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Good morning.  It was on this day exactly five years ago that I learned beyond any doubt that freedom isn’t free. Our younger son was serving with the Royal Marines in Afghanistan when we got news that he had been very seriously injured by an improvised explosive device. It had killed two of his colleagues and their Afghan interpreter – what price do you put on life? What price freedom?

It’s when you are brought face to face with such circumstances in life that you wish you had never said anything pedestrian or trite about faith or about God or about the meaning of life. Thrown, as we were, into that world of injury, recovery and rehabilitation:

      -  you learn to dig deep

      -  you learn about the indomitable spirit  which is in the heart of every human being

      - you learn about the power of human kindness  – a power that holds you up when nothing else can.

        Five years on, we have more than a passing interest in Prince Harry’s Invictus Games. These games gave our son a new perspective on life and, if you’ve been fortunate enough to follow anything of the story of these games, you too will know about the unconquerable spirit of those who have become more than they could ever have imagined.

The Invictus anthem declares that: we are the masters of our fate and we are the captains of our souls; and so we are – but, what we also found was the presence of God in the community around about us and for us that made all the difference.

We remember today, with gratitude those who have paid the price for our freedom and we pray that whatever adversity we might face in life your presence would be with us and would sustain us. Amen.