I’m sure living nativity displays aren’t unique to Texas, they are uniquely appropriate to the true Reason for the Season!
A Texas tradition our family has enjoyed in recent years is Main Street Bethlehem, a living nativity display at the First Baptist Church of Burnet which usually runs during the first two weekends of December from 6-9 each evening.
If Burnet isn’t close to where you live, check and see if there’s an interactive nativity in your area!
Another nativity scene we love–note live, but life-sized–is the one in Fredericksburg. This city has quite a nice Christmas market with lots of activities, as well as a beautiful German Christmas Pyramid that really turns!
As a child, I used to pray fervently for a White Christmas like I saw on Christmas cards and movies and heard about in songs. It never snowed. Most Christmases we played outside with our new toys wearing shorts. It was quite disappointing to a little idealist like me.
Then I realized that there probably was no snow in Bethlehem, either. Since the shepherds were sleeping out in the hills, there’s a good chance the weather was warm and spring-like, which would be a good thing for a baby born in a stable. The snow is Hollywood. It doesn’t so much matter whether Jesus came “in the bleak midwinter” as that He came as light into our darkness.
By some fluke of nature (and in complete irony to fears of “global warming”), I finally got my white Christmas in Texas in 2009. It was lovely. But now that I’ve satisfied that childhood dream, I think I almost like Texas’ traditional balmy “Bethlehem” Christmases better.
