- What if there was one night of the year

when the audience could comeand get away from Santa Claus

and remember just how amazing the story is

that God put on flesh and dwelt among us.

- [Narrator] 20 years ago,

Dove Award nominatedsinger-songwriter, Andrew Peterson,

had the idea to create a Christmas concert

that tells the story of Jesus

from the Old Testament to His birth.

♪ Sing out with the joyfor the brave little boy ♪

♪ Who was God but Hemade Himself nothing ♪

- [Narrator] While touringconstantly as a young artist,

Andrew came up with the idea

for the Behold The Lamb of God tour.

- The beginning of the tour was during

one of the most difficultseasons of my career,

in some ways my marriage too,

like we were just youngparents, we had kids in diapers,

we were trying to makethe music thing work,

we didn't really understand at the time

how crazy it was that we weretraveling as much as we were,

but it was in the middle of that season

that we did the first tour.

The first tour was really shaky,

and then we decided totry it again the next year

and kind of augment it a little bit,

and fill in the blanks,and finish the songs

that hadn't been finished yet,

and I had no idea back then

that that tour was gonna be a gift

that would keep on givingfor the next 20 years.

♪ David, he had Solomonby dead Uriah's wife ♪

♪ Solomon, well you all know him ♪

♪ He had good old Rehoboam ♪

♪ Followed by Abijah who had Asa ♪

- [Narrator] Andrew and Friends

performed the Christmastour for several years,

but the label didn'twanna record the album.

- I was trying to convince them,

hey, I've got this idea for an album,

it's all Christmas songs butit starts in the Old Testament,

and they're not standards, they're new,

and they have dobros,and hammered dulcimers,

and electric guitars, and it'snot gonna be just me singing,

it's other voices singingsongs, hey can we record it?

And it's like no surprise in hindsight

that they were like, thatsounds crazy, I don't think so.

- [Narrator] Without thesupport of the label,

he borrowed the money toproduce the Lamb of God album.

As audiences grew, Andrew dreamed of doing

the Christmas show at Ryman Auditorium.

- If you don't know aboutthe Ryman Auditorium

in Nashville, it was built as a church

more than 100 years ago, or a Bible hall,

and right in the middleof downtown Nashville,

and then it became thehome of the Grand Ole Opry,

so all this country music history there,

and gospel music history,

and so it's just this, whenyou walk in to the place,

you can feel the, it's like all that music

has seasoned the wood inthe room or something.

So we love this auditorium,

and back at the verybeginning of this tour,

me and the guys were like,man, wouldn't it be amazing

to do the show there, inthe city that we love,

and this venue that is so significant,

and I think it was fiveyears in to the tour,

it grew enough to where wewere able to pull the trigger,

and now it's hard toimagine not doing the show

at the Ryman, after 15 years,all of us walk in to the room

with this goosebumpy kindaawe that we get to play there.

♪ Hallelujah ♪

♪ Christ is born ♪

- [Narrator] To commemoratethe 20th anniversary,

Andrew and Friends recordeda new version of the album,

and are grateful to tourthe month of December.

♪ Behold the lamb of God ♪

♪ Who takes away our sin ♪

♪ Behold the lamb of God ♪

♪ The life and light of men ♪

- The personnel on the tour,

there's a core that hasbeen mostly the same

for all these 20 years, and all year long,

we're all running around like crazy

with family, and kids, andcareers, and everything,

but amazingly, I just stillcan't even really believe it,

but amazingly, in December,this same core group of people

kinda stop everything else and go,

the gospel is so important to us

that we are gonna putaside everything else

and just be together again,

and remember the factthat this community exists

because of Jesus, and then we'regonna tell people about it.

(soft music)