Our duty and our joy

Although the official royal jubilee celebrations are fixed for June, the date of the accession of Queen Elizabeth was February 6^th, 1952, and so we give thanks especially this month for the 60 years of her reign.

The quality of duty is often especially associated with the Queen as we have admired her commitment, and that of Prince Philip, to this country and the commonwealth.  Duty is an underestimated virtue.  I recall an ex-serviceman who served at 8 am Communion every week in one of the parishes I served.  He was there fifty two weeks a year, fitting in holidays around his Sunday commitment.  When I queried this he would respond, ‘It is my duty to god, padre’.  One Saturday we were putting away the chairs after an evening event and he was clearly unwell.  ‘Don’t come in the morning’, I said.  ‘I’ll be there’, he responded, and he was.  By the next Sunday he had died.  His memory stays in my mind as the epitome of duty.

His duty was also his joy.  There will be times for all of us when it does not feel like that.  We worship, we visit, we listen to others when we do not feel like it.  I have always been encouraged by Paul’s instruction to Timothy to proclaim the good news ‘in season and out of season’ (2 Tim 4 v2).  Yet the words of the Eucharistic prayer, ‘our duty and our joy’ lead us to reflect on the way our duty can develop into a source of fulfilment and delight.  Our duty becomes our joy.

This appears to be true of the Queen, and we thank her, and God, for that.  Among the duties she has fulfilled regularly is her speech to open a new General Synod every five years.  She is reputed to write it herself.  Always it is encouraging and supportive, spoken by a Christian monarch to a Christian assembly, a duty and a joy. 

As we thank God for 60 years of the Queen’s reign we commit ourselves again to the duties of our faith, praying that our joy will be deepened through them.

Bishop John Packer