This study considers a prophecy given in Scripture and the record of its fulfilment. The prophets spoke long before the events they described, and the account of fulfilment is part of why the text commands attention.
The Prophecy
The prophecy of Isaiah 7:14 was spoken by the prophet Isaiah to King Ahaz of Judah, a king whose heart was shaken with fear. Ahaz faced a coalition of enemies—Rezin king of Syria and Pekah king of Israel—who sought to dethrone him and install their own puppet ruler. The Lord sent Isaiah to meet Ahaz and urged him to stand firm in faith, offering him the opportunity to ask for a sign, “either in the depth, or in the height above.” Ahaz refused, hiding unbelief behind false piety. In response, the Lord Himself declared He would give a sign regardless of the king’s refusal. The prophecy reads: “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”
The word rendered “virgin” is the Hebrew *almah*, and the name “Immanuel” means “God with us.” The prophecy had an immediate context—the deliverance of Judah from its enemies—but its full weight reached far beyond Ahaz’s crisis. The sign was given to the house of David, and its ultimate fulfillment would come in the birth of a child who was truly God dwelling among His people. The prophet spoke of a conception that would be a sign from the Lord Himself: not merely a natural birth, but a supernatural one, a virgin conceiving and bearing a son whose very name testified that God had come near.
The Fulfilment
Matthew records the fulfillment in the birth of Jesus Christ. Mary was “espoused to Joseph,” bound in a formal betrothal, and “before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost.” Joseph, described as “a just man,” resolved to divorce her quietly rather than shame her publicly. But the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.” The angel declared the child’s name and mission: “thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins.”
Matthew then states plainly that all this came to pass “that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet,” and he quotes Isaiah 7:14: “Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.” The text is precise: Mary conceived before she and Joseph came together, and the conception was by the Holy Spirit, not by man. The child was named Jesus, yet the prophecy’s name Emmanuel is applied to Him in the sense of its meaning—God with us. Matthew does not claim the prophecy had no earlier application; he claims its ultimate fulfillment is found in Jesus, born of a virgin, truly God present among His people.
Why It Matters
Fulfilled prophecy demonstrates that Scripture is not a merely human book but the Word of the living God, who alone knows the end from the beginning. Isaiah spoke roughly seven centuries before Christ, and his words were not vague or generic; they named a specific sign—a virgin conceiving and bearing a son—that found its resolution in the birth of Jesus. Matthew, writing under the inspiration of the Spirit, did not manufacture the connection; he reported what God had done and showed it matched what God had said.
This matters because the reliability of Scripture rests on the character of the God who speaks. If God can foretell a virgin birth and then accomplish it, He can be trusted in everything else He has promised. The prophecy and its fulfillment together declare that God is with us—not in a distant, abstract sense, but in the person of Jesus Christ, who came to save His people from their sins. The sign given to Ahaz became the salvation given to the world.
Passages
- The prophecy: Isaiah 7:14
- The fulfilment: Matthew 1:18-23