One of the most common themes linking daily stories on BBC Radio Bristol is change.
Things people want to be different. Change as improvement.
Learn about sepsis or online grooming so bad things don't happen again.
Things people want to keep the same. Change as the enemy.
Don't let the dry dock be turned into housing.
We are all guilty of becoming more interested in issues when they affect us. A wise vicar friend of mine once told me that Christians should not be in the business of shouting for their own rights, but speaking out for the rights of others.
In Advent Christians prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. The story of Jesus' birth as a baby is a story of change. It marks a specific time when Christians believe the boundary between earth and heaven was crossed and God appeared on earth in the flesh.
The Christian understanding of God is not of a remote observer who watches and mocks at the mess the creation gets into, but who joins in and experiences life in all its fullness. Parties, miracles, free food and great teaching with a side order of hunger, pain, thirst, dirt, blood and death. God who understood suffering by suffering. Incarnation in anything means full involvement.
As a universal story we can all place ourselves in it. For God did this for us, whether or not we like or acknowledge it.
And it places a responsibility on those who take the story seriously to be the change we would like to see in other places. For if we have heard the story of Jesus and it hasn't left us wanting to make a difference in this world. Well I'm afraid we haven't really heard it properly.
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