Promise of a God-Man

We have seen God’s promises about the Redeemer growing more specific with the passage of time. God first revealed that a Redeemer would come to defeat Satan. Then He indicated the Redeemer would be a descendant of Abraham, then a descendant of Judah, a lineage that showed He would be a king. Now the promise takes on a new specificity and a new wonder. In a time when Judah is threatened by a united Israel and Syria, God comes to Judah’s king, Ahaz, and encourages him to ask for a sign as an indication of divine favor. Ahaz, knowing that people are not to test God (Deut. 6:16), refuses. But God graciously gives a sign anyway, saying that a virgin will conceive and give birth to a Son who will be called “God with us.”

Orthodox Christianity has regarded this passage as a prophecy of the Redeemer. But not all agree. They note that the word translated as “virgin” in The New King James Version actually means a young woman of marriageable age. Such a woman presumably would be a virgin, but Isaiah could have used another Hebrew word with a more specific reference to virginity. Also, some commentators cannot abide the long gap between this incident and Christ’s birth. They prefer to see the son of the virgin as Ahaz’s son or Isaiah’s son. But there are problems with both of these views. By contrast, the reasons for believing that Christ is Immanuel are numerous. First, God is giving a “sign,” or miracle; there is nothing unusual about a young woman giving birth, but it would be unprecedented for a virgin to do so. Also, the Son’s diet of “curds and honey” points to a future time after Judah’s overthrow, when the land will be untilled. Much more significantly, the New Testament depicts Jesus as the fulfillment of this prophecy. Matthew 1:22–23 specifically says the events of Jesus’ birth fulfill Isaiah 7. And Mary’s question—“ ‘How can this be, since I do not know a man?’ ” (Luke 1:34b)—and the angel’s words—“ ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you’ ”—also indicate that this is more than a normal pregnancy. Isaiah is speaking of the advent of the Redeemer.

We must see the significance of this. Isaiah was saying that the Redeemer would come in a miraculous way. And wonder of wonders, He would be God incarnate. The Lord of all would come in a cloak of human flesh. He would be both God and man, the God-man.