One day last week Al Mohler answered some listeners’ questions about Christmas. That inspired me to do the same in these last three weekdays leading up to Christmas, this coming Sunday. I’ll include some of Dr. Mohler’s answers, as well as offer some of my own thoughts.
Question Number Three: How was Jesus conceived?
The first and easiest answer is we do not know, nor do we need to know the details. What the scripture says is all God intends for us to know, or else He would have said more. So what is said in Scripture? Two things.
Mary was told by the angel Gabriel in Luke 1:35 "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.” Note the phrases, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you,” and “the power of the Highest will overshadow you.” These tell us that Jesus was conceived by a miraculous work of the Holy Spirit of God. Yet they do not tell us how the Holy Spirit did this supernatural work. That is all the Lord revealed to Mary and it is enough for us to know as well.
Joseph was told in a dream by the angel in Matthew 1:20, "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.” Again note the phrase, “that which is conceived in her [Mary] is of the Holy Spirit.” And again, if this was all Joseph needed to know, we need not know more.
That said, we know that contrary to the false teachings of some, there was no physical union between the Holy Spirit and Mary. Not only is the Holy Spirit a spirit, having no physical body, the very notion of such a physical union between God and Mary is nothing short of perverse.
I prefer to think that in a similar way, in which God created the universe by saying it was to be so (Genesis 1:3-ff), God said the Son was to be conceived in Mary and it was so. And note also in Genesis 1:2 that the initial chaos of creation was ordered as the Holy Spirit “hovered over the waters,” giving order. Similarly, the Holy Spirit “came upon” or “hovered over” Mary, and the eternal Son of God was conceived as a real human being inside the young virgin’s womb.
How God did this remains a mystery. And that is by God’s design. Had He wanted us to know how He created the universe or how Jesus was conceived, He could have told us. Since He did not tell us, we walk by faith in God based on what He has told us. We must not fret over what He has not told us.