God with us

 

This week, I lingered in the final breath of Malachi’s words and I felt the unbearable weight of what followed.

When the prophet finished speaking, heaven did not answer.

The echo of his voice faded…and then… nothing.

Four hundred years of silence.

No open vision.

No burning word.

No prophet rising with fire in his bones.

No “Thus says the Lord” breaking the darkness.

Four hundred years of waiting.

Of longing.

Of groaning.

Of hearts lifted toward heaven that seemed sealed shut.

Generation after generation was born into the quiet.

They lived.

They died.

And still—no voice.

Until one night.

On a dirt floor in a forgotten place… 

in a stable that did not look holy…

in the shadows of obscurity and insignificance…

a sound was released.

After four hundred years, heaven spoke again—

not with thunder, not with fire, not from a mountain- but from the lungs of a newborn.

A cry pierced the silence.

A cry that split history in two.

A cry that carried eternity within it.

In that moment, the King of Glory stepped down into the dust of His own creation.

The Eternal wrapped Himself in skin.

The Word became flesh—and cried.

The Son laid aside His throne and chose a manger.

Heaven’s highest treasure placed in a feeding trough.

He came low.

He came meek.

He came breakable.

Wrapped in swaddling cloths, laid where animals ate, born beneath the looming shadow of a cross.

A Lamb born to be slain.

The Hope of a hopeless world breathed His first breath in the dark.

A weary world rejoiced as a young virgin labored and delivered its redemption.

In that manger, the Great I AM made Himself vulnerable.

Touchable. 

Killable.

And with one holy cry, the silence was shattered.

The separation was broken.

The way was opened.

Then, suddenly, heaven could not remain quiet.

The skies erupted with angelic voices declaring,

“Glory to God in the highest!”

Wonderful.

Counselor.

Mighty God.

Everlasting Father.

Prince of Peace.

With the cry of an infant, heaven invaded earth.

Behold—our Redeemer.

Behold—our King.

Behold—the fulfillment of every promise.

Behold—the sound that broke four hundred years of silence.

Not the roar of an army.

Not the shout of a king claiming His crown.

But the fragile cry of God-with-us.

He did not arrive with a sword in His hand, but with nails already written into His future.

He did not enter wrapped in royalty, but in cloths that foretold a burial.

The silence was not just broken, it was answered.

Every unanswered prayer.

Every tear cried into the dark.

Every generation that waited without seeing.

Every promise that seemed delayed but not denied.

All of it converged in that single cry.

That night, heaven did not just speak- heaven gave.

God did not send another prophet.

He did not send another sign.

He sent Himself.

And in that stable, eternity took its first shallow breath.

Omnipotence learned weakness.

Glory learned humility.

Love made itself small.

The cry that shattered the silence would one day be echoed again- not from a manger, but from a cross.

The first cry said, “He has come.”

The final cry would say, “It is finished.”

From swaddling cloths to grave clothes, from a feeding trough to a borrowed tomb, He came to be broken so we could be made whole.

And even now, that sound still reverberates.

It calls the weary.

It awakens the forgotten.

It reaches into the places where heaven has felt silent again.

If God could speak through the cry of a baby,

He can still break silence in our darkest night.

So behold Him.

Not distant.

Not untouchable.

Not unmoved.

But Emmanuel.

God with us.

-Jessica Jecker Simply Jecker