In The Fullness of Time

God is spirit, and He created both the spiritual world and the physical world. From time to time in the Old Testament God appeared in a physical form to interact on a personal basis with individuals. We understand that this was Jesus, and these instances are refereed to by Bible scholars as appearances of the "pre-incarnate Christ". One example can be found in Joshua 5, when prior to the battle of Jericho, Joshua looks up and sees a man standing opposite him with a sword drawn. "Are you for us or for our adversaries?" asks Joshua, and the man answers; "No; rather I indeed come now as captain of the host of the Lord." And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and bowed down, and said to him, "What has my lord to say to his servant?" And the captain of the Lord's host said to Joshua, "Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy." That this was Jesus instead of an angel is known because in scripture angels never accept worship, but God does.

All people born after Adam and Eve sinned were born with a spirit that is dead (separated from God), and this included Mary (Rom. 3:23) Mary was chosen by God to provide the human dimension that would unite with God so that Jesus could be born human. From Mary came an egg that had the potential for a body, soul and spirit person. In Luke 1 the angel Gabriel says to Mary; The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; and for that reason the holy Child shall be called the Son of God". The Holy Spirit provided what was needed for the egg to become fertilized, and the result was something totally new. Jesus, who was not the Father but was one with the Father, who always was and through whom all things were created, became a human whose makeup was totally human; body, soul and spirit.

The one difference was that because He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, His spirit was alive to God. There must be a defect in the DNA of man, caused by the sin of Adam, that causes the spiritual deformity leading to a dead spirit. And Jesus did not have the defective gene that would normally come from the father. Even though Jesus's spirit was alive and in union with God, He was still in a position where His communication with the Father came through prayer and through His having learned to listen to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The gifts of the Spirit and the miracles performed came not because Jesus was God. Recall that Jesus often spent entire nights in prayer, and that His ministry began after His baptism by John, when the Holy Spirit descended upon Him. The Holy Spirit then drives Jesus into the wilderness where after 40 days He is tempted in the flesh; "tell this stone to become bread", and in the soul; All this domain and it's glory will become yours if you fall down and worship me." (Luke 4). And Satan also suggested to Jesus that it would be much easier for Him if He simply jumped off the temple tower and got caught by angels (so the people would immediately proclaim Him the messiah).

The good news for us as believers is that because of what Jesus did on the cross, our sins are forgiven, our spirits are reborn, and we have dwelling in us the same Holy Spirit that moved in power through Jesus. In remaining sinless Jesus was the spotless sacrificial lamb, able to be the perfect substitute to meet God's demand, truly human, and truly God.