy of the virgin birth is found in Genesis 3:15. Just after Adam and Eve sinned, God made this very intriguing announcement to the serpent that had tempted Eve – "And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise His heel." The term ‘her seed’ (i.e. the seed of the woman) in this verse implies the virgin birth. In ordinary births mentioned in the Bible, children are referred to 41 times as being the seed of the man, not of the woman (Genesis 17:19).

Later on, about 740 years before Christ was born, God revealed more details of the virgin birth through the prophet Isaiah, "Hear ye now, O house of David; Is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will ye weary my God also? Therefore the Lord Himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call His name Immanuel." (Isaiah 7:13,14)

There are some who claim that this prophecy was fulfilled in Isaiah’s own time, and that it was about a virgin birth which was to take place as a sign from God to King Ahaz who heard these words. Ahaz was an ungodly king who chose to put his trust in a foreign power to deliver his nation from danger, rather than in God. But Matthew specifically states that this prophecy was fulfilled in the birth of Jesus Christ – "Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us." (Matthew 1:22,23)

This has led some to speculate that there were actually two virgin births, a birth that took place in the time of King Ahaz as a sign to him, and the birth of Christ 740 years later. There are several problems with this view. Firstly, Bible prophecies cannot be fulfilled more than once. Secondly, the name "Immanuel" implies the child that is born would be the very incarnation of God Himself, since it means ‘God with us.’ No one but Jesus Christ can appropriately bear such a name. Thirdly, the sign need not be fulfilled in Ahaz’s lifetime, as it was given to the whole house of David (Isaiah 7:13). The word "you" in verse 14 ("Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign") is in the plural form, and therefore it cannot refer to Ahaz alone. The house of David continued to exist up till the time of Jesus Christ, and Mary and Joseph were both members of it. This proves that Isaiah’s prophecy must refer solely to the virgin birth of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The reason why there has never been any other virgin births in human history beside this one is that it is a biological impossibility. Human reproduction always requires the union of the reproductive cells of a man and a woman. The normal human cell has 46 chromosomes. But the reproductive cell of a man or woman has only 23 chromosomes. It has to fuse with its counterpart reproductive cell which has the other 23 chromosomes into order to be complete. This makes it biologically impossible for a virgin to conceive.

Scientists today are trying to circumvent the natural laws of science by means of cloning. This is done by transforming a normal cell which has 46 chromosomes into a reproductive cell. But as we all know, the result of cloning is an offspring that is an exact replica of its parent, since it has exactly the same chromosomes as its parent. The virgin birth of Christ was not at all like this. If it was, then Mary would have given birth to a girl like herself, and not to a boy. This means that there can be no explanation of how Mary could have conceived a male child on her own, except that God worked a wondrous miracle, transcending the laws of science!

Many unbelievers cannot accept this because to them, miracles do not happen. They therefore attempt to find a way to explain this virgin birth. For instance, Liberal scholars claim that in Isaiah’s prophecy the Hebrew Word for "virgin" is almah and this should be translated as "young woman" (cf. RSV). They say that the word bethulah would have been used if "virgin" was meant (cf. Gen 24:16). There is nothing miraculous about a young woman giving birth to a child, since she may not be a virgin. But contrary to what these scholars say, the word almah is used consistently in the Old Testament to mean "a young woman of marriageable age who is still a virgin." (cf. Gen 24:43, Ex 2:8, Ps 68:25, Song of Sol 1:3, Prov 30:19) And this is confirmed by the fact that when Matthew quoted Isaiah’s prophecy in his Gospel, he translated the word almah as parthenos in Greek. And this word means nothing else but virgin.

There is therefore no doubt at all that the virgin birth of Jesus is nothing less than a powerful miracle wrought by God Himself. What we want to understand then, is why this miracle was necessary. It was not only done to make the birth of Christ different from all other births. It was actually the only way in which the eternal Son of God can become a man fully and completely, without in any sense ceasing to be God.

This is stated in another prophecy of Isaiah concerning Christ’s birth, "For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon His shoulder: and His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The mighty God…" (Isaiah 9:6). Since this child is the mighty God Himself, He already existed before He was born into this world. In the process of ordinary human conception, a new person begins to exist only at the moment of conception. But Jesus, who is God the Son, the second person of the Trinity, did not begin to exist when He was conceived in Mary’s womb. The virgin birth explains how this happened. Since there was no union of two reproductive cells, no new person was created, but the existing person of God the Son took on a human nature at the moment He was conceived in a virgin’s womb.

This is indeed a great mystery. How can God who is almighty and all-powerful become a helpless, frail little baby? How can God who knows everything, be reduced to being a little child who has to learn how to talk, how to walk and how to put on His own clothes? Many have tried to explain this great mystery, but failed. Even the renowned scientist, Sir Isaac Newton who discovered gravity, could not explain this. To him it was impossible for an infinite God to become a finite creature. And because he could not understand this, he rejected it altogether. But his rejection does not mean that this great event did not take place. The conception and birth of God the Son must remain a mystery that defies all human reasoning, because human minds simply lack the ability to understand it. We must accept this mystery by faith in God’s written Word.

The Word of God itself admits that it is a great mystery, according to 1 Timothy 3:16, "And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory." The question that remains to be answered now is why did God do this? Why was He born of a virgin to become a human being like us?

God paid a tremendous price to be born into this world. To become an ordinary creature like us, He had to submit Himself to being limited by time and space. He had to put aside temporarily His unlimited powers and unlimited knowledge. As a man, He had to experience hunger, thirst, tiredness, pain and suffering. Jesus lived without many comforts of life. His birth took place in the humblest of circumstances – in a stable where animals were kept. He was placed in a manger, which was the feeding trough for animals. We can only imagine how dirty, smelly and unhygienic it must have been compared to the very sterile environment in which babies are normally born today. After that, Jesus grew up in a poor family, for Mary and Joseph did not have enough money to buy a sacrificial animal to sacrifice at the temple when they brought Him there to be dedicated to God, and had to offer birds instead (Luke 2:24, Leviticus 12:6-8).

What our Lord did when He came to live in this world as a man involved untold sacrifice and humiliation, because He had to endure living in a world that is full of sin and wickedness. This truly involved great condescension, because God is absolutely holy and pure and cannot tolerate sin at all. And He not only endured the sins of man throughout His earthly life, He also became a victim of man’s sins at the end of it. Philippians 2:7,8 tells us that He "… made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross."

Dear Reader, no one has ever condescended as much as the Lord Jesus when He was born into this world. What was it that made the almighty, all-powerful God willing to undertake the task of living as a man among us?

The virgin birth brings out the truth that God the Son loved us so much that He came right down to earth to save us from our sins. Then He removed our sins by dying on the cross for us. "But God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." (Romans 5:8). Has there ever been any love as great as this? Has anyone ever loved us so selflessly, so wonderfully and so completely the way that God loved us in Christ?