I got to church at about 10pm on Christmas Eve in order to set up for the Watchnight service. As I opened the bag which contained my prayer book and Bible, I detected the powerful smell of whisky. I'd placed a bottle of Glenlivet in the bag earlier in the day when one of our senior members had given it to me after a home communion in a snowy Strathblane. The trouble was, I'd forgotten to remove it when I got home. This wouldn't normally have been a problem, but unfortunately I slipped on the ice outside the rectory while leaving for church. I lost my mobile phone at this point too (I found it frozen to the step when I got home in the wee small hours). The bottle's base separated from the body during the fall, but I only discovered this once at church.
My main problem was that my Bible and Prayer Book were both reeking of strong liquor. At the beginning of the service, I explained what had happened, just in case anyone smelled the whisky and thought someone up front had taken one too many. I commented that my Bible was now most definitely full of the spirit. Most people laughed. I could have cried at the waste.
One staff member commented that this was one very convoluted method of explaining away my partying on Christmas Eve.
The Christmas services were both busy. It was good to welcome back some people who came to our Carol Service last Sunday night as well as those visiting family and friends. As usual, many of the church family are way at this time of year, but nonetheless, it always feels to me as if our worship is joining in with something much bigger, and so it proved this time as my retired Church of Scotland minister friend, Gordon Reid, led the music. On Christmas Day, I managed to avoid the dancing he invited us to participate in. This might have been somewhat lacking in Christmas spirit!
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