The trumpets!  What must it have been like for Elizabeth to hear them and know that their proclamation was for her?  What sober joy, like a splitting of the clouds of heaven!  We are attending her Coronation many decades later, and in print, but we hear them in our imaginations, and we know that as surely as she was called to wear a crown and receive scepters and an orb, we are called to bear the grace of Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 1:4,) and to be resplendent with His light (2 Corinthians 4:6.)  These are not small things.

Do we say, “No, that’s not for me!” and shrink back from the burden that comes with “highness?”  Spirit of the Living God, may it never be!

From the time she entered the West Door, as she made her way up the 300-foot corridor, twelve minutes ticked past. When she reached the Theatre, where the Archbishop welcomed her into the sacred premises, she received his bow and knelt in prayer.  We have a much longer aisle to traverse, from our first faith in Jesus Christ to the day when His image will be perfected in us.  We walk in majesty, for we walk with God.

When the last offense of life has been overcome in forgiveness, when the last unkind words in our mouths have gone unspoken, when we close our eyes for the last time without any bitterness of soul or pall of regret, we will die a royal death.  We will die in our diadems.  Trumpets won’t be heard, at least not on earth, but royal highness will be there.  Against that day we will need swords and scepters and the sacred garments of humility, mercy, and kindness (Colossians 3:2.)  All this and more, and the herald of majesty as well!

“To him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy – to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore!  Amen.”  (Jude 24, 25 NIV)

That is a herald of things present and things to come.

The trumpets that sounded for Elizabeth on her Coronation Day arrest our attention on the earth when we hear them!  More than trumpets, we will hear angels giving acclaim to the holiness of our God and Father.  Who can know what glories surround us even now, on the earth, each day that we live?  This must be true, because we walk with God!   Unseen majesty is still majestic, and we live and walk in the Presence of the King.  We have our being in him.  (Acts 17:28)  The First King.  The last King.  The King of Kings.

If we were to awaken each day and play Purcell’s trumpet fanfare, the one that was played for Queen Elizabeth, before we washed our faces, it would be paltry in terms of the heralds to come, but it would not be false. We are not “mere mortals” (Psalm 82:7 and 1 Corinthians 3:3)  Let trumpets sound and rocks cry out – He is Lord, and we are His Bride! 

Of all that had gone before Elizabeth on that day, looking upon all those assembled, wearing an incomparably ornate gown, having just exited a golden coach, the voice of those trumpets must have been both the most humbling and the most exalting moment she had known since her accession.  They called the nation and the world to the advent of her reign as a crowned Majesty.

To have one’s arrival, one’s very presence, announced in such a way, when music and drum roll and voices and even breathing stopped and were stilled, as every head turned and every heart beat faster, all for her sake – what could compare with it?

This will compare, and we will hear it:

“The seventh angel sounded his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, which said, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign for ever and ever.”  (Rev. 11:15)

         May we give ourselves today and every day that we live to keep our steps in the aisle that leads to this moment.  Amen, in the Name of the Lord.

Gerrit Dou, public domain – Trumpeter at a Banquet