Micah 5:2-5a
Canticle 6 (Magnificat)
Heb.lO:5-10
Luke 1:39-55(56)

Advent 4C RCL
HE 2B/Baptism
10:00

THE CHRISTMAS TREE

Credit: Pulp.Resource 12/22/85
Previous: '85 revised

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During Advent we have been thinking together about trees, because the Bible readings speak of trees in several ways. We thought about the leaves of the tree, how they turn towards the light, and how you and I as Christians are to turn towards the light of Christ. We thought about the fruit of the tree, and how you and I as Christians are expected to bear fruit of Christian living in our lives. Last week we thought about the purpose of the tree, and how part of our task in Advent is to look at the purpose of our lives, at what we are really living for. (All this is of course related to Baptism, and what we promise or was promised for us by our Godparents and parents.)

And today of course we get to the Christmas tree. Nothing in connection with Christmas is more popular than the Christmas tree. It seems that it began in Germany a few hundred years ago. One story tells us that Martin Luther was trying to explain to his family the beauty of a forest covered with snow, under a starry sky. Suddenly he had an idea. He went into the garden and cut down a small fir tree and dragged it into the house, and lighted some candles and put them on the branches or the tree. It seems that this happened on Christmas Eve, and so the story explains both the Christmas tree and Christmas candles. Now the Christmas tree and Christmas lights are all over the world.

The tree is green, the color of life and growing things; so it is a symbol or constant hope and of new life. (That is also related to Baptism.)

It is also a reminder of God's providential love; the gifts hanging on the tree or underneath it, remind us of God's gift of the Christ Child an expression of God's love for the world.

The Christmas Tree is also related to the Jesse tree often set up by Church School children in Advent. The Jesse Tree speaks of the human and spiritual ancestry of Christ. At the foot or the tree would be Adam and Eve, then Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and Jesse the father of David. Then David and the Prophets would be the various branches or the tree, and Jesus, born or Mary, is the light at the top or the tree, brighter than all the rest, the Light of the world, the Light that shines in the darkness. We sing about the Jesse Tree in the carol "low how a Rose e'er blooming".

Like other traditions or Christmas, the Christmas Tree has been sadly pruned by commercialism. The tree of shopping malls, with its loads of toys to be sold off, or raffled off, is far different from what we are thinking about.

The point of the Christmas Tree is that the glittering fruit is a gift, not a purchase, and that the Tree rises over the Crib in which the Child Jesus lies. Let the Christmas Tree rise, bright with lights, and loaded down with gifts to be, not sold, but given as freely as the grace of Cod. Let the Christmas Angel be at the top, and at the foot of the Tree, the Manger which is the Source of it all. And so let young and old alike learn, that all things bright and precious are the gifts of the Holy Child Jesus -(and not least the gift of the child presently to be baptized).

One more story from Germany tells us something more about the Christmas Tree.

It was on a stormy Christmas Eve that a woodsman and his family had bolted the door and gathered around a cheerful fire. Presently there was a knocking from outside the door, and the father, opening the door, saw a little child cold, hungry and exhausted. The child was kindly, welcomed and warmed and fed, and little Hans insisted on giving up his bed to the stranger.

In the morning the family was aroused by the singing of a choir of angels, and as they looked at their young guest, they saw him shining with light, for he was none other than the Christ Child. He broke off a branch from a fir tree and said, "I have gladly received your gift, and this is my gift to you. Henceforth this tree shall always bear its fruit at Christmas and you shall always have abundance." (Christmas & Christmas Lore, Crippen)