Feel good or factual?  This has been my dilemma over the past week or so as I've prepared for this morning's worship.  In the end I think, hope, pray, I have found a middle way that will carry honest hope into a weary world.

For so many this will be a difficult Christmas - floods and power cuts; sickness, bereavement and tragedy; poverty and debt... the list grows and grows, both in the braodcast news and in our private spheres.

So, I sit safe and warm in my third floor flat, power supply secure, breakfasted, parcels unwrapped and count my blessings...

Then, soon, I will head churchwards to celebrate the birth of Christ, the baby who bore hope into the world and, as a man, would bear despair out of it.  We will sip coffee and nibble treats round the table beautifully set in readiness for our annual Community Lunch, to which people of all types and conditions will be drawn (and, if true to form, some surprise and surprising guests).  And after the festive feast, I will slip on my clerical collar and head to the nearest hospital to see a couple of folk spending the holiday season there.  It all meets and muddles or melds - that's the reality I strive to express.

Whatever you day brings, whatever the circumstances in which you spend it, may you be blessed with moments of unbridalled joy and renewed hope for whatever the future holds.