Thoughts On the subject of Christmas.

It's been and gone.  Sort of sorry to see it past.  But what happened...

Well there was the children's Christmas party to start with.  A couple of hours of feeding the wee folk sugar and artificial colouring, while the parents looked on.  It was a good fun gathering, and was surprisingly popular.  The kids had a good time, and I was impressed at the amount of Christmas jumpers that were on display.

Then, immediately after the party we had the Christingle service.  Now I had never been to one of these before, so my first time being at one was in giving the Christingle talk.  I had read up on them beforehand, and I will have to admit that I didn't like the idea of the whole service.  I know that we use illustrations and other visual clues to explain the message through the year, but there was something about the idea of the orange and the candle that felt a little forced to me.  Also, when we have a collecting basket for the foodbank in the hallway, I'm reluctant to use foodstuffs in a service if there's a chance it will go to waste.  I am in two minds about whether I would agree to be part of such a service again, although if it is something that brings people a little closer to the Christmas message, in a new and refreshing way, then it is a good thing.  Although for a couple of the children present, they would have been happy if we had just given them the candles and flames to play with.

Sunday there was a nativity play during the service.  Away in a manger is always cute when the children sing it.  Children were a little hyper, but they were enjoying the message, and the older folk liked seeing the younger members enjoying playing an active part in the service.  It's not a day for heavy theology, just simple messages in bite sized chunks that the children can enjoy.

At this point in the proceedings, both Mrs G and myself were nursing a pretty bad cold, so we were relying on cough sweets to get us through.  Watch Night was struggled through, and I mimed most of my singing, in order to preserve my voice.  Turnout was good, and there was a genuine Christmassy,feeling of expectation for Christmas morning.  It wasn't a large gathering, but it was a friendly, spiritual one.

After a token visit to my house to sleep, it was back out for Christmas morning.  Toys everywhere, and children running around was a sharp contrast to the slightly more formal service that this church is used to.  It made being heard a bit more challenging, but my voice survived.  Again, not a time for heavy weight theology in the message, but instead, a need to keep everyone interested.  Halfway through the lords prayer, my supervisor was interupted by "To infinity and beyond!" from the cheap seats.  Someone had brought their Buzz lightyear toy.  Awesome!

Then it was back to the house to flop.  Christmas made for a tiring couple of days, but at least it happened away from the weekend, where, had Christmas fallen on a Saturday, I would have had three days of worship to undertake.  This season has been an easy introduction to Christmas worship. 

In theory, the next time I encounter Christmas, I may be a real minister...

Sympathy

From the BBC. Link

Original text of the article below.

"'Worst Christmas ever'
... from Essex, said her 10-year-old son got an Xbox One for Christmas, and he and a friend had spent weeks planning what games they would play together online.

She said they had been downloading a game since 09:00 GMT - and by 23:40 it was still not ready.

"He has spent most of the day in tears," she said.

"He says it's been his worst Christmas ever.

"I think Xbox should compensate us all."

I'm finding it a little hard to be sympathetic here.  I can think of one or two people that are having a Christmas that may be a shade harder than toys not working.  Worst Christmas ever?  Compensation? 



For anyone else, here's some seasonal advice from Reddit that may be useful next year.


Merry Christmas.

Countdown to Christmas. 24th.

Countdown to Christmas 23rd.

Countdown to Christmas 22nd

Countdown to Christmas 21st

Countdown to Christmas 20th

Essential skills.

Today I discovered that, while not an essential requirement for Ministry, the knowledge of how to repair a trumpet valve is exceptionally useful.



This is why school assemblies and children's music recitals are so stressful.  A girl got up on stage to perform her trumpet recital.  We were willing her on to each note, but when her instrument failed her about four notes in, we just didn't want her to lose confidence, after all, it's a brave person that will stand up in front of the entire school plus parents and perform.  It wasn't the children that were stressed, but the adults on their behalf.

So, the music teacher (violinist), girl and myself (didgeridoo-ist)  retreated to the music room, to pool our shared trumpet knowledge to work out exactly what was going wrong. 

I don't play trumpet, nor have I ever played trumpet.  But I have done plumbing, and, at the end of the day, it's all just pipes.

So when the girl's trumpet had a valve that appeared to have rotated round in its body, it was a simple matter of applying plumbing principles to realign the airflow.  

To the relief of everyone present, the girl got back up on stage, and gave us a note perfect performance. 

And of course, it was worth going to hear the nursery sing "Away in a Manger."

Drunk Driving

A lady was having a moan today about the new drink driving limits.  She said that she would never have been over the old drink limit, because she only ever had one drink at the start of the night...  Then perhaps a couple more through the evening before driving home.  How was she supposed to enjoy a night out without a drink?


I didn't get a chance to have a word with her, as I had a service to take part in.  If you can't survive a night out without a drink in you, then it's probably a lousy night out anyway, and a drink won't improve things.