It's Coming
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A shoot shall come out from the stump of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots.
- Isaiah 11:1
If you have a Norway maple tree in your year, you know about tree shoots. Every spring your yard, and garden, and gutters, and driveway cracks are all filled with baby maples. And if you don’t get them out by the roots, they’ll come back again. And if you let one go for too long, it becomes impossible to pull out by the roots, so you just have to cut the sapling down to a nub, but even so, that small stump will keep sending out multiple new shoots, no matter how often you cut them back.
The image of a shoot coming out of a dead tree stump is a powerful one. It’s not only a sign of new life, but of continuity. Jesse was the father of King David, the most honored of ancient Israel’s leaders, who united all the tribes of Israel together into a strong union that had many prosperous and happy years. This passage from Isaiah was probably written during a time when that great Davidic dynasty now seemed like nothing more than a dead stump. Israel was struggling and losing its way. But Isaiah prophesied that a shoot would spring up to unify and grow them once again. That all was not lost.
As Advent begins, what good things in your life seem to be nothing more than a dead stump? What losses in your life seem so overwhelming or changes in this world seem so drastic that you fear all might be lost?
The hope offered by Isaiah to his ancient listeners is also offered to us now. With God, new life is always on its way. We may need to wait and watch and adjust and get ready for a while, but a new shoot (or many!) will always spring from what seems lost and gone. Things die, change, and are reborn constantly in God’s creative universe. Advent is a season of trusting that though Christ has died, Christ is risen and has come and will come, over and over again!
