Advent: The Jesse Tree

I'm always looking for new ways to celebrate the Christmas season. For many years we've done some form of Advent celebration at home, along with what we do on Sundays at church.

Some have been really great (like the Advent "I Spy"-ish book we did a couple of years ago) and some a little dry (like when we tried reading a different scripture every night for all 25 days, including the many prophecies from minor prophets...not so riveting for girls who were all under the age of 8 at the time.)

This year I found a book called "The Jesse Tree".

Evidently, there is a tradition I'd never heard of, in which churches used to either have wood carved or stained glass windows of a tree with symbols on it. Each of the symbols denoted a Bible story, most from the ancestral line of Jesus, and some from the prophets who foretold his arrival. Here's the oldest known stained glass Jesse Tree, from the Chartres Cathedral in northern France.

The book was fashioned as an exchange between an older man who is carving a new Jesse Tree for his church and a boy who wanders in daily during his work and wants to know the stories behind each of the carvings. So as the tree develops, the boy, and we, hear the story of Jesus' birth from the Garden of Eden through the Magi and Angels.

We used each reading as an opportunity to make our own version of the Jesse Tree which we displayed on the wall in our hallway.

Each night after reading we'd add a picture, or something simple we made, or a piece from our girls many Playmobil sets that corresponded to the story for that night. And at the end, we had a complete tree, full of symbols that remind us of the Biblical narrative and each part along the way that led to the birth of Jesus.

Each night, we'd still light the candle, or candles as we got closer to Christmas, before we read the story. Then once we'd put our symbol on the tree, we'd blow them out until the next night.

As Advent celebrations go, this was a good one, definitely a keeper. It was good for me to think about Christ's birth within the context of the whole story, not just the 9 months at the beginning of the gospels that we usually concentrate on. And the story was written in a way that made it interesting for us parents as well as for the girls.

And alas, now that Christmas is over, our Advent celebration will stop for 11 months.

But not the memories, the stories, and the reminders of God's plan and faithfulness over the centuries.