There is lots of mystery surrounding the Holy Spirit in modern Christianity but the Bible does not support the mystery. I spend time exploring how that relates to conception here but my main article is The Holy Spirit and You.
Just Common Sense
Towards diffusing some of the mystery there are a few logical issues that I believe we can get out of the way early to make it easier to appreciate my understanding of this topic.
That too
Before I go into explaining what I mean by this point (conception and the Holy Spirit) I want to explain my objection to the use of the word power to describe the Holy Spirit. It is very difficult to argue with someone who prefers to say that the Holy Spirit IS God's power because the word power can mean almost anything. As a matter of fact that is precisely the point; because it means almost anything it means nothing. It is what I call a that too word. A man has good driving dexterity, it is power; someone can cook well, that too; some one is strong, that too; an if you object and claim that you don't mean all that sissy stuff, that too. Whatever you choose to include or exclude it is that too.
The concept of a presence is intuitive to man
People in ordinary life at times say I felt a presence. We all know what they mean. It is referring to supernatural life in close proximity. It seems like people have it right when referring to demons but when it refers to God it is relegated to power. A presence means more than power alone and it is a more precise description of the facts.
The use of language constructs to define the Holy Spirit
In my opinion the use of language constructs to define the Holy Spirit can at times be the result of over zealousness. Earlier I used some language constructs in the book of Psalms which I think are very appropriate since psalms are songs. Songs tend to make use of poetic language. In books like Luke where someone is using the reported speech of someone who is relating what God told an angel to say, I believe that the assumption of language constructs is stretching it a bit. Luke starts out by stressing to Theophilus (who seemed to be an official) his focus on accuracy, then I believe that the angel was not interested in flowery language but on explaining with irrefutable accuracy what he was instructed to convey. Looking at the incident in this manner leads to what I have described below.
God Becoming Man
The incident of God becoming man demonstrates some things clearly. For God to become bonded with another individual so that that individual can produce something that is both God and man requires that part of God is at some point in the individual as part of the embryo and that part develops into a whole being. That part must of necessity have the potential to become God or else there is no possibility of a God-man. Is that thing God or isn't it? Was I me before I was fully developed? Was I human? If what was there was Holy Spirit then it is more than power in the sense that we conceptualise power. It is the being. The being is present.
Human beings are made of cells. All cells are you in the sense that every cell at some point can produce a you. Skin grafting and other medical transplants work because the cells are all you. organ rejection occurs when the cells are not you. All of your cells have identical markers in the DNA identifying them as you. In the same way, any little bit of God is fully God. Since God is spirit any little bit of that spirit has the potential of reproducing Him. From Job we get that there is an intangible component to man and some unseen force of God gives us cognition. The Bible indicates that it unites with the spirit in man (Job 32:8, Ecclesiastes 3:21) and like joins with like.
In all of the kingdoms that we know like reproduces like. The exceptions are hybrids which are a combination of different species. The way that the hybrid is created is by a combination of two kinds and in higher beings they must be of two different genders. There is nothing to suggest that the birth of Christ differed from this pattern.
We see that the terminology here agrees with the normal practise. There is conception which is as would be expected. Artificial insemination and surrogate motherhood shows how this is possible with humans. A spiritual version took place with Mary.
Now look at verse 35. There is an argument The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee
is a repetition of the same thing in different words but I believe that it should read something like The holy Spirit will happen to you (as at Pentecost where they received a part of God) and following this you will be under the influence of God's power (i.e. by the part of God that now resides in you). God has no actual shadow to overshadow anybody but figuratively it shows that He is in very close proximity. close enough to scrutinise and control every activity. Once God is fully in control then He will produce a son over a period of time.
With this understanding we see that the same thing that happened to Moses so that he did not age, and that happened to Solomon and transformed his brain, and happened to so many people that were healed to repair their limbs, also happened to Mary to make her pregnant. The Holy Spirit did all these by changing physiology. There is nothing weird going on here.
Lets look at some places where these terms are used.
The following is using the term come upon
. Notice that in acts it shows that the term can mean conversion as with what happened on Pentecost.
Thin next group relates to overshadowed. Clearly the term does not mean overshadow as in tower over or cast a shadow of gloom. What it seems to refer to is that for some period under consideration you become the focus of an action of the Holy Spirit.
What happened to Mary is very similar to what the others experienced at Pentecost where the same Luke uses the same phrase. There is no doubt that Mary was converted before God permitted her to carry His Son but in Mary's case it went further. That Spiritual merger took over control of her reproductive system and caused it to conceive because that was God's will and God's Spirit always does God's will. God's Spirit causes our minds to change but it can also cause our bodies to change (as with healing when Peters shadow passed). So which part of God was present with Mary? God is all spirit. God has no reproductive organs because we are like Him and He said that in that regard we are like the angels. God is just spirit and any bit of His Spirit does whatever He wants it to.
This tiny part of us also hosts our personality. We receive a bit of the Spirit which makes us a hybrid just as Christ was, except that He did not have just a bit of Spirit when He developed to be a man. Christ was fully a man but also fully God because of the measure (or lack of measure) of the Spirit which He had. That Spirit was not His power only, it was His life force. It was Him. It gave Him power but it was more. Christ was given Spirit from the womb just like John the Baptist. It transformed the normal embryo into a God-man. Spirit is what makes God God
, just as the energies in an embryo makes it whatever it becomes. It is the force of its life. I prefer not to refer to this as power but as presence.
As a consequence of this we can appreciate the following extract from Matthew much differently than most people.
The cell and DNA
Nowadays the function of DNA is commonly known. It it is a blueprint of the creature. Each cell carries the same blueprint. In physical conception the blueprint of one creature is merged with the blueprint of another to create a composite of the two creatures. It only takes a small part of the creature to fully participate in the merger but the product demonstrates qualities of both parents. A god-man is similar. A God man is combining flesh and spirit so there must be a merger on two levels. Since spirit and flesh do not merge the there must be a spirit in man to comine witht the spirit from God.
(Job 32:8 [KJV]) But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding.
God is not flesh so He has no flesh to contribute. So we have Mary contributing the flesh and God contributing the spirit to replace the normal spirit in man. The spirit that is normally in man is now totally a replica of God's spiritual DNA and so it produces an exact replica of Him spiritually. When the physical being is immature it cannot have the total physical capability of the person but as it grows it will be able to take on all the dexterity and prowess of the original. So you can grow a physical replica of a person but it takes time before the body develops to its full capacity and this analogy suggests that you can grow a spiritual replica of a person too but it is not the person. The person exists only when that vessel contains the consciousness of the original person. As human beings we do not know how to transfer consciousness or even what it is. We measure it by brain activity but how do you measure brain activity in something that has no matter? Since spiritual beings have consciousness then it must be something that exists on the spiritual level and does not depend on physical things like brain activity. It exists and God can store and retrieve it. He proved it by doing it on Himself. It seems that as Christ grew physically to gain complete physically dexterity He also grew spiritually to be complete and to be able to have His consciousness fully restored.
(Luke 2:41-50 KJV)41 Now his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the passover. 42 And when he was twelve years old, they went up to Jerusalem after the custom of the feast. 43 And when they had fulfilled the days, as they returned, the child Jesus tarried behind in Jerusalem; and Joseph and his mother knew not of it. 44 But they, supposing him to have been in the company, went a day’s journey; and they sought him among their kinsfolk and acquaintance. 45 And when they found him not, they turned back again to Jerusalem, seeking him. 46 And it came to pass, that after three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them, and asking them questions. 47 And all that heard him were astonished at his understanding and answers. 48 And when they saw him, they were amazed: and his mother said unto him, Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing. 49 And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business? 50 And they understood not the saying which he spake unto them.
So the situation presented by God is not strange in any negative sense of the word. It is not spooky or on some plane of higher awareness. It is practical information for normal everyday people to understand. He never developed a spiritual body while on earth so the miracles were done by the power of the Holy Spirit supplied by the Father but He had His spiritual mind where men have a natural mind.
I Corinthians 2:11-14 KJV11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. 12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. 13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. 14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
God knows us by His spirit. God's spirit gives Him true awareness of us. Without His spirit present in us He does not know us anymore than we can know a puppy or a pet bird. We are different because of our DNA but with His spirit present He knows us with all of His being. He knows how things taste to us, smell to us, feel to us etc. as well as what we think about things because all of those parts are in His Spirit.
Now back to where we started. Christ was filled with the Holy Spirit but the power came from the Father.
John 5:30 KJV I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me.
John 14:10 [KJV] Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.
It was always a collaborative effort. The power came from the Father but it was not the Father because the Father is a person not just raw power. They were fully in sync so that Christ could draw on the Father's power at any time. The power resided with the Father not with the Spirit that was in Christ but the Spirit gave him access. In other words the Father was present through the Holy Spirit or in other words the Holy Spirit is the presence of God.