I want to draw attention to another aspect of this incident. The women s hope had merely been that they would be able to anoint the dead body of Jesus. Their joy came from the discovery that the stone which threatened their loving mission had been rolled back. I think this gives us some good lessons for evangelism and Christian nurture. It encourages us to make the most of people s most faltering first steps towards faith.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast.
Of course, because we are made in the image of God. But our hope needs to be nourished and cherished, so that it can grow from the little seeds that enable us to keep going when things are tough to the glorious expectation that God has truly raised Jesus from the dead. We apologise for the unacceptably late publication of the Spring issue of The Chichester Magazine . This was due to problems with the printers entirely beyond our control. As a result of those difficulties we will be using new printers from the next issue.