On Reflection

ON a recent visit to London, my wife and I took a morning sail down the Thames to Greenwich.

It’s there in dry dock that the last of the clipper ships, the illustrious Cutty

Sark, is permanently moored.

The ship was one of the last tea clippers to be built – and one of the fastest.

She was constructed on the River Clyde in 1869, and took her name from Burns’s classic, “Tam O’ Shanter”.

Unfortunately the famous vessel has been damaged twice by fire in recent years. However – now fully restored – she is one of London’s top visitor attractions.

Greenwich was the home of the Royal Naval College, which was closed in 1998 before being reopened to the public. It is well worth a visit.

The Old Royal Observatory in Greenwich Royal Park is the spot where you will find the famous Greenwich Meridian Line, together with a large selection of historic astronomical instruments.

Also, the 1852 master clock known as the Shepherd Gate Clock can still be seen at the nearby Royal Greenwich Observatory.

This timepiece was constructed to control our main railway station clocks, and Greenwich Mean Time (or Railway Time, as it was also called) has prevailed ever since.

But Greenwich is also the home of the National Maritime Museum, and in the grounds there visitors are able to walk freely among a vast selection of ship’s anchors, on display in an area known as Anchor Walk.

These anchors range from ones dropped from sailing ships of yesteryear to the anchor from HMS

Dreadnought, which was decommissioned in relatively recent times.

They indicate a lifetime of service in the fathoms of the deep, holding fast and safe the various ships from which they were once dropped.

The Bible has quite a lot to say about anchors.

The person who wrote the Letter to the Hebrews likens Christian hope to an anchor.

“The hope we hold,” the writer explains, “is like an anchor for our lives, an anchor safe and sure.”

The original words employed in describing this anchor in Hebrew were “sure and steadfast”, and it is from this verse that the motto of the Boys’ Brigade is taken.

Undoubtedly we all need an anchor to hold on to as we are buffeted about by the storms of life, which can blow up so suddenly and leave people seemingly hopelessly adrift.

The anchor of Christian hope can be a wonderful strength to those who, for whatever reason, are tempest-tossed.

It gives them something solid to cling on to, and holds them sure and steadfast until the immediate storm blows over and a sense of calm returns to their lives. ■