These powerful first words of Sir John Bowring's 1825 hymn of praise (Hymn # 588, in the familiar, "old blue hymn book", of the Anglican Church) speaks to our hearts and minds about the greatest love story in the Universe... the Love of God in giving His Only-Begotten Son to die on the Cross for us sinners!

The Church has the solemn duty -- and joy -- to proclaim in Scripture, Prayer, Vigil and Sacrament this great Love Story at all times, but especially in Holy Week. In it she is drawn ever deeper into the Greatest Mystery in the Universe: that the sinless Son of God died in the place of all the cold-hearted, ungrateful, greedy, cruel, and selfish people in the whole world: in other words, you and me! What seemed, on that first Good Friday, like a terrible defeat for love, joy and peace is actually their greatest -- and Eternal --victory!

Until we come to a personal appreciation of this saving Truth, by God's gift of Grace through trusting Faith, our lives will always be caught up in those "wrecks of time" we see all around our broken and hurting planet. By trusting in anything less than the completed work of Christ on the Cross -- no matter how worthy it may be in itself -- we are lost on the storms of life's sea, "tossed to and fro' with every blast", and heading towards "making shipwreck" of our lives.

But when we live in Christ, no matter what happens to us, we have an "anchor" sure and secure, that withstands every storm. No matter what heartbreak we may encounter, we will know that Christ's Passion and Compassion for us on the Cross carries us in it all, and

-- ultimately -- through it all, to final peace and joy.

"Bane & blessing, pain & pleasure, By the Cross are sanctified; Peace is there that knows no measure, Joys that through all time abide". AMEN!