But Mary said to the angel, How shall this be, since I know not a man?
Gabriel has told Mary she will bear a son, and she answers with one honest question: how? Much hangs on how we read it — whether she doubted, and how this Child came into the world.
Earlier in the chapter, a man questioned an angel and lost his speech for it. Mary's words sound similar, yet Gabriel answers her instead of rebuking her.
And Mary said to the angel, "How will this be, since I am a virgin?" She does not doubt; she asks with confidence. So there is no striking dumb and no sign of unbelief, as with Zacharias, who asked, "How shall I know this?" There may be a question in the spirit that needs an answer but shows no lack of faith. There might be another not so different in form which really sprang from unbelief. God does not judge by appearance, but by the heart.
One writer weighs her question against the request of Zacharias.
Zacharias had constantly asked for a son. It was only a question of God's goodness and power to grant his request, and God's clear declaration brought him to a point where he had only to trust it. He did not trust God's promise. It was only the exercise of God's extraordinary power within the natural order of things. Mary asks, with holy confidence, since God has so favoured her, how the thing is to be accomplished, outside the natural order. Of its accomplishment she has no doubt.
Her question exposes what she took for granted about the incarnation — God the Son entering the world as a man.
When the angel Gabriel announced the honour about to be given to her in the great work of incarnation, she asked, not in a spirit of scepticism but of honest ignorance, "How will this be, since I am a virgin?" Clearly she thought that the birth of this glorious Person, who was about to appear, would follow the ordinary principles of generation. In God's great goodness, her thought becomes the occasion for developing much valuable light on the central truth of incarnation.
Commentators differ on what exactly puzzled her. Another points to the titles she has just heard.
The coming Child was to have David as His ancestor and yet be the Son of the Highest! She did not ask for a sign, since she accepted the angel's words, but she did ask for an explanation.
Her asking did not stop the plan. It drew out the fullest answer in the passage.
Mary replied to the angel, "How will this be?" What was promised had to happen outside the order of nature. Even so, distrust did not prompt her question. We see this because God allowed Gabriel to give a full and complete answer to her question. That answer reveals two things: the miraculous conception of our blessed Lord, and that the Child so born should be called the Son of God.
Mary's description of herself also settles an old question about translation.
The Old Testament was carefully translated into Greek in the version commonly called the Septuagint, and our Lord quoted from it again and again. That translation plainly understood the word "virgin" as Mary herself shows in Luke 1:34. It rendered the word parthenos, which does mean "virgin."
Some have read her words as a vow of lifelong virginity. One writer rejects that, since an earlier verse in the chapter rules it out:
Schanz abandons his usually sensible interpretation by taking Mary's words as a vow of virginity, which verse 27 rules out.
If the child had come the ordinary way Mary assumed, everything would be different.
Sinful men have sinful children… Does it matter, then, or does it not, how the Lord was born into this world? Had He come by natural generation, would He not have been like every other man? To deny the virgin birth is to deny His pre-existence in the Godhead. It also denies the holiness of His Manhood. Without these two great truths about His glorious Person, He could not have been the Saviour.
- Ask. Mary's "how" is faith seeking light, not doubt demanding proof. God reads the heart, not the wording.
- Contrast. Zacharias would not trust a promise inside nature's order. Mary never doubted one outside it.
- Assume. Her question shows she expected an ordinary birth. That mistake became the occasion for light on the incarnation.
- Answer. Because she asked in faith, God let Gabriel answer in full: the miraculous conception, and the Child called the Son of God.
- Depend. Her own words about herself anchor the virgin birth. Deny that birth and you deny His pre-existence and the holiness of His Manhood — and He could not be the Saviour.
And the angel answering said to her, [The] Holy Spirit shall come upon thee, and power of [the] Highest overshadow thee, wherefore the holy thing also which shall be born shall be called Son of God.
Gabriel told Mary she would bear a son who would reign forever. She asked how, since she had no husband. This verse is his answer — how a virgin could bear a child, and why that child would be called Son of God.
Zechariah had asked a similar question earlier in the chapter and lost his speech for it. Mary does not.
She does not doubt; she asks in trust. So she is not struck silent, and there is no sign of unbelief — unlike Zechariah, who asked, "How shall I know this?" A question may rise in the spirit and need an answer, yet show no lack of faith. Another question, close to it in wording, might spring from unbelief. God does not judge by appearance, but by the heart.
The verse says two things about what God will do. One writer reads them as two distinct acts, not one act stated twice.
"The Holy Spirit will come upon you" means that the Holy Spirit produced the human nature of our Lord in the virgin by a creative act. And so He had a completely holy nature. "And the power of the Most High will overshadow you." This is not a repetition of the first statement. It means that the Son of God, who is the Most High, overshadowed the virgin. He united Himself with the human nature the Spirit had prepared. He is called "that holy thing" in His very being, because He fits into no class.
Commentators differ. Others read the whole verse as one act of divine power: "it was not to be nature, but divine power" (William Kelly).
Older translations render the phrase "that holy thing." That word choice separates this child from the first man God made.
There is no taint at all in that "Son of Man." It does not say "that innocent thing," but "that holy thing." The first man before the fall was innocent and guiltless. But that condition was only negative, and it was unstable. He was of the earth, earthy — made of dust; with a spirit, but a creature, and nothing more. The second Man is out of heaven. He was "holy," and had a positive, inherent, lasting character, utterly incapable of sin. His positive holiness came from the direct, divine work of the Spirit in His incarnation, apart from fallen nature.
This birth did not simply add one more descendant to Adam's family.
When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of woman (Gal. 4:4), yet conceived under the direct action of the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:35). That is why, although the Deliverer came by the woman, He was not an ordinary son of Adam at all. The virgin birth means that the Lord Jesus, while truly Man, was yet a Man of a new order.
The word "therefore" ties the name to the miracle just described.
"Therefore the child to be born will be called holy — the Son of God," and not just Son of Man. This is very important. "Son of God" is a title that belongs to our Lord in His divine glory before He became a man, and here too. When He became a man, He did not stop being the Son of God. As incarnate He was still the Son of God. And the same was true when He rose from the dead. So the title belongs to Him in all three conditions in which Scripture shows our Lord: Son of God as a divine Person; Son of God when He became a man; Son of God risen from the dead and gone to heaven.
What this verse teaches is narrower than the full doctrine of the Son:
It is not here the doctrine of the eternal relationship of Son with the Father. The Gospel of John, the letter to the Hebrews and the letter to the Colossians establish this precious truth and show how important it is. But here it is the One born by the miraculous conception who, on that ground, is called the Son of God.
This verse does Luke's work, not John's.
The power of the Holy Spirit did what would otherwise have been impossible. "That holy thing" born of the virgin was the "Son of God," even as to His humanity. This does not by itself declare what John declares. It is not the same as the Word becoming flesh. Luke's is the Gospel of the Manhood, as John's is of the Deity of the Lord. Both sides are essential to His proper glory.
- Question — Mary's "how" came from faith, not doubt, and God answered it fully; He reads the heart behind the words.
- Power — The conception was not nature at work but God at work: a creative act of the Holy Spirit.
- Holy — He is holy, not merely innocent. Adam could lose his innocence; nothing could touch this holiness.
- Name — "Therefore" links the name Son of God to the miracle. Yet the title was His before He became man, and His again when He rose.
- New — Born of a woman yet not of Adam's line, He is a Man of an entirely new order.
And behold, Elizabeth, thy kinswoman, she also has conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month to her that was called barren
Gabriel has just told Mary that she will bear the Son of God. Then, without being asked, he adds a second piece of news: an elderly relative is already six months pregnant. Why does the angel attach this quieter miracle to the greater one, and what does the pairing of these two mothers teach?
The verse fixes the timing of Gabriel's visit to Mary by the calendar of Elizabeth's pregnancy. That detail marks a shift in how God was dealing with people.
God sends the angel Gabriel in the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy with a more important message. After the long silence of centuries, heaven speaks again. In Luke it speaks in a closer way than in Matthew, where Joseph receives the messages, and receives them in a dream. Here we have open, face-to-face speech, and the most important message comes not in the temple but in a private home. God is coming near in His grace; and the nearer He comes, the more fully He reveals Himself.
Gabriel offers Elizabeth's case as evidence. One writer puts the reason plainly:
The less wonderful birth is set before her to strengthen her faith to believe in the more wonderful birth. "For nothing will be impossible with God" (Luke 1:37).
Mary had asked how this could happen. Commentators separate her question from the doubt of Zacharias, Elizabeth's husband.
What God promised had to be outside the order of nature. Even so, unlike Sarah and Zacharias, it was not distrust that prompted her question. We see this because God let Gabriel give her a full and complete answer… But to strengthen the faith God had already given her, He also sent Gabriel to tell her of His grace to her relative Elizabeth. "For," he said, giving the unchanging basis of all belief, "nothing will be impossible with God."
Both women conceive by God's power, yet the two births are not on the same level. The angel even names Elizabeth as the one "called barren." One writer shows how far apart the two children stand:
John comes as a child of promise. A special gift of God renewed a natural power in his mother. But Jesus comes as Son of God, born by no natural power at all, but by the Holy Spirit, beyond nature altogether. One is the child of a barren wife, the other the child of a virgin… Elizabeth was the mother of the saved, Mary the mother of the Saviour. Elizabeth's child was the sanctified, Mary's the Sanctifier.
The same writer explains why the child of a barren woman pictures the saved. It "tells us of God's grace and gift to those who were found powerless and lacking."
Mary now had two impossible pregnancies to think about, not one.
Gabriel's visit then ended. But first he told Mary that her relative Elizabeth was expecting a child, news she was clearly hearing for the first time. The barren woman was to become fruitful. The virgin was to bear a son. Both were miracles.
Gabriel stops there and says nothing more about Elizabeth's child.
He needed to add nothing more about John. This was enough to move Mary to visit Elizabeth, which was what God intended. Mary's simple faith is beautiful. She gladly took the place of a servant and accepted Gabriel's word, unlike Zacharias, who did not believe (v.38).
The ESV calls Elizabeth Mary's "relative." Older translations say "cousin." People often stretch this family link further than the text allows.
John the Baptist and our Lord were not first cousins, though people often say so by mistake. Mary and Elizabeth were the cousins, as we read in Luke 1:36… God did not send him to identify a relative, but to identify the Son of God, and to bear witness of this to Israel.
- Nearness. After centuries of silence, heaven speaks again. Not in the temple, but in an ordinary home, face to face. God was coming near in grace.
- Evidence. Gabriel gives Mary the lesser wonder to strengthen her faith for the greater one. Six months of it are already there for her to go and see.
- Difference. Elizabeth's son came by a natural power renewed. Mary's Son came beyond nature altogether: mother of the saved, and mother of the Saviour.
- Response. Mary hears just enough to stir her, and answers as a servant. Her question was inquiry, not the distrust of Zacharias.
- Limit. The kinship between the two women is real. But God sent John to identify the Son of God, not a relative.
for nothing shall be impossible with God.
Gabriel has just told Mary that she will have a son, though she has no husband, and pointed her to her relative Elizabeth, who is pregnant in old age. His closing sentence is the ground under the whole announcement, and commentators read it as a word about God's power and as the base of Mary's faith.
The words come at the end of a message that no ordinary birth could explain. One writer treats them as the settling of the whole matter:
This last statement from the angel "who stands in the presence of God" needs no comment. It drives away all doubt for those who will believe. The birth of the Saviour was miraculous, it was by God's power, it was God's work. No man had any part in it; the Son of Mary was holy and undefiled. He was the Son of God... Unbelief says it is against every law of nature, and impossible. Faith answers in the words of Gabriel, who knew God's power well: "nothing will be impossible with God."
Mary had asked how such a thing could happen. One commentator says her faith was already there, and explains why the angel added the news about Elizabeth:
She already had God-given faith. To strengthen it, God sent Gabriel to tell her of His grace to her cousin Elizabeth. "For," he said, giving the unchanging basis of all belief, "nothing will be impossible with God." God would not be God if this were not so; and, as the Lord Himself taught, "All things are possible for one who believes." Mary had learned this deep in her soul. Her answer shows it: "Behold, I am the servant" (the bondservant) "of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word."
Translations differ here because the Greek manuscripts differ. One writer, comparing revised versions with the older English text, notes the change at this exact point:
In verse 37 there is a bold change of reading in the Greek, which gives the wording "no word from God shall be without power."
Read that way, the promise covers more. God can do anything. And every word God speaks carries its own power to happen.
The word Gabriel used is not limited to Mary's situation. One writer applies it beyond the birth itself:
Admit superhuman power, and all difficulty vanishes. "Nothing," we read, "will be impossible with God" — "no thing," neither the virgin birth, nor the raising of the dead!
The same writer presses the point at the level of physical law: "His power is infinite, and no physical law is beyond that power. Nature is clearly subservient to the will of its Maker."
Gabriel had brought a similar promise to Zacharias earlier, and Zacharias had not believed it. He could not speak until his son was born. One commentator traces how that ended:
On the eighth day after the child's birth the father could speak again. He praised God, and prophecy through a human voice returned. It had been silent for ages. Now it burst out afresh as Zacharias blessed God for visiting and redeeming His people... His unbelief had vanished. Nothing will be impossible with God, Gabriel had said, and to that Zacharias added his Amen.
If nothing is impossible with God, the practical question becomes how a person comes to rely on that. One writer connects the promise to the condition of the one who trusts it:
So faith links the believer to the almighty power of God and puts that power to work. We could even say it brings God Himself in to act for His people. That is why, in the words of our Lord, nothing is impossible to them. But never forget that faith is a real thing. It is a divine plant, and it only grows out of the soil of a broken will. First we must come to the end of ourselves and our resources. We must learn how helpless we are. Only then do we throw ourselves on God and depend fully on Him and His power.
- Power — Gabriel's sentence holds up the whole announcement. The birth "was by God's power, it was God's work." No human father had a part in it.
- Basis — One writer calls it "the unchanging basis of all belief," because "God would not be God if this were not so."
- Reach — The word is "no thing." Neither the virgin birth nor the raising of the dead lies outside it. Nature is under the will of its Maker.
- Reading — Some manuscripts give "no word from God shall be without power." Then the promise rests on what God has spoken, not only on what He can do.
- Response — Mary answered by calling herself the Lord's servant. Zacharias doubted first, then added his Amen. Faith like that grows only "out of the soil of a broken will."
And Mary said, Behold the bondmaid of [the] Lord; be it to me according to thy word. And the angel departed from her.
An angel has just told a young woman that she will bear a son who will be called the Son of God. Her answer is short, and it gives away everything: she calls herself the Lord's servant and asks only that His word be done.
Mary does not pick a title of honour. She uses the word for the lowest place in a household; older translations read "handmaid" or "bondmaid." She is not the first believing woman to use it of herself:
In Scripture these words often mean a female slave, as with Hagar the Egyptian, Genesis 25:12. But women also used them of themselves as a term of humility. Hannah spoke this way to the Lord and to Eli, 1 Samuel 1:11, 16, 18. Abigail spoke this way to David, 1 Samuel 25:24-41. And Mary and Elizabeth used it as handmaids of the Lord, Luke 1:38, 48.
By taking that place she claims nothing and controls nothing. One writer sees this as the very thing that makes her great:
The angel tells her of the blessing God's almighty power has given to Elizabeth. Mary bows to the will of her God, the submissive vessel of His purpose. In her piety she sees a height and greatness in these purposes. They left her one place only: subjection to the will of God, as their passive instrument. This was her glory, through the favour of her God.
Earlier in the chapter Zacharias questioned an angel, and God struck him dumb. Mary asked a question too, and nothing like that happened to her. The difference lies in the heart, not in the wording:
"But Mary said to the angel, How will this be, since I am a virgin?" She does not doubt. She asks with confidence. So God does not strike her dumb, and there is no sign of unbelief, as there was with Zacharias, who asked, "How shall I know this?" A question may rise in the spirit and need an answer, yet show no lack of faith. Another question could look much the same and still spring from unbelief. God does not judge by appearance. He judges the heart.
Her answer is not the calm of someone with nothing to lose. It cost her, and one writer shows how faith acts when the cost is plain:
In all the range of Scripture there is no instance of a more exalted faith nor of a more complete submission. She could not be blind to what this might cost her in this world. Matthew tells us that she became an object of suspicion and inner trouble even to Joseph. But faith never reasons and is never confused. It counts on God. If He calls us to any service, or to walk in any path, He will both guide and sustain us, whatever the trial or persecution. The calm of a soul which rests in the will of God is beyond words, and this was Mary's inheritance at this moment.
Her closing words tie her whole future to what God has said. What comes of it is the Son of God coming in flesh:
To Mary the whole thing was supernatural. Her faith marks her as a true-hearted and dependent saint. She could only say, "Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word" (v. 38); and the angel departed from her. She places herself completely in the hands of God, to be His honoured vessel for the incarnation — the coming in flesh of "that holy thing," "Son of the Highest" and "Son of God."
The title she takes here is the one she keeps. Scripture's last picture of her shows nothing changed:
This is the last time Scripture shows Mary the mother of Jesus. She simply takes her place with the rest, humbled by God's grace towards her, not exalted by it. What a grief it would have been to her to know the place a church that had fallen away from the truth would later give her! No one prays to her, and she does not even lead in prayer. She remains what she was at the beginning, "the handmaid of the Lord," and with this she passes out of the history.
At the wedding in Cana her one recorded instruction points away from herself:
And Mary understood it, saying to the servants, Whatever He says to you, do it. She was still the meek bond-servant of the Lord... He, not she, is the One above all to be heard... She herself could not save others, nor plead for them as He does. She needed to pray herself, since she was a sinner like others, to be saved by faith.
- Servant — Mary's word for herself means a household slave. Hannah and Abigail used it too, as a term of humility.
- Servant asks — Her question carried no unbelief. God judges the heart, not the form of the words, so no rebuke came.
- Servant yields — Bowing to God's will left her nothing of her own. That was her glory.
- Servant pays — Even Joseph suspected her. Faith does not reason out the cost; it counts on God to guide and sustain.
- Servant stays — At the end she is praying with others, not prayed to. She is still what she called herself here: the Lord's handmaid.