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Queen Elizabeth II: The Bible in the Funeral

The funeral of Queen Elizabeth II was both dignified and deeply

moving. It was a great state occasion, marked by all the pomp and
circumstance due to a great queen, but it was also thoroughly
Christian and soaked in Scripture. From the moment the coffin
entered Westminster Abbey to the words ‘I am the resurrection and
the life’, the Bible shaped the service.

The texts were drawn from the Authorized or King James Version, familiar
to older people and certainly the one most familiar to the Queen. The old
forms of words make it more difficult to follow today if you aren't used to it,
and translation has moved on, but it is still amazingly powerful. As well as
Scripture, there were prayers from the old Prayer Book, which the Queen
would also have known intimately.

Some Scripture was read, some was sung. All of it, Old Testament and
New, referred to the Christian hope of eternal life through the grace and
mercy of God. ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth’ is from Job 19.25, but
points forward to the saving work of Christ. ‘Blessed are the dead which
die in the Lord: even so, saith the Spirit; for they rest from their labours’
is from Revelation 14.13, and is a wonderful word of comfort to those who
mourn.

The first lesson, 1 Corinthians 15.20–26, was read by Baroness Scotland,
and speaks of the Christian hope of resurrection. ‘For as in Adam all die,
so in Christ shall all be made alive’ – Christ's resurrection is a pattern for
our own. And so, ‘O death, where is thy sting? ‘O grave, where is thy
victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But
thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus
Christ ...’

The sung psalm which followed was Psalm 42.1–7, which speaks of the
soul's ‘thirst’ for God at a time of sorrow. It ends, ’Why art thou so full of
heaviness, O my soul: and why art thou so disquieted within me? Put thy
trust in God ...’ All will be well.

The New Testament reading was by Prime Minister Liz Truss, from John
14.1–9. Jesus tells his disciples not to be ‘troubled’. ‘In my Father's house
are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to
prepare a place for you ... I am the way, the truth and the life.’ These are
great words of comfort, spoken by Jesus in the knowledge of his ap-
proaching death, and they are gospel words.
The congregational hymn, ‘The Lord's my Shepherd’, is a favourite at

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