An Oracle of Promised Mourning

The oracle of promised doom by the shepherd of Tekoa was reminiscent of history’s most dreadful day. He told of bitter mourning that would reverberate throughout creation.

“And on that day,” declares the Lord God,
“I will make the sun go down at noon
    and darken the earth in broad daylight.

I will turn your feasts into mourning
    and all your songs into lamentation;

I will bring sackcloth on every waist

and baldness on every head;

I will make it like the mourning for an only son
    and the end of it like a bitter day.”

[Amos 8:9-10 ESV]

The rejoicing and glad tidings of the national festival stilled.

All laughter and singing extinguished.

The day began in exuberant celebration. Then all color was wrung right out of the chilled, thick air. 

Straight-up Noon, darkness prevailed.

Creation, cloaked in grave clothes, mourned the execution of its Creator.

Time droned three endless hours. Then the earth quaked and great boulders cracked as eggs.

Golgotha’s crest heaved sorrow. And all through Jerusalem that holy feast day, those touched in the course of three hope-filled years bereaved the man called Jesus.

Heaven and earth mourned God’s Only Son while Promise worked a cave-held miracle.

Long, dark shadows of mourning shattered in Easter morning light.

The shredded fringe of the temple veil, left flapping in spring’s breeze.