Great Themes of the Bible (continued)
look for no other, for this was He "to whom all the prophets bare witness". Now the Scripture that was fulfilled in the birth of Christ was that promise of a sign which God gave to King Ahaz (Isa. vii. 14). "Behold a virgin shall conceive"', where the prophet, encouraging the people of God to hope for the promised deliverance from Sennacherib's invasion directs them, as we have seen, to look forward to the Messiah who was to come of the people of the Jews and of the house of David.
"A virgin shall conceive'', and by her He shall "'be manifested in the flesh". The word Almah signifies a virgin in the strictest sense, such as Mary proffered herself to be (Luke i. 34)—"I know not a man". Nor would it have been such a wonderful sign as it was intended for if it had been otherwise. It was intimated from the beginning that the Messiah should be born of a virgin, when it was said that He should be the "'seed of the woman''. So the seed of woman, as not to be the seed of any man. Christ was born of a virgin, not only because His birth was to be supernatural and altogether extraordinary, but because it was to be spotless, and pure, and without any stain of sin. Christ would be born not of an empress or queen, for He appeared not in outward pomp or splendour, but of a virgin, to teach us spiritual purity, to die to all delights of sense, and so to ''keep ourselves unspotted from the world"' and the flesh, so that we may be presented "chaste virgins to Christ"'.
4. THE MESSAGE OF THE PROMISE The truth proved by this sign is, that He is the Son of God, and the mediator between God and man, for "they shall call his name Emmanuel'. He shall be Emmanuel, as when itis said "'he shall be called" it is meant "he shall be the Lord our righteousness". Emmanuel signifies 'God with us". It is a mysterious name, but very precious. God incarnate among us, and so God reconcilable to us, at peace with us, and taking us into covenant and communion with Himself.
The people of the Jews had God with them, in types and shadows, dwelling between the cherubims, but never so as when the "word was made flesh"—that was the blessed Shechinah. What a happy step is hereby taken towards the settling of a peace and correspondence between God and man, that the two natures are thus brought together in the person of the mediator. By this He became an unexceptionable referee,