A Living Nativity

Every year, Sunrise Community Church  puts on this awesome "living" nativity that they call Bethlehem Village.  They set up their entire church compound to look like Bethlehem and you can walk through and see the shop keepers, meet the shepherds and wise men, and walk by the innkeeper who let's you know that he has no room because of the census.  They really do an amazing job.  Here's the angels making an announcement to the frightened shepherds.

We got there early and were one of the first people in line... which is a good thing because there's thousands of people that go see this every year.  The kids loved watching the story tellers and the dancers.  But most of all they loved the "barn" area where they got to pet goats and chickens.  Molly and Garrett even held some bunnies!

 Then of course after you wander through the village, you come upon a rickety barn and meet Mary and Joseph who are there with their baby.  They let the kids hold baby Jesus, which was definitely another highlight.

Then we wandered into their sanctuary, where the church provided hot chocolate and cookies for everybody to enjoy while they watched their worship band sing Christmas carols.  I can't even imagine the expense of the event for that church and we were so impressed by the whole thing.  It's such a fabulous outreach for the community!