Isaiah 7:14
“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”
The Christmas story begins long before the manger in Bethlehem. Throughout the Old Testament there are prophecies that promise the coming Messiah who would redeem God’s people. The prophet Isaiah, quoted above, prophesied the miraculous virgin birth of the Savior nearly 600 years before the birth of Christ.
Isaiah said that the birth of Jesus would be a sign, and indeed it was. It was a sign of God’s power, God’s love, and God’s faithfulness.
The birth of Jesus is a sign of God’s power.
Being born of the virgin Mary, the birth of Jesus was a miraculous event unlike any the world has ever known. God’s power is so great that Jesus was born as a human child, and yet he was fully God. The gospel of Matthew describes it this way:
“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. (19) Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not wanting to make her a public example, was minded to put her away secretly. 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. And she will bring forth a Son, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will save His people from their sins.” So all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, saying: “Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel,” which is translated, “God with us.”
The birth of Jesus is a sign of God’s love.
Isaiah says that the Messiah was to be called “Immanuel,” which means “God is with us.” The purpose for God becoming a man through the virgin birth is given to us in John 3.16: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”
It was because of God’s great love for the condition of man that the Lord sent his son to come to earth, take human form through the virgin birth, grow to adulthood that he might die on the cross to pay the debt that our sin demands.
The Apostle Paul tells us the story from the viewpoint of Christ in Philippians 2.6-8: “…who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”
The birth of Jesus is a sign of God’s faithfulness.
God makes promises and follows through on his promises. The Lord’s ultimate promise was to reconcile, redeem, and restore mankind through the birth and death of Jesus, the Messiah.
“What God foretold by the mouth of all the prophets, that his Christ would suffer, he thus fulfilled. Repent therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Christ appointed for you, Jesus, whom heaven must receive until the time for restoring all the things about which God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets long ago.” (Acts 3.18-21)
As you celebrate Christmas today, remember that we are celebrating the birth of God’s Son, who was born to die for our forgiveness.
“Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you too will abide in the Son and in the Father. And this is the promise that he made to us — eternal life.” (1 John 2.24-25)
