While we’re now four months removed from Christmas, this fourth piece of The Apostles’ Creed takes us back to the miracle of Christmas and fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy.
We believe that Jesus Christ was “conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary.” Through this confession, the early church Fathers appealed to the virgin birth as proof not that Jesus was truly divine as distinct from being merely human, but that he was truly human as distinct from merely looking human.
If Jesus is just a man, a human being like the rest of us, he shares our need for redemption—and he can’t redeem us. He is part of the problem, not our solution. On the other hand, if Jesus is God—and God alone—He has no point of contact with us. He cannot relate to those who need redemption. Jesus’ humanity provides that point of contact. Therefore, we arrive at the conclusion that Jesus must be divine and human if He is to redeem us.
Yes, for Jesus to be Savior, He must be both God and man, and in order to achieve this union between God and humanity, Jesus must be conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary!
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