For that expression, when we take time to think of it, is never applied to any other child in all the world but Mary's Child. And it is a very startling, and indeed staggering expression to be found applied to her Child, to hear Him called that thing, even when it is added, that holy thing. But the evangelist's so startling expression has the seal of the Holy Ghost set upon it. Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth. Human nature in all its stages and in all its conditions is a very wonderful thing.
Human nature is by far the most wonderful thing in our whole universe of things.
At the same time, human nature is but a thing, till a far more wonderful thing than itself is incorporated and identified with it. And, in like manner, when 'that holy thing,' which was conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost in the womb of the Virgin Mary, was taken up into Himself by the Son of God, that holy thing henceforward and for ever becomes and abides part and parcel of the Son of God. The only Redeemer of God's elect is the Lord Jesus Christ, who, being the Eternal Son of God, became man, and so was, and continueth to be, God and man in two distinct natures, and one person, for ever. Christ, the Son of God, became man, by taking to Himself a true body, and a reasonable soul, being conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost, in the womb of the Virgin Mary, and born of her, yet without sin. Now, it was that true body and that reasonable soul, taken together, which constituted that holy thing of which the angel here speaks in such salutation and in such congratulation to the mother of our Lord.