The Virgin Will Conceive

“Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.” Isaiah 7:14 (NIV)

The Old Testament is filled with miraculous conceptions! The pregnancies of Sarah, Rebekah, and Hannah are just a few examples. But in all of these stories, never had anything so miraculous occur as a virgin conceiving and giving birth.

And yet, in the prophetic ministry of Isaiah (700s BC), such an amazing thing was foretold. Isaiah declared that a virgin would conceive and give birth to a son, and that son would be called “Immanuel,” which means “God with us.”

This prophecy operates on two significant levels. On the first level, it was an immediate sign for King Ahaz of Judah during a specific crisis. At that time, the northern kingdom of Israel had allied with Aram (Syria) to invade Judah, and Ahaz was terrified.

In the midst of this threat, God sent the prophet Isaiah to Ahaz with a timeline for Judah’s deliverance. The timeline was conveyed through a sign: a young woman—a virgin at the time of Isaiah’s prophecy—would conceive and give birth to a son. Before this child reached an age where he could discern right actions from wrong wrongs (about 3-4 years old), both threatening kingdoms would be eliminated.

But this prophecy operated on an entirely different, deeper level as well. The "virgin birth" imagery pointed forward to a miraculous, unprecedented conception by the power of the Holy Spirit. Like God’s deliverance of Judah during Ahaz’s time, God was bringing about another deliverance, only this time for the whole world. And the son born would not just be a human child but would actually be "God with us"—the long-awaited Messiah, Jesus Christ.