Skip to main content

Welcoming

O holy Child of Bethlehem,
Descend to us, we pray.
Cast out our sin and enter in,
Be born in us today.
We hear the Christmas angels
The great glad tidings tell -
O come to us, abide with us,
Our Lord Emmanuel.

 

Merry Christmas!  It's time to welcome a baby!

May your Christmas time be a time of welcoming others, and of receiving a welcome.

May your Christmas time be a time of welcoming Jesus, and of being welcomed by him.

And may those welcomes carry you through the year to come.

Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him."
John 14:23 


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Erewash Valley Trail: Ilkeston

You could spend a lot of time following old canals and railways in the Erewash Valley. This walk included parts of the Erewash Canal, the Nottingham Canal, the Nutbrook Canal, and the Stanton branch line, and I could have continued further along any one of those, if I'd had the time. I started in Kirk Hallam, which is mostly a post-war housing estate with a distinctive outline on the map: the main road to Ilkeston through the middle, and a loop road encircling the village. It looks like the London Underground logo. I parked at the lake at the top of the loop. There was a sculpture commemorating the nearby Stanton Ironworks - the ground remembers the roar of the blast  read the inscription around the base - and the remains of a lock on the Nutbrook Canal. Heading towards Ilkeston, I crossed a former golf course, now a nature reserve called Pewit Coronation Meadows, passed a large sports centre, and was soon in the town centre. There was a general impression of red-brickiness, with l...

National Forest Way: Bagworth and Thornton Reservoir

I'd hoped to be further along with my walking by now, but a combination of illness, bad weather, and inset days meant that I couldn't get out for a few weeks. At the first sign of a break in the clouds, I was ready to go. It had rained heavily the day before, and there was still a watery feel to the air. I parked at Thornton Reservoir and donned waterproof trousers and wellies, then started by following a footpath along the back of some houses in Thornton. The village is perched on a ridge, which slopes down to the reservoir on one side, and Bagworth Heath woods on the other. view to Bagworth Heath woods I picked up the Leicestershire Round opposite the village school, and followed it past an old mill, across a railway line, and through the woods. One section of the path was particularly squelchy. At the end of the woods, the footpath sign pointed right, which I assumed meant I should follow the road. It wasn't until afterwards that I realised I could have crossed over and ...

Ten books that shaped my life

Ten books that shaped my life in some way.  Now that wasn't a problem.  I scanned the bookshelves and picked out nine favourites without the slightest difficulty (the tenth took a little longer). The problem was that, on the Facebook challenge, I wasn't supposed to explain why .  Nope.  Having picked out my ten, I couldn't let them go without saying why they were special to me. These books are more than a collection of words by an author.  They are particular editions of those words - taped-up, egg-stained, dust-jacketless and battered - which have come into my life, been carried around to different homes, and become part of who I am. How to Be a Domestic Goddess Well, every woman needs an instruction manual, doesn't she? Nigella's recipes mean lazy Saturday mornings eating pancakes, comforting crumbles on a rainy night, Christmas cakes, savoury onion pies and mounds of bread dough.  If you avoid the occasional extravagance (20 mini Bundt tins...