I am continuing my reflections of 40 years of history that highlight specific people that have been part of this journey, but also special events and places. 40 years is a fairly long time and there has been a great deal of ‘water under the bridge.’ This series of articles is my way of recalling and recording missions history. Today is part 4 of my reflections and remembrances.
The Living Nativity Tours:
In the early 1990’s not too long after we built the worship facility that we still use (we moved into this building in February 1990) we came to realize two important facts about building a church building.
- It did indeed attract some attention from the neighborhood and definitely people would drop by and visit our church.
- But… 2. Most of the community was still essentially unaffected by the church’s presence. The Church Body and the Church building were still largely irrelevant to the community. They were often just fine with us being here and having a church service, but it did not make any real difference for them in their normal life. AND — there was almost nothing that would draw them the building to ‘check out the church.’
Always being a Gospel centered and preaching pastor and church, this was and still is deeply concerning.
David Sapp, along with his wife Paula and 3 children had been in our church since the late 1980’s and God had done some wonderful things in their lives. David had read about churches across the USA that were striving to figure out a way to connect with their immediate communities in ways that would at least open the door to Gospel conversations with neighbors. But learning how to help the neighbors overcome the “Sunday morning Church service” hurdle. Of course we have always been and always will be striving to have a great Sunday morning worship where all are welcome and the Gospel is clear. But for those that just would never show up on a Sunday morning and never will, how do we invite them and give them some exposure to the Gospel? This led to the birth of what we called “The Living Nativity Tours.” David took as an example some churches around the country that were taking the Christmas Story and telling in a more realistic way in the outdoors. He proposed to our leadership team that we tell the birth of the Messiah story in a walking / play story setting, outdoors, station to station, and helping people realize the truth of this story and how Christ can be real in their lives now. For the most part, David wrote most of the script of the play. Of course it is all in the Bible, but he laid it out in a way that could be performed in an outdoor setting. The reason for being outdoors was not only did it display a strong realism to the birth of Jesus story, but it allowed people an opportunity to hear the Gospel without coming to a ‘Church service.’ David and others then developed the idea of stations and following the story… from the Old Testament prophecies of a coming Messiah, to the angels visit to Mary and Joseph, to the Inn in Bethlehem, to the Shepherds in the field, to the Wise Men, to the manger scene, and finally a wrap up at the end.
For 20 years — from 1993 to 2012, the Living Nativity was a bedrock of outreach at both Palisades Church and now LifeWay. At my best calculation we told the Christmas story personally to about 25,000 people who walked through this play with us. We gave just about 500 – 30 minute performances over those years to our community. After 20 years of Living Nativity, we decided that in this context it was time to stop. But to this day I have people in the community who say they know our church because of a visit to the Living Nativity. Even though we have stopped doing this Christmas outreach show, it still lives on today. A close friendship with a Russian Church in Edgewood asked to pick it up and they still continue the tradition today. This performance has even spawned Churches in Russia to do this in parks in the middle of winter!
Thank you David Sapp! Thank you to the hundreds of Palisades/LifeWay people who have put this together over the years. Even though we no longer perform the Living Nativity on our property, I pray that this spirit and desire of outreach to the community continues! This is a great part of the history of this congregation over the last 40 years.
The story goes on next Sunday.
