Good afternoon.

And Happy Christmas to you and to yours.

I'm thinking of my family now because
ol' Father Christmas (more than Santa Claus)
on that first Christmas day  displayed his cause;

which somehow woke a family up at night,
with pain and crying, labour and delight,
and grew that family with a little tyke...
a household, not their furniture or Might!

The present of the Father was his child
to all the world, his presence unbeguiled,
a love that would keep showing as it styled
itself upon the love of "God the Wild".

The One who's only wise, the One who's Love,
whom proud men would despise, and kick, and shove,
on whom God's spirit rested like a dove,
the "khesed*" of the Father up above...

came down and then was present to this race,
this rat-race where we "live" within God's space,
if "living" be what happens in this place;
oh that is what I call amazing grace.

So Father Christmas, Lady Carol too,
I offer up a prayer by means of you,
a prayer of thanks for what he came to do,
and more than that what he brought into view

within himself, when he bore witness true,
to your whole house - your children are your due,
your payment, and your glory, treasured "few",
and none who come to you, you will eschew.

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* khesed (Hebrew)= loyal faithful love.