Next weekend's "Journey' result of much preparation, volunteers

Mike Wankum, left, and Matt Kremer unload fence panels as they and others help set up the town of Bethlehem on Saturday morning during preparations for Capital City Christian Church's upcoming 20th annual "Journey to Bethlehem" Christmas program.
Mike Wankum, left, and Matt Kremer unload fence panels as they and others help set up the town of Bethlehem on Saturday morning during preparations for Capital City Christian Church's upcoming 20th annual "Journey to Bethlehem" Christmas program.

Around 3,000 Mid-Missourians are expected to "Journey to Bethlehem" next weekend, in the hilly area just east of the Capital City Christian Church, 1512 Swifts Highway.

"In 1993, we decided we wanted to (do) something that would be a gift to our community around the Christmas season - and to bring the focus to Jesus, the reason for the season," said Troy Easley, the church's Student Minister and a nearly 14-year staff member, as he and other volunteers worked Saturday to assemble the buildings, fences and special lighting needed to stage the annual program.

The "Journey" is a dramatization of what it might have been like for Mary and Joseph - and others - to travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem, because the occupying Roman government had ordered all citizens to return to their "home" towns for a census.