The Apostles' Creed

Conceived by the Holy Spirit, Born of the Virgin Mary

This line confesses the mystery of the incarnation: that the eternal Son of God became a real human being, conceived in Mary's womb by the power of the Holy Spirit and born as a child. God did not merely appear to be human; he truly took our flesh. The virgin birth guards both sides of that wonder, that Jesus is fully God, come from heaven, and fully man, born of a woman, one person who is both.

And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.Luke 1:35 (KJV)

What this line confesses

The creed here confesses that the Son who is eternally God entered our world as a genuine human being. Two things are held together. First, his conception was the work of the Holy Spirit, not of human striving; his coming is God's gift and God's initiative, a new act of creation. Second, he was truly born of the Virgin Mary, carried nine months, delivered as an infant, sharing our flesh and blood from the first.

This is the doctrine the church calls the incarnation, from the Latin for taking on flesh. The one through whom all things were made was made a man. He who upholds the universe became a baby who needed to be held. Mary is honored across the church as the mother of the Lord, the one who said, be it unto me according to thy word, and through whom God came to dwell among us.

Its biblical basis

The angel's words to Mary are the source of this line: The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. Matthew tells the same story, adding that this fulfilled the prophecy that a virgin would conceive and bear a son called Immanuel, God with us.

The wider Scripture guards the full humanity of Christ just as firmly. John says the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Paul writes that God sent forth his Son, made of a woman. Hebrews says he was made like his brethren in all things, and was tempted as we are, yet without sin. The creed simply confesses what the Gospels record: God truly became one of us.

Why it mattered: against denying his real humanity

This line answered an early error called Docetism, from a Greek word meaning to seem. Its teachers, uneasy that God could touch flesh, claimed Jesus only appeared to have a body and only seemed to suffer. Related Gnostic groups agreed that pure spirit could never truly be born or die. If they were right, then the incarnation is a mirage and the cross is a pretense.

By insisting he was conceived and born, the creed nails the Son to real human flesh. He was not a phantom. He grew in a womb, was born, hungered, wept, bled, and died. At the same time, by confessing that the Spirit, not a human father, brought about his conception, the creed guards his full deity, for the child born is the Son of God come down from heaven. The virgin birth holds the two truths together: truly God and truly man, in one person, so that the God who could not otherwise be reached could be reached, held, and known.

One person, truly God and truly man

This line raises the deepest mystery of the faith: how can one person be both fully God and fully man? The creed does not explain it; it confesses it. The child conceived by the Spirit and born of Mary is the eternal Son, so that in Jesus, without any confusion or loss, true deity and true humanity are joined in a single person forever. He is not half of each but wholly both.

The early church spent centuries carefully guarding this wonder against every attempt to flatten it. The Council of Chalcedon, in the year 451, confessed Jesus as one person in two natures, fully God and fully man, without confusion, change, division, or separation. The creed states the fact of the incarnation; the later councils fenced it from error. Both exist to protect the same good news, that God has truly come to us as one of us.

It is here that Mary is rightly honored. Because the child she bore is God the Son, the Council of Ephesus in 431 called her Theotokos, the God-bearer, a title about who Jesus is even more than about her. Christians honor Mary in different ways and to different degrees across the traditions, but all agree on the shared boundary that Scripture draws: she is blessed among women and the mother of the Lord, yet she is never worshiped, for worship belongs to God alone. Her greatness is that she pointed away from herself, saying of her Son, whatsoever he saith unto you, do it.

Immanuel: God with us

Matthew tells us that the birth of Jesus fulfilled the ancient promise that a virgin would conceive and bear a son, and they would call his name Immanuel, which means, God with us. That single word gathers up the whole meaning of this line of the creed. The God who once seemed high and far off has come to be with us, sharing our very flesh.

This nearness is not a passing visit. In taking our humanity, the Son joined himself to our nature forever; he did not lay it aside when he ascended. There is now, and always will be, a man upon the throne of heaven, one who knows from the inside what it is to be tired, tempted, and torn by grief. God with us has become God who understands us.

For anyone who feels alone, this is the tenderest truth in the creed. The message of Christmas is not that we must climb up to God but that God has come down to us, into the ordinary and the painful and the small. He was laid in a manger because there was no room; he still comes to those the world has no room for. Immanuel means you are not alone, and never will be, for God himself has drawn near.

What it means for us

Because the Son was born of Mary, God knows our life from the inside. He is not a distant deity who has never felt hunger or grief. He entered the womb, the cradle, the long years of an ordinary human life. Whatever you face, you face it with a Lord who has worn your flesh and can be touched with the feeling of your weakness.

And because he was conceived by the Holy Spirit, his coming is pure grace. Salvation began not with human effort but with God stepping down to us. The same Spirit who overshadowed Mary is the Spirit who gives new birth to all who receive her Son. The incarnation is God's great yes to the world he made, and an invitation to welcome the One who came so near.

So the wonder at the center of Christmas is also an invitation. The God who came so near in Bethlehem still draws near to all who will receive him. He did not stay at a distance to be admired; he came within reach to be known and loved. If you have kept God at arm's length, the manger is where that can change, for the child born of Mary grew to be the man who said, come unto me, and he says it still to you.

A note for all traditions: the creeds are not a fourth authority above Scripture but a faithful summary of it. Christians hold them in different ways, some reciting them weekly in worship and others rarely, yet the faith they confess is broadly shared across the church. Where believers differ on secondary matters, the creeds mark the ancient center that unites us: one God, and one Lord Jesus Christ, crucified and risen.

Related: And in Jesus Christ, his only Son · Suffered under Pontius Pilate, crucified, died, and buried · Who is Jesus? · The Christian creeds