“What was the greatest work of wonder that ever God did in the world? It was the incarnation of the Son of God:
‘How long wilt thou go about, O thou backsliding daughter? For the LORD hath created a new thing in the earth, a woman shall compass a man.’ (Jeremiah 31:22)
God has created (says the prophet, speaking of it) a new thing in the earth, a woman should encompass in her womb that Gheber (גֶּבֶר), that strong and giant-like man, Christ, God and man, without the help of man.
Now at the instant time and moment when this was to be done, there was a manifestation and declaration of all three persons in it.
A record is extant how all, though invisibly, concurred in it, not darkly, with an ‘us‘ in general words, as at the creation, ‘Let us make man,’ but clearly and distinctly.
And as at the transfiguration of Christ (which Peter sees as the solemnest and most glorious manifestation of God that ever he had been an eye and ear-witness of, 2 Peter 1:16-17) you find, to grace the solemnity of it, Moses, Christ, and Elijah talking and conferring together. So here, there is the very conference recorded.
It was a set and solemn conference in heaven, and the words spoken set down at the instant of Christ’s conception, the Father declaring His decree about it to the Son, and the Son speaking to the Father of His willingness to it.
Paul hath recorded and set down the very words as a great secret, (as it must be accounted) in Hebrews 10:5: ‘When He comes into the world He says…’ It is the Son of God he speaks of, as existing before He took man’s nature.
The words that follow are expressly said to be spoken by Him at the time, instant, or moment of His coming into the world and His being made flesh when He came into the world, as prophesied of by David. And Paul affirms He then did utter them.
His taking of flesh was a going forth from His Father (as He Himself styles it in John), the setting out upon the greatest adventure and design that ever was.”
–Thomas Goodwin, “The Work of the Holy Ghost in Our Salvation,” The Works of Thomas Goodwin, Volume 6 (Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage, 1862/2021), 6: 418.
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