Sights, Sounds, and Laughter in Branson, MO

Sights and Sound Theatre

Often when people mention they are traveling to Branson, Missouri, many think of a visit to see the multiple country music shows. Although they still exist, the area has changed over time, incorporating many other genres and family friendly attractions. At night, the main strip looks remotely similar to the strip in Las Vegas. The area is also surrounded by the Ozarks with beautiful trails and lakes.

Although fans of hiking (and we did hike), Jim and I had another attraction that brought us to the area – Sight and Sound Theatre.

You may remember we attended our first show at Sight and Sound Theatre last year in Pennsylvania. So when the map to the southwest conveniently passed through the Branson area, we took the opportunity to stop and attend a show.

The previous show we saw was Queen Esther, which was amazing. The color in the show was so vibrant and the story compelling. I am a visual learner so seeing the story in this form brought to light the story I had read in the Bible.

In Branson, the show was titled Jesus. I really do not want to pick favorites but I will give you a hint which show I liked more – Jesus. Esther was amazing and everyone should see it but in the show about Jesus, it focused on the many events of His life, the disciples, and the time leading to the crucifiction.

From Peter walking on water (yes, he did walk on water on the stage but I’m not going to tell you how so you are encouraged to attend yourself), to Jesus turning over the money tables in the Temple, to the Last Supper, and The Crucifixion; each event, and those in between were tastefully done, recognizing families with young children attended the shows. However, one scene stood out to me and the memory has lingered in my mind ever since. Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane.

This was the moment toward the end of Jesus’ time on earth when He knew the day had arrived for Him to be caught by Roman soldiers for professing to be the Messiah and subsequently crucified. You see, the Jewish people were waiting for the Messiah to come and overthrow the Roman occupation, returning the land of Israel to them. However, when the true Messiah came, He did not act or do the things many expected. Despite the prophecies of the past, people had their own ideas of how this person would save them. In their minds, it wasn’t Jesus.

How often do we do the same thing? We look to society, money, politics, or our career to fix what only He can do in our lives.

Jesus’ purpose in entering the Garden of Gethsemane was to talk to His Heavenly Father – to pray. Those who know the story know Jesus cried out God to take this cup from him; meaning take away His impending crucifiction. But it wasn’t just the outwardly physical act of the crucifiction. The purpose of the cross and Jesus dying was to absorb all of our sins. That included everyone prior to Jesus’ time on earth, during His time on earth, and after His resurrection. Just imagine the magnitude of all of those sins. We can’t possibly fathom what it would physically or emotionally feel like to take on those sins. I once heard or read that there are so many things we will never understand while on earth because our minds couldn’t handle the magnitude of information. This is one of those moments.

As the scene proceeded, the actor that played Jesus displayed an interpretation of the pain Jesus was experiencing. I can’t even describe it to you other than to say the pain looked worse than any emotional pain I have ever experienced. Although I knew the story, I will be honest, I had always pictured a beautiful garden where Jesus went to pray about His impending fate. In my mind it didn’t look at all painful because it was Jesus. He knew all along what would happen, He was the Son of God who was brought to earth for this very purpose. Surely He was prepared and not scared or in pain. How naive I was.

Jesus did a lot for us – more than we can even image, or deserve. Despite that, we are still waiting, putting Him in a box to ignore, to bring out when we need Him, or hope when we open the box He is what we have “created” Him to be. However, in doing so, we are missing His greatness and how it can change our lives. I am learning to not keep boxes in our little home. I am daily trying to learn more and more about Him, to share how I am learning to see Him in others. Those lessons may not be a best seller in our world, but for what He does for me while I am in this world, and the grace He gave me to one day be in His world, I will keep sharing and maybe others will want to do the same.

Elevate Branson

During our short stay in Branson, we were able to serve at a great organization called Elevate Branson. Despite only visiting for an evening, we were able to learn about their mission and are quite impressed with how they are helping their community.

The campus is equipped with resources that help individuals in need by providing transportation, counseling, health screenings, education, and even coaching to start a business. Although all were impressive, one initiative stood out to us, the plans to build a tiny home community. Once construction is final, these little houses will be home to individuals who have been homeless or living in inadequate housing.

We had the opportunity to see first hand the inadequate housing that evening when we joined volunteers, who loaded into several vans filled with bags of a basic meal. Most places we brought meals to were motel rooms containing no kitchen facilities, preventing residents from cooking. These bags of food are something the people we met looked forward to receiving.

With a fun, rythmic knock and the announcement: “Elevate Branson!”, residents knew who we were and opened the door to receive their weekly bag of food. We even had dog biscuits for anyone who had dogs.

We learned it wasn’t just a moment to drop off food but to build relationships. It is important to people in need to know they are not given handouts, but instead, are getting a visit from a friend.

Our group was torn between balancing a chance to visit, and to keep moving fast enough to reach others before dinner time was over. There is a lot of need! It isn’t always what many might visualize, either. These are elderly people, families, young adults; who look like you and me. They have well kept rooms and are extremely grateful. But they are in a rut, and with some love, can start to find hope.

We are learning some of the ways organizations are serving their communities. Although individual donations are appreciated, they are not always sustainable. Of the many behind the scenes efforts, organizations reach out to local businesses for support and host fundraisers. Seeing the size of these organizations dependent on outside funds, it is impressive to see how many people they can support. Not only are they helping feed, house, or clothe, they are assisting people with life skills that bring them from the place they are to being fully sustainable. It truly gets me excited – hoping one day, that somehow our mission can do the same on a national level.

We had a great time meeting people and making friends with a crew that were such a blast! As always, we didn’t want to leave but when we did, we left with memories of how we loved and laughed all night.