We were blessed with a meaningful reminder of the birth of our Savior. It was a lot of gathering times, but everyone kept coming to the events and commenting about the blessing of being together. On Sunday December 23rd we had our annual pageant worship. We read scripture, sang songs and re-enacted the Christmas story. This was proceeded by a rehearsal on Saturday night. ARGH! How confusing that was, but on Sunday morning when the actors prayed, I said, "Just let God lead. If anyone goofs in what they are supposed to say, it's ok. It's worship. God knows the story."
It all came together! I was awed at how some of the people who were most confused on Saturday did their part with ease. Glory to God. The service ended with everyone singing "O, Come Let us Adore Him." I felt many of us were speaking the words from our hearts.
The next day was Christmas Eve. I don't have any pictures from that day...I brought the camera but got wrapped up in the moment. We arrived at church at 8 PM...ate snacks and watched the hour and a half movie "The Nativity". The movie was a great visual of the whole Christmas story. After briefly talking about what was in the movie that was "new" to us, or made us think, we gathered around the table in the front of the church and lit an advent wreath that was encircled with about 15 candles. That light was enough to see each others faces and hands. We sang carols, prayed, anyone who wanted to shared something, (Sulmi said, "Ok everybody tomorrow morning when you open presents be sure to remember that Jesus is the reason we are celebrating" ahhh she's an angel sometimes. Juan, too, who is usually quiet, shared about treasuring Jesus in his heart.)...and we ended the night with Brittany leading us in "O, Holy Night."
I could have left it at that but...several of the boys had firecrackers in their pockets that they were eager to send off...so we went outside and they made some noise and we saw some fireworks lighting the sky and heard loud cherry bomb firecrackers from all over the neighborhood going off simultaneously.
It was a Holy night.
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