Through the crash of falling worlds

I know that when the stress has grown too strong
Thou wilt be there,
I know that when the waiting seems so long
Thou hearest prayer,
I know that through the crash of falling worlds
Thou holdest me,
I know that life and death and all are Thine
Eternally.
~ Janet Erskine Stuart

The past week has been strangely momentous - when else will we ever have two different Prime Ministers and two monarchs in the space of two days? It has been a week in which millions of people have mourned a woman they may never have met, but who was instantly familiar, and an intrinsic part of our lives for seven decades. Until now. Now, in a country and a world accustomed to seventy years of Elizabeth II, we find ourselves caught up in a continuing, far-reaching wave of changes. 

There have been many tributes paid to the late Queen - to her sense of duty, her dignity and service; her strong Christian faith, and examples of kindness and humour - but alongside them, people have spoken of how, all these years, she exemplified certainty, constancy, reliability. And in a world in flux, an unreliable, at times insecure, unstable, scary world, we all need to seek out and cling to whatever certainty and security we can find.

And as I read and listened to these laments for lost certainties, a line from Janet Erskine Stuart came to me: I know that through the crash of falling worlds, Thou holdest me. Someone sent me this extract more than twenty years ago, when, at a particularly difficult time, I especially needed to rely on God, and others, to hold and carry me through. Never forgotten, the words have come back at times to help me return to that precious place of certainty and trust in God's unfailing, loving presence. Now, I offer them to anyone who might need their trust and reassurance.

We all need our stability, our rocks; and we need them to outlast us. So, whatever certainties may be crashing and falling for us, may we all anchor ourselves in God, the only enduring, steadfast certainty we can ever have, and the fundamental source of all our hope and our strength.