Calvary Chapel Yuba City
"The Seed of the Woman" | Matthew 1:18-23
Matthew's Gospel, chapter 1, verse 18, "We read, 'Now, the birth of Jesus Christ was as follows, after his mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Spirit.'" Verse 19, "Then Joseph, her husband, being a just man and not wanting to make her a public example, was minded to put her away secretly. But while he thought about these things, always good to take time to think." Verse 20, "An angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, 'Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take to you, marry your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she will bring forth a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. So all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophets saying, verse 23, "Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel, which is translated, God with us.'" These are very familiar verses to us at Christmas time. Passages like this one, Luke chapter 1, where the angel announces Jesus' birth to Mary, or Matthew chapter 2, the visitation of the wise men. Luke chapter 2, the shepherds, keeping watch over their flocks in the fields by night. And what's amazing is how many Old Testament references we find in the Christmas account. So for instance, in Matthew chapter 2, when King Herod is trying to discern the location of the king of the Jews, the wise men answer and say to him, "In Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it is written by the prophet," we just looked at this last week. "You, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are not the least among the rulers of Judah, for out of you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people." That's Micah chapter 5. When Joseph is warned by an angel to take his family to Egypt, we read that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the Lord through the prophets saying, "Out of Egypt I called my son." That's Hosea chapter 11. When Herod instigate the plot to kill off the male children born in Bethlehem, we read, "Then it was fulfilled what was spoken by Jeremiah." When Joseph is told not to return to Israel, we read, "He turned aside into the region of Galilee and dwelt in a city called Nazareth that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the prophets. He shall be called in Nazarene." Numbers chapter 24 says, "What I saw in my vision hasn't happened yet, but someday a king of Israel will appear like a star." We think of how the wise men were led to the birth of Jesus following a star. Genesis 49 tells us that Judah will hold the royal scepter. His descendants will always rule, nations will bring him tribute and bow to him in obedience, which is exactly what the wise men end the shepherds. Both did. Psalm 72 says, "May the kings of Sheba present him gifts. May all kings bow down to him and all nations serve him." Matthew chapter 1 verse 22, you can look at it again. It says, "So all this was done that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the Lord through the prophets saying, 'Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel.'" That's a direct quotation from Isaiah chapter 7. This idea that Jesus would be born of a virgin is mentioned in both Christmas accounts in Matthew and Luke. Luke actually takes great care to preserve this continuity. In Luke chapter 3, he says, "Jesus himself began his ministry at about 30 years of age, being as was supposed the son of Joseph." So he's pointing out that Jesus wasn't really sired by Joseph. It was supposed by the community that he was. And let's not forget that Luke was a doctor, and it seems that he drops strong hints in his gospel writing that he received Mary's account firsthand. The virgin birth is attested to in the Nicene Creed, the Apostles Creed. It pops up all throughout famous Christmas carols. We just sang one of them in Silent Night, Silent Night, Holy Night, all is calm, all is bright, round yawned virgin, mother and child, and heart the herald angels sing. We read Christ by highest heaven adored, Christ the everlasting Lord, late in time behold him come off spring of a virgin's womb. In O come all you faithful, we read God of God, light of light, low he abhors not the virgin's womb. Very God begotten, not created. It's why I like Christmas carols, and hymns in general, they're laced with good theology. By the way, for those who would suggest that the term virgin simply means a young woman, David Gusig writes, those who deny the virgin birth of Jesus like to point out that the Hebrew word translated virgin can also be translated as young woman, but the ultimate fulfillment of the Isaiah 7 prophecy clearly points to a woman miraculously conceiving and giving birth. This is especially clear because the Old Testament never uses the word in a context other than virgin and because the Septuagint, the Septuagint, excuse me, translates it categorically as a literal virgin using the word Parthenos. This idea of the virgin birth is so central to the coming of the Christ and indeed the New Testament faith that Moody Bible Institute writes, Mary did not conceive through ordinary means, but through the intervention of the Holy Spirit. Without the virgin birth, there would be no salvation for sinners. Jesus Christ would be a sinful human being. If the virgin birth did not occur, then the Bible is not true and cannot be trusted. In short, the virgin birth is an essential part of salvation and scripture. David Mathis writes, to deny this doctrine is to open the door to denying anything plainly affirmed in the Bible. A Scottish theologian by the name of Donald McLeod writes, dismissal of the virgin birth is seldom the end of an individual's theological pilgrimage, meaning if you struggle with this, the virgin birth, you're going to struggle with many things in the New Testament and ultimately in the Bible. I'll be honest, when I was growing up, and really even when I was just a young believer, like my take on the virgin birth was just, oh man, that's really cool. God did something completely unique in having his son be born supernaturally. God's just proving that he can do whatever he wants to do, but that's pretty much where my appreciation for the virgin birth stopped, and yet there is so much more to it than God just doing something cool. Again, as David Mathis writes, on one end of Jesus's life lies his supernatural conception and birth. On the other, his supernatural resurrection and ascension at both ends, the God man's authenticity was attested to by the supernatural working of his father, J.I. Packer adds, sorry, I got a lot of quotes this morning, if we deny the virgin birth because it was a miracle, we should also deny his resurrection. These miracles are on par, and it is unreasonable to accept either while rejecting the other. You see, Jesus could not have had a human father because sin, the sin nature, is specifically passed on through the father. Even though the woman was deceived in the garden, Romans chapter 5 just hammers this point home. Through one man, sin entered the world. By one man's offense, death rained. By one man's offense, many died. Through one man's offense, judgment came to all. By one man's disobedience, many were made sinners. First Corinthians chapter 15 agrees, by man came death. In Adam, we all die. There's a great article from the Christian apologetics research ministry, Calm. It reads, the concept behind this idea of the man passing on the sin nature is called federal headship. This means that a person, a father, represents all of his descendants. There's biblical support for the idea that the sin nature is passed through the father. Since Jesus had no literal biological father, the sin nature was not passed to him. However, since he had a human mother, he was fully human, but without original sin. Jesus had two natures, God and man. He received his human nature from Mary, but he received his divine nature through God the Holy Spirit. Therefore, Jesus is both God and man. He was sinless, had no original sin, and was both fully God and fully man. Again, J.I. Packer writes, "Virgin born, Jesus did not inherit the guilty twist called original sin. His manhood was untainted, and his acts, attitudes, motives, and desires were consequently faultless." Now, another author quickly adds, "That's not to say women are without sin." Sorry, ladies, we know too many of you, right? They are also sinners by nature and by their actions. However, both a man and a woman contribute to any conception of new life, and it is through the man's contribution that the sin nature has passed on. Jesus was formed like the original Adam by God directly. Scripture makes it clear, there is something inherently different about the body Adam had and the body Jesus had. Again, from 1 Corinthians chapter 15, Paul calls Jesus the last Adam, and he writes, "The first man, Adam, became a living being. The last Adam became a life-giving spirit. The first man was of the earth made of dust. The second man is the Lord from heaven." So, Jesus is not made of the earth or of dust. He is directly from heaven. Now, Paul says that in the same way we have inherited Adam's fallen condition, we can also inherit Jesus' spiritual condition. He writes, "As was the man of dust, so also are those who were made of dust, and as is the heavenly man, so also are those who are heavenly. As we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly man." Now, this is where you get into the idea of the new birth being born again, born of the spirit, born from above, which really is an entirely different Bible study. We're not necessarily going to go into that today. My point today is simply this. There was something completely, inherently, utterly supernatural and unique to the birth of Jesus Christ. He had no earthly father. He inherited no sinful condition, and this is what the gospel writers are telling us. In fact, it is interesting. Take note of this again in verse 20 of Matthew chapter 1. Joseph, the angel tells him, "Don't be afraid to take to you, marry your wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit." Ben Witherington writes, "What we find in Matthew and Luke is not the story of a God descending to earth and in the guise of a man mating with a human woman, but rather the story of a miraculous conception without the aid of any man, divine, or otherwise. As such, this story is without precedent, either in Jewish or pagan literature." Another author writes, "Matthew says the Holy Spirit conceived the child inside Mary so that Mary was a surrogate only. Conception usually involves material from both a man and a woman. But since Mary was a virgin, the normal process was not used to conceive Jesus. Mary simply carried the child, but her body did not conceive the child. The child was conceived in her in Luke 135. The angel says to Mary, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the highest will overshadow you. That Holy One who is to be born will be called the Son of God." And it's funny. There are folks who will argue the virgin birth because they'll say, "You can't circumvent natural processes, and so often so many of those same people will lobby that the entire universe was created out of nothing." Right? R.C. Sproul said, "That is the ultimate virgin birth, the birth of the universe. It was not the potency of Joseph that created this child. It was the potency of God Almighty." It's amazing. But there's even more significance to the virgin birth than this, right? I mean, this is amazing when we pause and consider, "Oh, wait a minute, this is why a human father could not be involved in this process." But there's more to it than that. The virgin birth fulfills the very first messianic announcement in the entire Bible. Find it all the way back in Genesis 3.15, you guys who have been studying with us this year, you'll remember God's created the man and the woman, right? He's placed them in this beautiful garden called Eden. He's given them free reign, but then in the middle of this paradise, the serpent slithers up, and he deceives them into sin. They rebel, but then immediately God is on the scene. And he pronounces a curse upon the man, the woman, and the serpent. But specifically, to the serpent, here's what he says, hugely important verse. He says, "I will put enmity or hostility between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He will bruise your head and you will bruise his heel." We call this the proto-evangelium. It's the very first mention of the gospel in the Bible. Protos, meaning verse. Evangelion, meaning good news. Let me just read you a snippet from the scholarly resource Wikipedia. It says, in Christian theology, yes, that's a joke, by the way, the proto-evan, actually, some people have asked, "Why do you quote Wikipedia?" I don't quote Wikipedia because I stand on their authority. I quote Wikipedia because clearly this is common knowledge. Like, this is something that every single one of us as a believer should be familiar with. In Christian theology, the proto-evangelium is God's statement to the serpent in the Garden of Eden about how the seed of the woman would crush the serpent's head. The proto-evangelium, in Genesis 3.15, is commonly referred to as the first mention of the good news of salvation in the Bible. Old Testament scholar Derek Kidner describes the proto-evangelium as the first glimmer of the gospel. Several early church fathers, like Justin Martyr and Irenius, regarded this verse the first messianic prophecy in the entire Bible, Martin Luther, said Genesis 3.15 comprehends everything noble and glorious. That is to be found anywhere in the scriptures. Charles Spurgeon said, Genesis 3.15 is the first gospel sermon preached on the face of the earth. With God himself as the preacher and the entire human race and the prince of darkness for the audience. Now, notice how the reference to the seed of the woman is immediately equated with the singular male pronoun he. God says to the serpent, "I will put enmity between your seed and her seed, he, the seed of the woman, he will bruise your head, and you will bruise his heel." In other words, this reference to the seed of the woman is not a reference to Eve's descendants in a general sense or the entire human race. God is not saying, "I'm going to put enmity between your seed and her seed, they will bruise your head." He says, "He will bruise your head. You will bruise his heel." Again, Wikipedia points this out. From the masculine singular Hebrew pronoun in Genesis 3.15, we see the seed of the woman is a man. In Romans 16.20, the "He" is called the God of peace, which clearly identifies him as Jesus Christ. And when God says to the serpent, "I will put enmity between your seed and her seed," I want you to know the meaning in the original language is quite clear. In the Septuagint, for instance, the word translated as seed is spermatose. So what's being talked about here is the sperm of the woman. Okay, biology 101. And I know we live in a day and age where somebody would argue this point, but the woman has no sperm of her own. Okay? It's the man who possesses the sperm. The man deposits the sperm into the woman. NT Wright once said, this is a great quote, "First century folk knew every bit as well as we do that babies are produced by sexual union between a man and a woman. When in Matthew's version of the story, Joseph heard about Mary's pregnancy. His problem arose not because he didn't know the facts of life, but because he did. This is why Mary asks in Luke 134, how can this be? Since I do not know a man. And right now, I'm sure there's somebody in here watching online thinking I cannot believe you're talking about this in church, right? But the reality is like I want us to know exactly what the Bible is talking about. Genesis 3.15 describes hostility that will exist between the serpent Satan and the sperm of the woman. And by the way, that sperm is a singular he. This is the very first reference to the virgin birth in the entire Bible. And it's all the way back in Genesis 3.15. David Guisegrites, this prophecy gives us the first hint of the virgin birth, declaring the Messiah deliverer would be the seed of the woman, not of the man. Again, Wikipedia says the reference to the seed of the woman is believed to relate to the virgin birth of the Messiah. One more author writes this, the Lord foretold the virgin birth of the Messiah in Genesis 3.15, the mention of a woman's seed is a reference to the Holy Spirit's conception of Jesus within Mary. Importantly, a woman doesn't possess seed in the Bible sense of the word. And yet here, the Bible says the Messiah will be conceived by a woman's seed, which is intentional, to make the point that the Messiah would not be conceived in the normal way by a man's seed, but rather would be conceived in a woman without the help of a man. This is why the New Testament writers work very hard to tell us that Mary was a literal virgin, a partheos. This is why Paul very specifically in Galatians 4 says, when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law that we might receive the adoption as sons. Okay, well, we might read that and we might think, what's the big deal, right? Why is it significant that Paul adds that Jesus was born of a woman? Aren't we all born of a woman? The idea here is that Jesus was born exclusively of a woman without the intervention of man. Jesus is the seed of the woman prophesied about and promised in Genesis 3.15. I'm going to read to you one more quote from Donald McCloud. This is a great quote. And I hope this kind of sets our compass as we go into the Christmas season this year. He says, the virgin birth, I did that same thing when I was practicing in earlier when I did a microphone check, the virgin birth, not the virgin both, the virgin birth is posted on guard at the door of the mystery of Christmas. And none of us must think of hurrying past it. It stands on the threshold of the New Testament blatantly supernatural, defying our rationalism, informing us that all that follows belongs to the same order as itself and that if we find it offensive, there is no point in proceeding further into the Christmas account. That's amazing. It does deserve a wow. If we are going to struggle to accept the virgin birth, we really can't accept any of the rest of it. If we don't accept the virgin birth, it changes everything because if Jesus wasn't born of a virgin, that means Mary was sexually promiscuous before she was married and it means she was lying and a whore. It changes everything to believe in the virgin birth. In closing, the angel tells Joseph in Matthew 1, 21 how Mary will bring forth a son and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. The name Jesus means the salvation of Yahweh, which is exactly why the promised seed was announced and why Jesus was sent. One of my favorite things to do, at the beginning of every Christmas season is to just kind of take time to reorient myself with all of the specific reasons that the Bible says Jesus was born. 1 John is a great book for this, for instance. 1 John 3, 5 says he was manifested to take away our sins. 1 John 3, 8 says for this purpose the Son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil. Hebrews 2 says Jesus was born that so that through death he might destroy him who had the power of death. That is the devil and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. And this is just a few. Like I encourage you guys to take time to look up what are the specific reasons that Jesus was born. Because let me tell you what the Bible doesn't say. It doesn't say Jesus was born to make our lives better. It doesn't say Jesus was born because he wants us to be happier or to live our best life now. The Bible says Jesus Christ was set forth because man was lost desperately in a sinful condition and the only way out is if God himself was willing to take on human form and allow himself to be born and suffer in our place bearing the punishment for our sin so that his righteousness could be transferred to us. That is why Jesus was born. And that is what Christmas is really all about. Amen? Amen. Guys, I hope that you will celebrate Christmas with us this year at Calvary Chapel. Next Sunday we're going to look at how Jesus not only is he the seed of the woman, but he's the promised seed of Abraham. If you're visiting, you're thinking, I have no idea what you're talking about. But you guys who have studied with us this past year, you know this is one of the things we have been tracing all the way through the Old Testament. So I encourage you to come back, join us on Sunday morning. [BLANK_AUDIO]
Kicking-off our Christmas season connecting-the-dots between Matthew's Gospel and the very first mention of the Gospel in Genesis 3:15!