Collect for Second Sunday after Easter (1928 BCP)

Collect for Second Sunday after Easter (1928 BCP) is the collect appointed in the 1928 American Book of Common Prayer for the Second Sunday after Easter. It prays from Christ's finished sacrifice into Christlike obedience: the only Son is "a sacrifice for sin" and "an ensample of godly life," and the Church asks for grace both to receive his benefit thankfully and to follow his steps daily.

Text of the Collect

ALMIGHTY God, who hast given thine only Son to be unto us both a sacrifice for sin, and also an ensample of godly life; Give us grace that we may always most thankfully receive that his inestimable benefit, and also daily endeavour ourselves to follow the blessed steps of his most holy life; through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The collect is built around two inseparable gifts of Christ. First, he is received as "a sacrifice for sin," so Christian obedience begins from atonement rather than from moral effort. Secondly, he is "an ensample of godly life," so the one who saves also gives the pattern of sanctified conduct. The petition therefore asks for grace to receive and grace to follow: thanksgiving for the benefit of Christ, and daily conformity to his holy life.

The 1928 American conclusion also deserves notice. The Society of Archbishop Justus comparative source marks that 1928 adds "thy Son" after "through the same." The PDF text confirms the full phrase, "through the same thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord," so the prayer's final mediation is explicitly tied back to the Father's gift of the only Son.

Liturgical Setting

The Second Sunday after Easter stands in the Easter-to-Ascension sequence. In the 1928 propers it follows Easter Day, Easter Week, and the First Sunday after Easter, and it is read with 1 Peter 2 and John 10. The result is a Good Shepherd Sunday: the Epistle speaks of Christ's suffering as both saving and exemplary, and the Gospel gives Christ's own saying, "I am the good shepherd."

Francis Procter and Walter Howard Frere describe the broad pattern of the Prayer Book Sundays after Easter:

The joyful commemoration of our Saviour's resurrection, and the promise of the Comforter, are the principal subjects of the Gospels from Easter to Ascension Day; while the Epistles exhort to the practice of those duties which are answerable to the Christian profession.

That summary exactly fits this collect. The prayer begins from Easter redemption, but the Epistle presses the duties that answer Christian profession: patience under wrongful suffering, freedom from guile, righteousness, and return to the Shepherd and Bishop of souls.

The Prayer Book's own Communion rite uses very similar atonement language in the Prayer of Consecration:

ALL glory be to thee, Almighty God, our heavenly Father, for that thou, of thy tender mercy, didst give thine only Son Jesus Christ to suffer death upon the Cross for our redemption; who made there (by his one oblation of himself once offered) a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction, for the sins of the whole world.

This makes the collect's "sacrifice for sin" a Prayer Book phrase, not an isolated devotional metaphor. The Son's death is the ground of thanksgiving and the source of the obedience that the collect asks God to form in the Church.

Clause-by-Clause Meaning

"Almighty God" addresses the Father as the giver of the Son. The collect therefore begins with divine initiative. The Church does not offer Christ to itself as an example first; it receives him as the Father's gift.

"Who hast given thine only Son to be unto us both a sacrifice for sin" gives the first office of Christ in the collect. The phrase is singular and completed: Christ is not one sacrifice among others, but the saving gift by which sin is answered before God. This guards the prayer from becoming a bare imitation of Jesus.

"And also an ensample of godly life" gives the second office. "Ensample" means example or pattern, but in this collect it is more than a moral illustration. The one who died for sin is also the one whose life is to shape the Church's life.

"Give us grace" is the hinge of the prayer. Thanksgiving and imitation both require grace. The collect does not assume that gratitude for Christ or daily obedience to Christ can be produced by unaided will.

"That we may always most thankfully receive that his inestimable benefit" asks first for reception. The "benefit" is not merely instruction; it is the immeasurable saving good of Christ's death for sin. The proper response is not casual acknowledgment but thankful receiving.

"And also daily endeavour ourselves to follow the blessed steps of his most holy life" turns reception into active discipleship. "Daily" keeps the prayer practical. The Church asks not for occasional admiration of Christ, but for ordinary, repeated effort in the path his life marks out.

Appointed Epistle

The appointed Epistle is 1 Peter 2:19-25. It begins with patience under undeserved suffering:

THIS is thankworthy, if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully. For what glory is it, if, when ye be buffeted for your faults, ye shall take it patiently? but if, when ye do well, and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God.

This passage supplies the collect's moral seriousness. Following Christ is not a sentimental imitation. It includes conscience toward God, patient endurance, and acceptance of wrongful suffering without retaliation.

The Epistle then joins atonement and example in almost the same order as the collect:

For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps: who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who, when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not: but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously.

The collect's "blessed steps" are not vague holiness. They are the steps of Christ's Passion: innocence, truth, patient non-retaliation, and trust in the righteous Judge.

The Epistle closes with explicitly sacrificial and pastoral language:

Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed. For ye were as sheep going astray; but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls.

This gives the collect its grammar. Christ bears sins in his body; therefore the faithful are dead to sins and live unto righteousness. Christ is sacrifice; therefore he is also Shepherd and Bishop, bringing straying sheep back under his care.

Appointed Gospel

The appointed Gospel is John 10:11-16. It opens with Christ's own identification:

JESUS said, I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep.

The Gospel sets the collect's sacrifice language inside pastoral imagery. Christ's death is not detached from his care; the Shepherd gives his life precisely because the sheep belong to him.

The Gospel then moves from sacrifice to mutual knowledge and unity:

I am the good shepherd; and know my sheep, and am known of mine, even as the Father knoweth me, and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one flock, and one shepherd.

Read with the collect, the Gospel prevents imitation from becoming self-directed religious aspiration. The Church follows the blessed steps of the one Shepherd because it first hears his voice, is known by him, and is gathered by him into one flock.

Historical and Anglican Interpretation

The 1662 English Prayer Book prints the same collect, Epistle, and Gospel for this Sunday, but its collect conclusion lacks the 1928 American addition "thy Son":

Almighty God, who hast given thine only Son to be unto us both a sacrifice for sin, and also an ensample of godly life: Give us grace that we may always most thankfully receive that his inestimable benefit, and also daily endeavour ourselves to follow the blessed steps of his most holy life; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The continuity matters because it shows that the 1928 American book receives this as an inherited Anglican Eastertide collect, while the small 1928 addition sharpens the connection between the prayer's opening gift of the Son and its concluding mediation through the Son.

Percy Dearmer identifies the First and Second Sundays after Easter among the collects specially written for the 1549 Prayer Book:

The Collect of the Day is generally, as we have seen, an ancient Latin prayer translated from the Sarum Missal by Cranmer or another. Most are from the Communion Service of S. Leo (c. 450), or of Gelasius (c. 480), or of S. Gregory (c. 580). But nineteen [6/7] (including the First and Second Sundays in Advent, Christmas Day, Quinquagesima Sunday, and the First and Second Sundays after Easter) were specially written for the Prayer Book of 1549; and three, as we have seen, were added when our Prayer Book took its present form in 1662.

Procter and Frere make the same source-history point in their discussion of Eastertide:

The only deviations from the Latin services are in the Collects of the first and second Sundays, which come from 1549.

This helps explain the collect's close fit with 1 Peter 2. The collect sounds like the appointed Epistle because it is Prayer Book composition shaped directly by apostolic language: Christ suffered for us, bore our sins, left us an example, and calls us to follow his steps.

Anglican Theological Use

For catechesis, the collect is a compact statement of Anglican moral theology. It keeps justification, atonement, gratitude, and sanctification together. The Church does not choose between Christ as sacrifice and Christ as example. It gives thanks for his inestimable benefit and asks grace to follow the life of the one by whose sacrifice it is saved.

For preaching, the Epistle and Gospel make the collect concrete. 1 Peter teaches what "follow the blessed steps" means under pressure: no guile, no revenge, no threats, trust in the righteous Judge, and life unto righteousness. John 10 teaches why such following is possible: the Shepherd knows his sheep, lays down his life for them, speaks with a voice they hear, and gathers them into one flock.

For devotional use, the collect searches the ordinary day. "Daily endeavour" includes speech, patience, conscience, gratitude, and willingness to suffer without malice. Yet the first movement remains reception. Before the faithful follow Christ's steps, they receive Christ's benefit with thanksgiving.

See Also

• Book of Common Prayer (1928)
• Collects Epistles and Gospels (1928 BCP)
• Church Calendar (1928 BCP)
• Eastertide in the 1928 BCP
• Holy Communion (1928 BCP)
• Collect for First Sunday after Easter (1928 BCP)
• Collect for Third Sunday after Easter (1928 BCP)

External Links

• EpiscopalNet: 2nd Sunday after Easter Prayers (1928 BCP)
• The 1928 Book of Common Prayer Standard Book PDF
• The Second Sunday after Easter - The Church of England
• Procter and Frere, A New History of the Book of Common Prayer, Internet Archive text
• Percy Dearmer, The Prayer Book