Today’s Guest Writer is Iain Rodgers
Most people who know me will also know that I have more than a passing interest in Rugby Football. If I am to be honest it is more of a passion, particularly during the Six Nations when nobody can doubt my allegiance to Scotland!
Getting to the point, I recently watched the film “Invictus” on the TV. The film was ostensibly about the South African victory in the World Cup in the year that Nelson Mandela became president of that divided nation. In fact, it was about much more than a rugby match or South African pride in the Springboks (the national team). The film revolved about Mandela’s immense capacity for forgiveness following 30 years of imprisonment on Robbin Island. It focused on his vision of reconciliation and unity.
Mandela drew his strength and resolve from a poem he had kept close in his cell throughout his captivity, the poem was “Invictus” written by the Victorian poet William Ernest Henley. At first reading it appears to be inspiring and uplifting, certainly it gave Mandela comfort, but close reading reveals it to be of humanistic and self-centred hubris in tone. Henley relied only upon his own strength, with only a vague nod to possible deities who might or might not exist…
“I thank whatever gods may be for my unconquerable soul”.
He saw nothing beyond this life, feeling only “the horror of the shade”.
With sadness I read his concluding couplet,
“I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.”
For me, there can only be one master, one captain and that is not me but the Lord, Jesus Christ. It is he who is present in all tribulation and suffering and he who embraces us in love and hope.
“How much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit,
offered himself without blemish to God,
purify our conscience from dead works to worship the living God.”
Hebrews 9:14
P.S. If you wish to read the entirety of Henley’s poem “Invictus”, you can google it easily under the title name.
Iain.
Stephen writes:
Use these lyrics to inspire your prayers to the ‘captain of your soul’
O Jesus I have promised to serve thee to the end;
be thou for ever near me, my Master and my friend.
I shall not fear the battle if thou are by my side,
nor wander from the pathway if thou will be my guide.
O let me see thy footmarks, and in them plant my own;
my hope to follow duly is in Thy strength alone;
O guide me, call me, draw me, uphold me to the end;
and then in heaven receive me, my Saviour and my friend!
J. E. Bode 1816-74