Sprout

13th day of Advent—Shoot from the stump of Jesse.

Symbol: Stump w/shoot or leaf

Hymns: Jesus, Name Above All Names; O Come, O Come, Emmanuel

It seems strange to realize that the Jesse Tree is actually a stump. Where it should be a towering oak with spreading branches, it is a seemingly barely there little shoot.

Isn't this a kindness of God, a granting of hope—however feeble? The tree (of the Davidic line of kings) may appear as though it has been weakened to the point of elimination, made as nothing, chopped down, but the stump remains, indeed, life still stirs within.

In fact, life was never not within. In another place, instead of the stump of Jesse, the phrase "root of Jesse" is used. Isaiah speaks of the root coming and standing as a signal to the nations and becoming a resting place for them.

The root always comes before the tree. But how is it that the root stands and becomes a resting place?

That little shoot, the nearly hidden line of David for hundreds of years, blossomed a Branch among the earthy stable dung and livestock companions, chosen parents and select shepherds attending.


‘The days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will fulfill the gracious promise I made to the house of Israel and to the house of Judah.
‘In those days and at that time I will make a righteous Branch sprout from David’s line….'
Jeremiah 33.14-15

And the Branch grows into a Tree. And from the Tree flows life.