Flibbertigibbet? One could be called worse: blackguard, for instance, or son of a bitch. But this word for somebody without malice is a word for a person also without purpose. Most of us would not wish to have it applied to us.
To say a person is a clown is to say he is not serious. To call a person a chancer is to dub him a rank opportunist, one looking to move up the greasy pole with no regard for others.
At the other end of the scale is the resolute person, one who has a purpose firm, like Daniel in the children’s hymn. In his youth John Milton determined to be a poet and set himself to learn the lifelong skills required in that activity. He achieved his aim to some effect. Engineers need the same determination. Those two rivals, Edison and Tesla, quarrelled. Edison won; he became a prolific inventor. Tesla died more or less penniless but he left ideas for others to work at. Von Braun left the ruins of Nazi Germany with a head full of ideas for space exploration and saw them come to fulfilment in the USA.
William Booth was a man of serious purpose. So was David Livingstone. They applied themselves to their chosen fields of work in the UK and in Africa. We have just been celebrating the life of another man who brought about change in Africa – Desmond Tutu.
We pick and choose our words with care when we come to survey the New Testament. We hesitate to call Jesus a gentleman (though Livingstone did just that and said that we could trust his word). We sometimes favour the words ‘meek and mild’. But there are words like ‘resolute’, ‘steadfast’, ‘determined’ that we can hardly avoid when we look at his life-story. Luke fastens on this aspect when he says (Luke 9.51) that Jesus ‘set his face resolutely towards Jerusalem.’ He had a purpose in view.
SCOTT’S ANGLICAN CATHEDRAL
At the age of 21 Giles Gilbert Scott was astonished to find that he had won a competition to be the architect of a new cathedral for the Anglican Liverpool diocese. He set to work with a will and overcame obstacles on the way. Bodley, an experienced architect, was appointed to supervise his work but on his departure Scott continued with the work in his own way altogether. In the course of it he replaced twin towers with a massive central tower. On its completion in 1978 the building became the largest cathedral in the UK and the fifth largest in the world.
MOST NORTHERLY
Britain’s most northerly cathedral is St Magnus’s, Kirkwall, Orkney. Yes, it’s still called a cathedral even if it doesn’t have a seat (a cathedra) for a bishop. It has in its time been Roman Catholic, Norwegian, Scottish Episcopal and is now Church of Scotland (Presbyterian). Simon Jenkins has included it in his ‘Europe’s Best One Hundred Churches.’
DOGGED
‘It’s dogged as does it. It ain’t thinking about it.’ – Trollope ‘The last Chronicle of Barset.’
If you have a comment on this post please send an email to Revd John King at johnc.king@talktalk.net Edited extracts may be published. To forward this to a friend click on the chain icon below.
Comentarios