Dear Friends,

Win and I are at this moment looking forward to our second short visit here by a member of our immediate family from the time of the beginning of the covid lockdown. Our son Peter is due in this evening having travelled via Berlin, Heathrow and Miami and is as I write on the long leg between London and Miami. Our daughter Margaret bravely was the first family member visiting us for a few days last November from Jamaica when the restrictions were somewhat more onerous than they are now. We pray that things will go quite smoothly for him as well.

While we were in Jamaica last week we not only had the pleasure of being with our daughters and their families but also - because of the new ways of tracing family connections that are available - actually met some relatives that we had only become aware of recently. This was quite an adventure, one that I have never experienced previously. It may remind us that as a human family worldwide we are more connected than we think and have a degree of responsibility to one another that our Father expects us to fulfil no matter how little we are aware of one another.

The Collect for the First Sunday after Easter (or, as it is often now called, the Second Sunday of Easter, Easter Sunday being the First) is

Almighty Father, who hast given thine only Son to die for our sins, and to rise again for our justification: Grant us so to put away the leaven of malice and wickedness, that we may alway serve thee in pureness of living and truth; through the merits of the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The reminder that the Son of God was “given….to die for our sins, and to rise again for our justification” may rightly remind us of the inestimable weight of responsibility that He victoriously bore for us His erring family, and the petition beginning “Grant us …” is that we may respond rightly to that inestimable gift in the urgent reordering of our desires and actions in the directions that the prayer prescribes. 

For directions about the services this Sunday the 24th April 2022, the First Sunday after Easter, please see the website www.TruthWithLanguage.com . 

In faith in the holy Name of our Lord Jesus, who will continue to provide guidance by the Holy Spirit to all His people.

+ Nicholas