So.... are you ready? Everything organised? The presents wrapped? The food bought? The menu planned?

Even as I write this, I can feel myself coming out in a cold sweat! I am not sure I have ever been this slow in getting started on Christmas. I am hoping our family, now older, will understand how busy life gets and not mind the IOUs hanging from the tree on Christmas Day!

To be honest it's the family coming home that I enjoy most. I like being able to sit down together and as I said last week, I enjoy our being able to spend some time together.

The celebrations themselves are pretty special too, though, as you would expect me to say!

The midnight service with its mixture of all sorts of people makes me smile. I'm not sure I like the pressure of trying to come up with new ways of presenting the Christmas story everyone knows so well, that keep that story fresh and challenging, but I love it when people can enjoy and celebrate what the Christian faith has to offer - and perhaps even smile and laugh in church as we give thanks for the birth of God's Son among us.

Have you tried that? Going along to your local church, I mean? Christmas gives the perfect excuse since there's safety in numbers then and no need to feel self-conscious.

Find out when the service is locally on Christmas Eve and sneak in. If that's too late to be out, then check out what the church down the road is doing on Christmas Day and give that a try.

Many of us have a fairly informal service then when children are encouraged to bring a present they've been given and Jesus's birthday is celebrated in readings and carols. We also remember that the life he lived is a life he invites us to share - eternally.

If we, as churches, can't inspire you at this time of the year as we think of the Love that came down at Christmas, then we're failing.

Come and meet the God among us: the God who came and who comes to stay.

As the angels said the night Jesus was born: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward all!

Susan Brown.