The Gospel of Isaiah: Highlights of Chapter Seven

The Gospel of Isaiah: Highlights of Chapter Seven. 

WANTED: An imaginative scribe who can write exquisite poetry. A faithful, articulate believer in Yahweh who can switch from one extreme to another at the Lord’s command… from a sublime vision of God’s glory, to a ridiculous demonstration of shameful nakedness; from confronting the people over their sinfulness, to comforting people with hopefulness; from being an outspoken messenger one minute, to a living object lesson the next; from having one foot in the immediate surroundings one minute, to one foot in the future messianic realm the next. Must be adaptable, thick-skinned, and extraordinarily brave. Person who answers, “Here I am. Send me!” will be especially considered. (from The Jerusalem Post, 740 BC).

• “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son and shall call His name ‘Emmanuel’.” (Isaiah 7:14).

a. With us is God. One might wonder why it is that we human beings are so important to an almighty and everlasting Creator God. The well-established fact is that With-ness appears to be in God’s very nature. As Rev. Sam Wells once said, “Creation itself is the theater in which God could dwell with us! The purpose of mankind is to be God’s companions forever!” Take the name Emmanuel, for instance. (Emmanuel is Greek and Immanuel is Hebrew). The messianic prophecy of Isaiah 7:14, “and shall call His Son Immanuel,” is quoted and fulfilled in Matthew 1:23. The name Emmanuel literally means “with us is God” according to the order of the name’s words. The renowned biblical scholar Lancelot Andrews (1555-1626) was amazed at this name of Emmanuel, because when God put that name together, He put ‘us’ first, before Him! We are in front of the Name, and God placed Himself second to us! In His own Name, God held the door open for us! “In His very name we might read that we are dearer to Him than Himself, that He so preferred us. Oh, which is greater in Him, His humility or His grace! It is hard to say which, but both are unspeakable.” 

b. With Us Forever. It would take pages of notes written in tiny script if one were to record all the passages in Scripture that included God’s promise of His personal presence, that He would faithfully be “with us” for all time. From the very creation of the world, God has had an overwhelming desire to be with us… from His walks with Adam and Eve in the cool of the day in the Garden; to the presence of Yahweh all through the ups and down of His Chosen People; to the Incarnation when Father God sent the Son of God to be with the ungodly; to Jesus’ baptism when He didn’t mind identifying with the sinful in order to be with us; to the very last words Jesus said before He went home to be with the Father…  “Behold! Listen carefully to My words here! Understand this and take it in! I am with you always! Yes, to the end of the ages of ages.” (Matthew 28:20).  God has made it abundantly clear that His eternal desire is to be with us… “Behold, the dwelling of God is with His people, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God.’ (Revelation 21:3). His everlasting desire to be our bosom buddy is an astounding part of His heart for humanity. He yearns to be true to His name Emmanuel, and so is His mission and His destiny to be present with us. That’s not just Good News. That is Best News! What could be better than that? What else can we do but take joy in the with-ness of God?

“Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary…” (an excerpt from the Apostle’s Creed).

The Miraculous Pregnancy. Yes, it is completely unique in human history that a woman had become pregnant without a human father. And this miracle is a direct fulfillment of Isaiah 14:7. Isaiah used the Hebrew word that is a bit ambiguous with multiple meanings… maiden, or a young woman of sexual maturity who is of marriageable age, or a young woman who is unmarried and sexually chaste/inexperienced, or a virgin in the traditional sense. Isaiah’s word is also used in a number of other passages in the Hebrew Bible, so it’s reasonable to think it could be used here in his messianic prophecy. Also, the Septuagint, which was the Bible that Jesus and His fellow Jews used, the specific Greek term for virgin was used because the translators believed that was what was intended by Isaiah. Also, the early Jewish understanding of Isaiah leaned toward the traditional virgin as opposed to a general fair maiden of some sort. In fact, early rabbinic discussions included this… “And this is the sign: the one who will conceive is a girl who never in her life has had any intercourse with any man. Upon this one shall the Holy Spirit have power.” (Rashi). To support this idea, the official Hebrew Bible, the Tanakh, translated Isaiah’s word for virgin as meaning “a young woman of unsullied reputation.” Finally, the context of this famous verse in Isaiah 7 is something to be given that is miraculous, something outside natural human experience and way beyond a normal human birth… “Go ahead! Ask for a sign from Yahweh your God! Ask for something big, so miraculous that you will know only God did it! Ask for something as high as the heavens and as deep as the Place of the Dead!” (7:11).

Why is the Virgin Birth So Important in Christianity? (1.) To reject the Virgin Birth, one would have to ignore lots of Scripture, since the angel told this fact to St. Joseph in Matthew 1:23; the angel told Mary in Luke 1:34; the angel said so again in Luke 1:35; Luke the physician, who would know all about the technical aspects of the birthing process, reported it as fact in his Gospel, even calling her a virgin in 1:27. (2.) The only way it makes sense for Jesus to live up to His heavenly-dictated name Yeshua (Lord our Savior), and to be the world’s Redeemer, is if He was without sin. Only a sinless sacrifice would be sufficient. An earthly father meant He would inherit a sinful nature. Only a truly spotless Lamb would be an adequate sacrifice for our salvation. (3.) Only a virgin birth would make for the perfect union of two natures: He took His human nature from His mother Mary, and His spiritual nature from the Holy Spirit who impregnated her. The thought that God became incarnate, or the Word took on flesh, could only make sense in this scenario. Fully God-fully man is not possible without a virgin birth. (4.) Christ’s unique, distinctive identity as the only possible God-man meant He was truly a New Creation, and that only He would be able to produce other new creations, namely each of us in the human family. As the Orthodox Church puts it, “He who is conceived in Mary is not a new Person coming into existence but the eternal Son of God now using her womb as His throne.”

Mary’s Womb. In the fullness of time, Isaiah’s prophecy became true: “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call His name Emmanuel.” (Isaiah 7:14). The angel Gabriel was sent from God’s presence to an unmarried girl, most likely a teenager, who was a virgin. This young lady was named Mary, or Miriam, which means “exalted one.” Mary lived in Nazareth, a little village in the Galilee district of Israel. She was betrothed to a man named Joseph. Both of them were descendants of King David. In Jewish marriage, a couple becomes betrothed as they commit themselves to a future marriage. Betrothal was a very formal contract and not a mere engagement period that could be easily called off at any moment. Betrothal was a binding commitment to a covenant relationship. Most betrothals lasted one year, and unfaithfulness on the part of the bride during betrothal brought drastic consequences, even death. A pregnancy during betrothal would have been horribly scandalous and deeply shameful. Unless the baby’s father agreed to marry the woman, she would likely remain unmarried for her entire life. And if her father rejected her, she would be removed from her home and she would have to beg or prostitute herself to make a living.

Pregnant with Jesus. True to the announcement of the angel, Mary indeed was made pregnant by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Holy God. The Spirit fell upon Mary and “overshadowed” her, or as one translator put it, “spread His shadow of power over her in a cloud of glory.” This term “overshadow” is thought to refer to the bright cloud over the Israelites in the wilderness which was a sign of God’s presence and a symbol of His guidance and protection. And this was the deep, deep mystery that resulted in the momentous conception within Mary. Jesus had no human father, but He had a heavenly Father, and so Jesus has been called the Son of God ever since. And Jesus will reign as King of Israel forever, and “of His kingdom there will be no end.” (Luke 1:33). Jesus Christ, fully divine from God, fully human from Mary His mother. The whole of Christianity comes down to this intimate moment of conception between Mary and the Holy Spirit.

The Thin Place of Mary’s Womb. “The birth of Jesus took place like this. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be married to Joseph. Before they came to the marriage bed, Joseph discovered she was pregnant. (It was by the Holy Spirit, but he didn’t know that). Joseph, chagrined but noble, determined to take care of things quietly so Mary would not be disgraced.  While he was trying to figure a way out, he had a dream. God’s angel spoke in the dream: ‘Joseph, son of David, don’t hesitate to get married. Mary’s pregnancy is Spirit-conceived. God’s Holy Spirit has made her pregnant. She will bring a son to birth, and when she does, you, Joseph, will name him Jesus – ‘Yahweh saves’ – because he will save his people from their sins.’ Then Joseph woke up. He did exactly what God’s angel commanded in the dream. He married Mary. He named the baby Yeshua, or Jesus.”  (Matthew 1:18-25, MSG)

More Spacious Than the Heavens! There is an ancient Eastern Orthodox prayer that celebrates “this paradoxical mystery in which our God, who created the universe, whom the cosmos cannot contain, was contained within the Virgin’s womb as He became Man in His incarnation.” … ‘O sanctified Temple and Rational Paradise! O Glory of Virgins! From you, God was incarnate and became a child, our God before the ages. He made your body into a throne, and your womb He made more spacious than the heavens. All of creation rejoices in you, O Full of Grace!”  What a majestic and (literally) awesome thought!

Mary, the first literal “Christian,” Christ literally within her, the first human tabernacle containing the Holy of Holies, the womanly Ark of the Covenant harboring the Word made flesh, the human branch bearing a heavenly Fruit, the Holy Gate that welcomed the Spirit of Yahweh to enter into her most intimate place and begin an unprecedented, unrepeatable new Life within her. Mary, who responsibly, carefully, and lovingly nurtured the unborn Savior inside of her, right on through to the bloody birth pangs when she introduced the physical, human God to the world:

• At conception, when Jesus was a one-cell zygote, a fertilized egg, when His genetic framework was established, his gender is set, and is now programmed to develop into a unique individual with trillions of cells; when God “empties Himself” into the human experience; Julian of Norwich called His conception “God in a point.” All this in a fraction of a second, when a spiritual seed united with a human egg. It is here we begin to see the weak and helpless God, vulnerable, and completely dependent on a human mother;
• Week 1 = The embryo of Jesus becomes attached to Mary’s uterine wall;
• Week 2 = Christ’s early brain begins to appear, as well as His heart;
• Week 3 = The blood vessels of Jesus begin to appear, and His heart begins to beat;
• Weeks 4/5 = The embryo of Jesus has His eyes and lungs appear, His kidneys form, and the cerebral hemispheres of His brain develop; Mary’s umbilical cord starts developing, and is fully formed by week 7, the life-line between them that provides the unborn Jesus with oxygen-rich blood and nutrients, and carrying away his waste products;
• Weeks 6/7 = The brain waves of the Lord in the womb begin to pulsate, the heart has developed its four chambers, and His hands and feet and legs begin to move;
• Weeks 8/9 = In modern terms, Jesus is now officially a fetus, and He can now open His mouth, suck His thumb, and move His head around;
• Weeks 10-12 = Jesus can now make facial expressions, and a heavenly eye witness could now see His fully formed nose, lips, and gender anatomy;
• Weeks 13-14 = The unborn body of Christ is now sensitive to touch;
• Weeks 15-20 = His brain’s hemispheres are now completely connected, He has stem cells in His bone marrow, and has a stress response to anything invasive;
• Weeks 21-24 = Jesus now has a blink/startle response to sudden loud noises;
• Weeks 25-30 = Jesus can now produce tears, react to light, and practice breathing movements for the near future;
• Weeks 31-40 = Jesus now shows preference for mother Mary’s voice, is aware of new songs sung to Him, has evidence of memory function, and has the capacity for learning.

I was wondering if perhaps… In Mary‘s sanctified womb that was literally full of the eternal Holy Spirit, Jesus grew and sanctified every stage of human development. In Jesus, all human stages of unborn life are now worthy of God Himself, His personal Presence, and somehow even His unborn life is involved in the mystery of redemption. Church Fathers maintained that Christ could only redeem that which He had personally experienced Himself. I include the unborn life of Christ in that aspect of redemption. Whatever Jesus has experienced in His human life, from conception onward, has been elevated and made even more special in God’s eyes. If the mother’s womb was literally good enough for God, then it must be honored and held in reverence. Since the incarnate Jesus, all physical life has been raised to a new level, even within the womb.