Disclaimer: I write stories, not hymns; and owning lions is usually a bad idea. Just sayin'.
What can wash away my sin?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
Oh, precious is the flow
that makes me white as snow!
No other fount I know:
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
Clouds frowned at the small figure climbing the hill. The browning grass bowed under his feet. The wind pulled harder as he stood unprotected on the crown of the hill. The Stone gave off a numbing cold when he laid his hand upon it.
"When a willing victim, who had committed no treachery, was killed in a traitor's stead…." Round and round he plodded, passing his fingers over the ancient runes in the Stone. He stopped and leaned on the Stone. A tear welled up and he blinked it out. Round and round the single clause spun in his mind. "When a willing victim, who had committed no treachery, was killed in a traitor's stead…."
"… the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward."
He turned, surprised, but not startled. There, unaffected by the dark clouds, frigid wind, and dead Stone, stood the Lion: golden, warm, alive.
"Child," His rich voice rumbled, "why do you stand here in the cold?"
He indicated the Table. "You know, my Lord," he answered numbly.
"Why do you fear the past, child?"
He huddled into his cloak. "I remember… what I was. Who I was."
The Lion took a step forward, bringing a wave of warmth with Him. "Remember, child. Remember what I did."
He turned to face the Table again. A solitary snowflake drifted from the heavens, bringing with it the first of winter. Winter. He shivered at the memory. Stone, all was stone. Figures frozen in time behind forbidding walls. His own heart, turned so easily by temptation. Even the Table before him. "But it was because of what I did."
Another step, another warm breath. "And I freed you from that."
The fragile crystal wafted closer. He followed its course, predicting its landing on a stain on the Stone. His blood. Red was that stain, oh so red. All he could see was red. "When a willing victim, who had committed no treachery, was killed in a traitor's stead…."
The Lion surrounded him, wrapping him in a living embrace, shielding him from the wind. "Red were your faults, child. But what I did…."
The snowflake alighted on the stain, contrasting starkly.
"What I did made you white as snow."
The cold he felt dissipated into the Lion's warmth and he looked up at Him. Snow fell around them, but he was lost on islands of green in a sea of gold. "White… as snow," he repeated. "When a willing victim, who had committed no treachery, was killed in a traitor's stead…." "… the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward."
The Lion's eyes reached into his very soul. "Never forget that, my son. Come, it is time you returned home."
He climbed onto the Lion's back and looked again at the Table. The stain was nowhere to be seen. White, oh so white. Everything around him was white except for the golden glory which whisked him homeward. He drank in the first snow: it held no fear for him.
He was white as snow.
Jesus paid it all!
All to Him I owe.
Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow.
Author's note: Please review!