Christmas comes early on the farm! Everyone here is knee-deep and prayer-deep in preparing for the thirty-first year of what has become Bethlehem Revisited. Anticipation fills our hearts as we grandparents along with our children and grandchildren are joined by our large community to worship and work together in bringing this narrative to life once again. Costumes hang in the barn separated into categories: Angels, market-place, shepherds, guides, children, Marys, Josephs. We have covered the paths with wood chips ready for hundreds of people to trudge up and down the hills. The tickets that sat in Judd’s office have been distributed to various outlets. Stock pens for all the animals who will need boarding overnight are ready and waiting for their occupants. The lanterns (around sixty of them) sit on tables in the barn; some will hang from lampposts, others will hang from the guides’ and guide assistants’ outstretched arms as they lead the groups through the forty-five-minute walk. Cut wood stands in neat, orderly stacks beside the fifteen fire pits.
With prayerful anticipation, we are asking that the whole weekend will be drenched in God’s Spirit as we invite our guests to relive the greatest story we humans can ever tell. In fact, last year, as one woman was waiting to board the bus to go back to the welcome center, she hesitated before boarding. “You mean to tell me,” she almost stammered as she addressed her guide, “this story is TRUE?” And we can say without hesitation, “Oh, the amazing thing is, it is TRUE!”
I am attaching a two-minute link for this year’s event. Enjoy!!!
https://www.dropbox.com/s/n49qa47w9gciw1v/BR%20Trailer%202015.mp4?dl=0