Hemin Sare Galana Lyrics (හෙමින් සැරෙ ගලනා) by Bro. Charles Thomas

Slowly, gently flowing,
in the tears of your eyes,
falling from your body,
in the streams of warm blood,
washing away every one of my sins,
you gave me salvation on the cross,
Jesus, my Lord

Shedding your blood upon the cross, my Lord,
bearing the tenfold sorrow all alone,
to save us, you gave up your very life,
and you reigned upon the cross
Yet never even now, my Lord, not once,
have you truly reigned within us
inside our own hearts you have been left alone,
imprisoned in a tear

This is a Passion hymn that begins in adoration of the crucified Christ but ends with a gentle, searching challenge to the worshipper. It opens by gazing at two things flowing from Jesus on the cross, “the tears of your eyes” and “the streams of warm blood” falling from his body, and it reads both as the means of salvation, “washing away every one of my sins, you gave me salvation on the cross.” The tears and the blood together are the price of grace.

The second verse deepens the picture of what that cost involved: “shedding your blood upon the cross, bearing the tenfold sorrow all alone, to save us, you gave up your very life.” And it uses a striking phrase, “you reigned upon the cross,” the paradox at the heart of Christian faith that Jesus is most truly king not on a throne but nailed to the wood, ruling by love and sacrifice rather than force.

But then the hymn turns and looks at us, and the ending is quietly convicting. “Yet never even now, my Lord, not once, have you truly reigned within us.” The one who reigns from the cross has, ironically, not been allowed to reign in the hearts of those he died for. Worse, “inside our own hearts you have been left alone, imprisoned in a tear.” Christ, who set us free, sits confined and lonely within us, honoured with a tear but not enthroned. What the listener is left with is both wonder and a summons, gratitude for the King who reigned from the cross, and the uncomfortable, loving question of whether we have actually let him reign in us, or merely kept him locked away.