Thanks so much for writing to us here at TruthBook.com with this important question.

Your assumption that the incarnation of Jesus occurred through physical sex is correct. Mary and Joseph were average human beings of their time, married to each other, and all of the children that they produced through their sexual union were also human beings, including their eldest child, Jesus. Of course, they were specifically chosen for this singular honor, but nonetheless, they were very much like any other mother and father.

It had to be this way, else Jesus could have never claimed to be son of man, as well as Son of God. He was first a human being—just like you and me—and it is this fact that creates such a love of humankind for this son of man. He lived his life as a mortal of the realm and he accomplished his mission, which was to reveal the loving character of God to a whole world—even to a whole universe.

I grew up in a traditional, institutionalized church—specifically, the Catholic Church—and I can remember being taught that this incarnation occurred through the “Holy Spirit,” and I also remember Mary depicted with a dove above her head—this being the way that she somehow became impregnated (the “Holy Spirit” being represented by a dove). His birth was also shrouded in mystery, as if he somehow simply “appeared” in the stable of Bethlehem. Even as a child, I found this to be an incredible story, although I did accept it as just one more of those “mysteries” that the Church was so fond of. But somehow, it also distanced Jesus from me, as it was pretty clear that no other human being on the planet was created in this way. So, I was left wondering: Is Jesus a human like me, or not?

I hope this idea that Jesus was conceived from sexual intercourse is not too shocking an idea for you…my feeling is that the churches have long been reluctant to teach that sex could somehow have been involved in the incarnation of God into a human being. Sex is something that schoolchildren in religious institutions are often warned about as something possibly less-than-wholesome. There may be a suspicion that imagining Jesus’ natural origins may somehow “taint” him because of this erroneous thinking about sex. But, I find this truth to be liberating and enlightening, placing Jesus and me on the same playing field, as it were. I know now that he truly IS one of us…and it makes his life accomplishments all the more meaningful.

Once I found The Urantia Book, I was greatly relieved to read this story with new eyes and with a new understanding of Jesus’ humanity. Once I realized that he was truly one of us, his bestowal mission gained a poignancy and a reality that I never imagined before.

However, as we know, Jesus was also a divine being—in reality, God incarnate. How can this be? Below, I am adding some passages from The Urantia Book that may help your understanding; however, even the revelators admit that they are not able to fathom just how this incarnation of God into a human life vehicle happened. It will forever remain a mystery:

120:4.5 Urantia mortals have varying concepts of the miraculous, but to us who live as citizens of the local universe there are few miracles, and of these by far the most intriguing are the incarnational bestowals of the Paradise Sons. The appearance in and on your world, by apparently natural processes, of a divine Son, we regard as a miracle—the operation of universal laws beyond our understanding. Jesus of Nazareth was a miraculous person.

Some other passages (bolding is mine)

122:3.4 Gabriel’s announcement to Mary was made the day following the conception of Jesus and was the only event of supernatural occurrence connected with her entire experience of carrying and bearing the child of promise.

122:8.1 All that night Mary was restless so that neither of them slept much. By the break of day the pangs of childbirth were well in evidence, and at noon, August 21, 7 B.C., with the help and kind ministrations of women fellow travelers, Mary was delivered of a male child. Jesus of Nazareth was born into the world, was wrapped in the clothes which Mary had brought along for such a possible contingency, and laid in a near-by manger.

122:8.2 In just the same manner as all babies before that day and since have come into the world, the promised child was born; and on the eighth day, according to the Jewish practice, he was circumcised and formally named Joshua (Jesus).

120:0.1 To live such identical lives as he imposes upon the intelligent beings of his own creation, thus to bestow himself in the likeness of his various orders of created beings, is a part of the price which every Creator Son must pay for the full and supreme sovereignty of his self-made universe of things and beings.

120:1.1 “My Creator brother, I am about to witness your seventh and final universe bestowal. Most faithfully and perfectly have you executed the six previous commissions, and I entertain no thought but that you will be equally triumphant on this, your terminal sovereignty bestowal. Heretofore you have appeared on your bestowal spheres as a fully developed being of the order of your choosing. Now you are about to appear upon Urantia, the disordered and disturbed planet of your choice, not as a fully developed mortal, but as a helpless babe. This, my comrade, will be a new and untried experience for you. You are about to pay the full price of bestowal and to experience the complete enlightenment of the incarnation of a Creator in the likeness of a creature.

These following passages are verbatim from The Urantia Book:

120:4.2 But make no mistake; Christ Michael, while truly a dual-origin being, was not a double personality. He was not God in association with man but, rather, God incarnate in man. And he was always just that combined being. The only progressive factor in such a nonunderstandable relationship was the progressive self-conscious realization and recognition (by the human mind) of this fact of being God and man.

120:4.3 Christ Michael did not progressively become God. God did not, at some vital moment in the earth life of Jesus, become man. Jesus was God and man—always and even forevermore. And this God and this man were, and now are, one, even as the Paradise Trinity of three beings is in reality one Deity.

120:4.4 Never lose sight of the fact that the supreme spiritual purpose of the Michael bestowal was to enhance the revelation of God.

120:4.6 In and through all this extraordinary experience, God the Father chose to manifest himself as he always does—in the usual way—in the normal, natural, and dependable way of divine acting.

Thanks again for writing to us with this great question. Sex is a normal, natural, and wholesome activity which produces and replenishes humanity upon the earth. The fact that Jesus’ physical being was produced in the same way as yours and mine is a good thing, in my view. We were all created this way—it is part of God’s plan, and so it is normal and natural that Jesus—the son of man—should also have been created in this way as well.

Again, thanks for your question, and please feel free to write again at any time!