As The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe enters cinemas today one Anglican Church in the Illawarra has already used the motion picture event to attract over 500 guests into their halls.
Dapto Anglican Church welcomed visitors through the wardrobe and into the magical world of Narnia last week with "The Narnia Christmas Experience'.
The multimedia event featuring a petting zoo, videos and a colourful cast of characters brought to life by church members took three months of planning to put together.
Over 60 parishioners volunteered their time to ensure the event was ready for the two evenings of presentations.
Dapto Anglican Church Administrator, Lyndall Bailey, who has spent three months helming the preparation process, says the event was pre-evangelistic in its focus.
"Our aim was to do something free for the community and attract those people who normally drive around looking at Christmas lights," she says.
"It's about getting people into our building and having them associate our church and its members as people who care about the community."
However, Mrs Bailey says the event had an evangelistic edge given the right opportunity.
At the end of the walk-through area four evangelists from Dapto Anglican offered gospel conversations for those willing to engage in further discussion.
"We asked people "Did you realise Jesus did for humanity what Aslan did for Edmund?' A number of non-Christians came back and said how good it was to hear the gospel without any pressure," she says.
The event appealed to adults as well as children, with many commenting on the quality of the half hour walk-through presentation.
"Adults came through saying how it was absolutely wonderful and they enjoyed sharing the experience with other people."
"The Narnia Christmas Experience' also encouraged people to return to the church for Christmas Eve services.
"At the end we showed a short video made by the characters in the play encouraging people to come back on Christmas Eve to see the concluding skit " the final battle between Aslan and Queen Jadis."
