Good Friday
Round Golgotha Hell’s engines roar
The shrieking demons cry Man’s doom
Christ’s broken body, hanging slack,
The darkened sky, the deepening gloom
The broken bread, the wine outpoured,
Prefigured in the Upper Room
Dereliction of the Lord
The journey to the stranger’s tomb
Disciples hiding, self -absorbed,
Who fondly dreamed He was the One
One more Messiah sacrificed
Their dream of sovereignty undone
The Golden Gate, the Palm strewn road
The welcome to great David’s heir
Now but a distant memory
All is confusion and despair
The Temple veil is rent in twain
The God in Man at last revealed
The Body on the rock shelf laid
The stone in place, the tomb is sealed.
The women and the angels weep
All but this lone apostle fled
The Light and Life of all the world
Now roams the realm of shadowed dead
Deep in this prison of the lost
The victim of the Calvary
Absolves Eve from her mortal sin
And sets poor foolish Adam free
Meanwhile the night-time Zion stirs
We are no longer Satan’s slaves
The Resurrection song resounds
The holy dead rise from their graves
The demons, terror-struck, in flight
Before this Third triumphant Day
Broken down the Gates of Hell
Death is undone and Christ holds sway
And so we climb this ancient hill
To kneel before our dying Lord
Whose death brings life to mortal Man
Whose wounds have paid our sins’ rewards
We venerate the Cross of Christ
Our lips upon the bloodstained wood
Heartbreak and sorrow for our sins
Upon this Friday we call ‘Good’