Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Columba – the Hawk turned Dove

Columba lived in the middle of the sixth century and was an Irish missionary to Scotland who personally founded the monastery at Iona, and was responsible for the founding of many monasteries in Scotland and Western Europe. Names associates with his movement include Dallan Forgaill, credited with writing “Be Thou my vision” and later missionaries including Anskar, known as the Apostle to the North, one of the first missionaries to Denmark and Sweden.

Columba means “dove” and in later life he was called “the dove.” However, he wasn’t that way in the beginning, by all accounts in his youth he was a hot-head. His missionary endeavours did not begin in the usual way, his began with a war. He had been involved in copying a book that he had borrowed from someone from another area, and after a dispute over the terms of the loan of the book, both groups got enflamed and went to war. After many people had been killed in the dispute, Columba saw the error of his way and left Ireland in self-banishment to Scotland vowing he would not return until he had seen at least as many conversions as there were casualties in the war.

He wandered somewhat in Scotland eventually establishing his abode on Iona and setting up a community there. From this place much of Scotland and even other parts of the British Isles were evangelised. Columba, himself, gained a reputation for wise counsel and apparently flowed in the prophetic office. I have read accounts of several times when he prophesied of various things to people who came to him. The most noted thing though was that he became known as a man of peace, Columba the dove.

His last day was spent transcribing the Psalms, followed by the evening devotions during which he collapsed. He died shortly afterwards with a peaceful countenance.

I think the best lesson to learn from this man is that how you start is not the most important thing, but how you end. He may have been a hot-head in his youth, but in the end he became a calming influence on those around him and his work remained and was a light to the nations for the next 200 years.

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