Christmas began on 2nd December with a Coffee Morning! The church family, neighbours and friends shared coffee, tea, cakes and chat. The church Christmas Tree was up and there were two lovely arrangement of red and white poinsettias in memory of Dr Alex Harrow. Huge piles of warm clothes were donated Pathways, the Chesterfield Charity for the homeless alongside other huge piles of tinned and packaged food for the Chesterfield Foodbank.

Carols by Candlelight on the evening of 17th December was well attended. Popular carols were sung and many mince pies eaten afterwards. Over £670 was donated to Christian Aid. On Christmas Eve the Sunday service was led by Revd Caroline Andrews and at communion we were delighted to welcome Lorna and Joyce into membership. Most of us turned up, with our Christmas presents, on Christmas Day and the service was once again led by Caroline. The star among the presents was probably Jaro’s large dinosaur with flexible jaw and terrible teeth!

Fun and donations, carols, mince pies and presents, but at every event we celebrated the coming of Christ amongst us. The cloths laid on the cradle at the Christmas Eve service contrasted with the unlit Bethlehem candle in solidarity with Palestinian Christians, Muslims and Jews in the Holy Land. In the words of the lovely Christmas hymn by John Bell and Graham Bell: ‘God surprises earth with heaven, coming here on Christmas Day’.