St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church

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Trees:  We Are the Branches

John 15:5; Revelation 22:1, 2

December 24, 2006         (Click the date to see the bulletin)

1. The First Sunday of Advent we read the story of Jesse, King David’s father, the "root of the tree" from which would someday grow "the true vine." The Second Sunday of Advent we remembered the strong and true vine which became Jesus. He would grow, firmly rooted in his heritage, fed by the life of his Father God; he developed and produced branches from which would sprout leaves and magnificent fruit. Last Sunday was the Third Sunday of Advent, which we skipped last Sunday, in a way, to make room for the choir’s cantata.

2. Today is the Fourth Sunday of Advent – at least for another hour and a half, at which time the Fourth Sunday of Advent will morph into Christmas Eve. This morning, tho, while it is still Advent, we come to the top of our tree, so to speak. From our vantage point, we can see the branches as they shoot out from the trunk, from this "true vine. " And we recognize them – they look much like us! Jesus IS like the true vine, and we are like the branches. Just as a branch cannot grow on its own, we know that we cannot grow, much less produce ANY fruit, apart from him!

3. All during Advent, the children have been putting these ornaments on the Jesse Tree. Each ornament represents someone we’ve read about in the Bible, all of them people who trusted God to lead them into an unknown future. These people became branches on this Jesse Tree, and the lives they lived produced the fruit that brings us to our very own day. John wrote in the 22^nd chapter of the Book of the Revelation that the leaves of the tree he saw are for the healing of the peoples." We are those leaves! Everything we do is to have a healing effect on people. Everything!

4. Many of you remember Shel Silverstein’s story of The Giving Tree. For those of you who don’t, it’s about one little boy and one big apple tree, and the relationship that develops between them. When the boy is a bored little boy, the tree offers its branches for him to swing on; when he’s hungry, she offers her apples for him to eat. As he grows and needs money, the tree gives him her apples to sell; when he needs to build a home, she gives him her branches for lumber; when he needs a boat, she gives her trunk. By the time the boy is an old man, there is nothing left of the tree but a stump, and she offers all she has left, her stump, for him to sit down and rest.

5. The Giving Tree is a story of the same kind of unconditional love and sacrificial giving that the Jesse Tree teaches us. And we, as the branches and leaves growing from the True Vine of the One whose birth we celebrate tonight, we are to spend ourselves in God’s service like all these people represented by the ornaments.

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