This article is based on Pastor Adrian Rogers' message, His Unequaled Birth.
Jesus is not the Son of God because He was born of a virgin—He was born of a virgin because He is the Son of God.
The world laughs at the idea of a virgin conception. Satan hates the idea of the Virgin Birth of Jesus, because it teaches both the humanity and the deity of his nemesis and our Savior. Many so-called Christians doubt the doctrine of the Virgin Birth. Others think it is incidental.
But if you take away the Virgin Birth of Christ, you have destroyed the foundation of the Christian faith. Did the Virgin Birth actually happen? Yes—and it is fundamental to your salvation.
Mary is a virgin—she is espoused to Joseph, but the marriage ceremony has not yet transpired, so they are not living together as husband and wife. Yet the angel Gabriel announces to her, “Mary, you are going to have a baby.” She asks a very pertinent question: “How can this be, since I do not know a man?” (Luke 1:34b). “I do not know a man” literally means that she has not had sexual relations with a man.
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…. For with God nothing will be impossible.”
With God nothing will be impossible. If you have difficulty with that, you have difficulty with the Virgin Birth of Jesus.
The Virgin Birth is a mystery. It does not depend upon your understanding for validation.
People say, “A virgin birth is a biological impossibility!” Not if you let the angel answer: With God nothing will be impossible. God is not bound by the laws that He Himself created in the Universe He made. He is the Master of that Universe. God can do anything He well pleases, because He is God.
If you believe God made the first man without a father or mother, out of clay that He formed out of nothing, can you have difficulty believing the Virgin Birth? It is a mystery to you, but not to God.
Without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen by angels, preached among the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up in glory.
Join Mary in saying, “How can this be?” And join the angel in answering, “With God nothing is impossible.” Amen. Settled.
The Virgin Birth of Jesus and the incarnation (that is, God being made flesh) were both necessary for our salvation.
God gave Adam and Eve dominion in the Garden of Eden. They sinned and lost that dominion. They turned their dominion over to Satan, and they infected the entire human race with sin.
Our dominion was lost by a man, so the only way it could ever be returned to us is through another man—and that other man is the Lord Jesus. All of us are represented by one of two men: either Adam or Jesus. “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22).
Jesus Christ, the last Adam, was born of a virgin to undo what the first Adam did. (See 1 Corinthians 15:45.) Apart from the Virgin Birth, there is no hope of salvation. Why?
The Bible plainly teaches, “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23a). “The soul who sins shall die” (Ezekiel 18:4b). Sin must be paid for—atoned. And it must be atoned for by shed blood. (See Hebrews 9:22.)
The eternal I AM cannot die. God in Spirit cannot bleed. And this dominion was lost by a man, therefore, it must be redeemed by a man.
But not just any man will do. This man must be a perfect man. He must be sinless and innocent. No son or daughter of Adam can qualify. Why? “Through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned” (Romans 5:12b). We know that we are sinners by birth, by nature, by choice, and by practice. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23).
If Jesus Christ had been born like we are, He would have been a son of Adam. Had He been a son of Adam, He would have been a sinner. Had He been a sinner, He would not have been innocent. Had He not been innocent, He could have been nobody’s substitute. The only sin He could die for would have been His own.
So, God’s answer was the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ, both truly human and fully sinless.
Whose blood was in baby Jesus? It was not Mary’s blood. When a baby is in its mother’s womb, that baby has a separate life from that mother. The mother may have one blood type, and the baby another. That is because blood line is not determined by the mother, but by the father. The blood of Jesus was the blood of God—sinless and innocent.
Jesus came to be born of a virgin so that He would be sinless. He was sinless in order to die a substitutionary death. He died a substitutionary death to atone for our sin. He atoned for our sin so that we might be born again and go to Heaven. That is why Jesus’ virgin conception was necessary.
Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name JESUS. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David.
The name Jesus is the same in Hebrew as the name Joshua, which means “Jehovah saves.” As the Son of God, Jesus shares the nature of God. He is God in human flesh. Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Muslims, Unitarians, and liberal theologians do not accept this. But the Bible says:
But to the Son He says: “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of Your kingdom.”
Baby Jesus was as much God as if He were not man at all. He was the earthly child of a Heavenly Father, and the Heavenly child of an earthly mother. That little baby lying in the manger, with His dimpled feet touching the straw, was the mighty God of Genesis 1:1. (See John 1:1-3.)
Do you believe it?
There is something tragically wrong with our world. There can be no real peace without the Prince of Peace. The answer to this world’s problems is Jesus Christ.
His is the cradle that rocks the world.
Luke 1:30-38; 1 Timothy 3:16; 1 Corinthians 15:22,45; Romans 3:23, 5:12, 6:23; Ezekiel 18:4; Hebrews 1:8, 9:22; Genesis 1:1; John 1:1-3
Now the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows: After His mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Spirit….But while he thought about these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you Mary your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.”
Then he said, “Hear now, O house of David! Is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will you weary my God also? Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.
