If I asked you what was round, nine feet round the edge, weighed a hundred and sixty six pounds and came on wheels, I don't think your answer would be 'a mince pie'.

But you'd be wrong. In 1770, a noble household served just such a mince pie - and the wheels were really there, so that it could be trundled round the dinner table.

Mince pies have a strange history. They used to be crib-shaped, for obvious reasons, and they were savoury.

They were banned by the Long Parliament under Cromwell because he thought they were 'abominable and idolatrous'. But people aren't so easily put off and they liked their Christmas Pies. They changed them a bit and made them round and added some sweet things and called them, 'Minc'd Meat Pies' instead - and you can see from that how we got to where we are today.

Well, I like the story of the mince pie because it reminds me of Jesus' teaching to us all, not to get stuck on things that don't really matter. It seems to me that the people who found a way to celebrate the birth of Jesus - and to have mince pies even when the government banned them - were right.

Jesus did not have much time for petty rules that got in the way of God's greater demands. He came into the world so that we might have life, abundant life, life such as God gives, a full measure poured out and running over.

Yet it's not just rules that get in the way of that. There's also a lot of suffering in the world and, as we prepare for Christmas in the Advent fast, we'll identify with that suffering.

We'll remember those less well-off than ourselves. We'll remember that we're not here for self-indulgence and wasteful pleasure. We'll remember that the Christchild whose coming we'll soon celebrate grew up to suffer for us. That's important and we must remember that. But it's not the end of the story.

The end of the story is the vision of God to which his people are all called, the eternal praises of heaven, the messianic feast, the Kingdom of our God and of his Christ. The end of the story is plenty and joy and abundance and delights - and it's my prayer that this coming Christmastide will give you a foretaste of that, so that your lives may be filled with the generous love of God, poured out for you and shared by you with others. May God bless you all this Christmas.