Pause For Thought - In The Tempest, But Not Shaken!
The Archbishop of York and Her Majesty The Queen pictured in 2009.Wednesday 15th February 2012
The Archbishop of York today paid tribute to Her Majesty The Queen in her Diamond Jubilee year. His Pause For Thought with Chris Evans follows:PAUSE FOR THOUGHT
Radio 2
Wednesday 15th February 2012
Theme: In The Tempest, But Not Shaken
I was nearly three years old when the Queen was crowned in 1952. In a Ugandan village the BBC World Service brought the Coronation Service into our home. We stood up and joined in the singing of the British Empire anthem, as my father called it. We sang it in Luganda: Ayi Katonda Kuuma Kabaka Atufuga: God safeguard the Sovereign, our Ruler.
In a broadcast to the nation and empire at that time, the Queen said,
“My whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family.”
She has been, and she continues to be.
The winds of change swept away the British Empire but not the imperial family. How come? Because the Queen’s faith in God who lived among us in Jesus Christ, her love of the global family, her service and commitment to duty, her humility and loyalty, have largely helped to turn the ‘imperial family’ into the Commonwealth of Nations – of which she is the Head.
Two lines in the popular hymn ‘Abide with me’ express something of what the Queen would have experienced throughout her sixty year reign:
“Change and decay in all around I see;
O thou who changest not, abide with me”
It is a testament to her trust and commitment that she has lived through this ‘change and decay’ without becoming pessimistic or defeatist. She has looked “at tempests and has never been shaken”[1]. Because she is standing on the rock of faith and her duty.
And so, in her address to Parliament, to mark the start of her Golden Jubilee Celebration in 2002, she was able say, “Change is a constant; managing it has become an expanding discipline. The way we embrace it defines our future.”
Things, people, we, our world, constantly change: God doesn’t. He is the same yesterday, and today, and forever.