“In the case of a will, it is necessary
to prove the death of the one who made it, because a will is in force only when
somebody has died; it never takes effect while the one who made it is living.
(Hebrews 9:16, 17, NIV)
Elizabeth and Phillip were in Kenya
when her father died. He had been recovering from surgery and illness, but had
seemed to be regaining his strength.
Somewhere in the night, probably in the earliest hours of February 6, he
took his last breath. Far from
home, unbeknownst to her or anyone else, Elizabeth’s next breath was that of a
Monarch.
She flew home immediately, cutting
short the tour she and Phillip had undertaken in his place. That night the Accession Council met in
London, setting in motion the events that would proclaim her reign throughout
her kingdom, lands, and dominions all over the world, but Elizabeth was only
then on her way to catch a jungle plane that would take her to the next stage
of her sorrowful journey home. She
traveled all night and long into the next day, and at last, on February 7, she
came down the steps of a BOAC aircraft to her waiting privy counselors, all
dressed in black, and as she did, they bowed their heads. She, too, wore mourning clothes that
had been included in her luggage, a part of the never-failing preparedness of
those who serve the royal family.
“This is a very tragic homecoming,” Elizabeth said to
Winston Churchill, who stood at the head of the line of her counselors, and
indeed it was. The love she had
for her father, indeed for all her family, was deep and true. She belonged to an immensely happy
family, full of mutual love and comforts and understanding. She entered into her reign, not
exulting in privilege or power, but in grief and duty.
No more would she be free to follow
Phillip to Malta and live as normal a life as she had ever known as a Navy
Lieutenant’s wife. No more was she
The Princess Elizabeth, charming and delightful and relatively safe from
censure and failure. No more would
she be able to work alongside her beloved father, which had been her joy. Now she would have to stand, alone in
his place. Now it was her own
place, for good or ill.
It is lonely at the top, and
rightly viewed, this is true at the pinnacle of every life, where no one can
choose for us or do for us what must be done. There we are in solitude with the Lord. His death marked our accession, from
darkness to light, from lost to found, and from shameful to sacred. The Scripture says that once we were not
a people, now we are God’s own.
Once we were without mercy, and now we have received mercy. Now we are a royal priesthood. (1 Peter 2:10) No earthly ceremony can accomplish such
a consecration, but we who live by faith have acceded to great honor and
responsibility. Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift, Jesus Christ and LIFE in Him!
Elizabeth’s Coronation Day certainly
highlighted the splendors and the obligations of God’s choosing. A very long and complicated strand of
accessions had brought her to this hour.
She had become heir to the throne of a powerful kingdom, centuries old. As we have seen, she was Queen because
one of those strands, the rightful successor to the throne, abdicated his place
in history and in the hearts of his peoples. May it never be that we should refuse the duties of
“reigning.” There are
charges upon us, according to our inheritance: kindness and generosity, prayer
and service, worship and obedience, repentance and honesty, and more besides,
but we, in Christ, are fit for the task.
We might have to leave some other loves behind, but at tremendous cost
do we trade this kingdom for any other infatuation.
“We
love, because He first loved us.”
(1
John 4:19)
February 7, 1952
public domain
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