DO you remember those Saturday mornings long ago when children would go in their hundreds to the "Pictures"?

There was always a Western which would often end with a wagon train drawn into a circle, surrounded by hordes of “Injuns” and with arrows coming in from every direction. Just as hope was slipping away, a distant bugle would sound and the Seventh Cavalry would appear on the ridge! Salvation was at hand!

Salvation in its ultimate sense is what Christmas is really about. The same feelings of relief and joy felt by those besieged travellers of the Wild West have been felt by countless generations of folk as they celebrated the mystery of Christmas. Help is at hand. Light has come into this dark world. God has visited his people. Hearts are still touched by the Child of Bethlehem.

Perhaps as a youngster you shared this faith and felt its power? Alongside the Pictures on a Saturday, there may well have been church or chapel on a Sunday. Over the years, for all sorts of reasons, faith and church can slip away. Christmas can be a good time to go back, to see if our hearts can again be moved by that timeless message of love.

Skipton Christmas services are on the website skiptonchurches.org.uk Why not look them up? Just as you may have done in the Pictures, why not sneak in at the back of a church somewhere and listen for those distant notes that may herald God coming to you?

A very happy Christmas to you all.

The David Williams,

Vicar of Christ Church, Skipton, and St Mary’s, Carleton.