I stood that day away from the Cross-silhouette hill
Afraid to look, yet aware of the figure so still–
He was the one they called Jesus of Nazareth.
Once a babe of lowly birth
Then a man who walked the earth
Teaching the worth of life
And love’s win over strife.
I stood that morning as women to his tomb did come
(He whose memory was now but a grief-whispered name)
With their spices, love’s last labour to perform.
When hark! the echo’d voice
“He is not here! He is risen!”
Broke open death’s prison.
An empty tomb–a sign to rejoice.
I stand today in the dew-dappled dawn
Awake from sleep, the night curtains drawn.
This sun-rise day we meet
And friend to friend I greet
“He is risen! He is risen indeed!”
And I know anew that a seed
Must needs die to bring forth Life.
Originally published in the April 1969 issue of Methodist Message. Reprinted in Candles of the Lord, 1987.
Betty Yap was a field worker in Christian Education, Northern Malaya District, in 1969.