With Us
I’ve loved being an Alabamian for some 35 years now, but this week, as I’ve watched the many much-deserved tributes to Queen Elizabeth II, I’ve never been so close to heading back to my native Scotland, wishing I could somehow be there to pay my respects and say my farewells to one of the most remarkable women ever to grace the world stage.
Like most, I’ve never known life with anyone else on the throne, and it is truly an overwhelming feeling of loss to think that she will no longer be with us. And she was, in every way she knew how to be, with us. I only saw her in person one time, near her beloved Balmoral when I visited the Highland Games at Braemar. That was nearly forty years ago but the sights of the passing Rolls Royce, the winning smile, and the trademark wave, and then watching her (albeit from a fairly distant vantage point) enjoy the thoroughly unique spectacle that is a Scottish Highland Games, are indelibly fixed in my memory, as will be the scenes we’ve witnessed together over the last few days.
The Queen wasn’t at Braemar that day out of duty or habit or expectation, but because she loved being there and wanted to be, again and fully, with us. It was a mark of her genuineness that her pleasure in such easy fellowship with all of us was so obvious, and, to say the least, utterly endearing.
It was heart-wrenching to watch her travel from Balmoral through Aberdeen, Dundee, Perth, and then to Edinburgh. I lived in Aberdeenshire for years, and those are roads I know well enough that I could have taken up the driving duties anywhere along the way. Sitting here in Alabama, it feels suddenly difficult and emotional to not be there. When that solemn procession made its way up the Royal Mile from Holyrood Palace to St. Giles Cathedral, again a location I know intimately, despite the flood of emotions, I couldn’t tear my eyes from the screen.
That the Scottish people had such a fulsome opportunity to say goodbye and express their gratitude for Her Majesty’s remarkable life of service is beautifully fitting, and somehow impossible to consider a mere accident of fate. For the Scots, she was with us, literally to the end.
It has been equally compelling to watch the events of the last few days in London, especially to see the thousands who have joined the “Queue,” as they call it now, waiting hour after hour for the briefest of opportunities to say that final goodbye, offer a heartfelt “Thank you!” and bow in profound respect.
That these determined souls find it, in total unanimity, so worthwhile to come and wait and pay that final homage is surely the ultimate testament to how deeply the Queen impacted us all. Even when we were so busy with all the flurry of life that we didn’t really think too much about her, we always knew she was there, ever stable, always watching, and, for we had the evidence of our own eyes to prove it, actually caring. She was always just there, and that she can no longer walk among us is just going to take a lot of getting used to.
Much has been said of the Queen’s embrace of the Christian faith. For as much as she has been so faithfully with us, she needed One even more faithful to be with her. She knew of a greater Majesty, a King of Kings, who made a way to be with her and with all of us, completely and eternally. That we can rejoice that our Queen is now in the loving presence of her King surely comforts us, for it assures us that we have not seen the last of her… if the King whose presence she longed for and who was surely with her, has been received in salvation through faith in His name. For in the same submission the Queen made to His Lordship, lies entry to His Kingdom, and to the assurance that He is also with us.
So, at 5:00 am Alabama time on Monday, I’ll be joining millions of mourners around the world for the Queen’s funeral. Her coffin bears her earthly remains and we’ll all pay due respect to that process as she is laid to rest. It will be a deeply emotional farewell, not least for King Charles and the rest of the Queen’s family, and we truly do mourn with them. But when they do finally lay the Queen to rest, I know this… she is not there! She may be finished with her earthly body, but she is more alive than ever, rejoicing in the presence of her Savior, and, I have no doubt, hearing the ultimate accolade from the lips of her eternal King, and there are few who would deserve it more… “Well done, good and faithful servant!”
Thank you, Your Majesty, for a life so well lived, and for being so devotedly with us. Now, go be with Him!
Brian Paterson
Global Director
Stella’s Voice
Click here to take the same journey the Queen took to meet her King!
Picture: By PolizeiBerlin - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=85014628