Advent 2 2022
There’s something very
powerful about trees. Perhaps it’s their size, towering over us, or their age –
some are hundreds, or even thousands of years old, far older than we are – but
they matter to us in ways that other plants often don’t.
Philip and I walked past what
used to be a fine stand of trees near Kemsing this week, most of which had been
felled because of Ash Die Back disease. There was no choice in that case. It
was the only way of stopping the disease spreading, but it was a very sad
sight, a huge gap in the landscape, and it reminded me of all the trees around
the world which are felled for far worse reasons. Apparently 10,000 acres of
trees a day are being cleared from the Amazon rainforest, mostly for cattle
grazing and cash crops. It’s an old story – humanity has form for this. Dartmoor
was deforested by our ancestors in the Bronze Age, as agriculture developed,
and Seal stands on what was once the edge of the great forest of Anderida,
which used to stretch almost unbroken up from the south coast to here, and from
Ashford all the way across to Petersfield in Hampshire.
Trees matter to us, but it’s
often only when they’re gone that we realise how much. They’re a vital part of
our physical landscape, but they’re equally important to our spiritual
landscapes too. Sacred stories from many religions celebrate them. Norse
legends speak of Yggdrasil, the World Tree, a giant Ash around which all
creation was formed. The Buddha found enlightenment sitting under a Bodhi tree.
And trees are hugely significant in the Bible too.
It starts with those trees in
the Garden of Eden – fruit trees of every kind, given as food for humanity and,
in the midst of them, the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good
and evil, the one whose fruit Adam and Eve ate. According to the story, Adam
and Eve lost that first paradise as a result, but at the end of the Bible, the
Book of Revelation describes the tree of life standing at the heart of the new
Jerusalem, the heavenly city, bearing fruit every month of the year, and leaves
which are “for the healing of the nations”. It’s a reminder that whatever
happens, the God of life is with us, and nothing can defeat his life. Adam and
Eve may have been driven out of the Garden, but they were never driven out of
God’s heart.
Medieval legends say that a
seed from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was placed in Adam’s mouth
when he died, where it grew, and eventually, after a series of twists and turns
too long to recount here, wood from the tree was used to make the cross on
which Jesus died. There’s no foundation for that in the Bible, but it shows how
important the symbol of the tree was to the medieval storytellers. It
represented the continuity of God’s love and purpose.
But why all this talk of
trees? Well, it came into my mind because both our readings today mention them.
In the Gospel reading, John
the Baptist thunders at his hearers, “Even now the axe is lying at the root
of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down
and thrown into the fire”.
He’s challenging people who think
they have an absolute right to be at the centre of everything, who are resting
on their historical positions in the national life and faith, and have
marginalised others in the process. “You may think you are here for ever,” he
tells them, “but there’s no tree so mighty that it can’t be felled.”
It’s important that we
recognise that John is talking to particular Pharisees and Sadducees here, part
of the religious elites, not to the whole Jewish people. John the Baptist was Jewish,
and so were Jesus and all his first followers. There’s no evidence that any of
them intended to found a new religion, or reject the old one. John isn’t saying
that the Jewish faith is like a tree which has outlived its usefulness, to be felled
and replaced by Christianity. That interpretation is sometimes called “Replacement
Theology”, and it’s been used to justify appalling treatment of Jewish people,
including the Holocaust. Essentially it says, “Judaism got it wrong, but now
Christianity is getting it right, so Judaism doesn’t matter anymore”. All
too often the unspoken end of that sentence is “and neither do the Jews who
practice it.”
But John’s not saying that.
He is challenging us all to look at our own sense of entitlement, the
feeling that we have a right to hang onto whatever power or position we happen
to have, that we, or our pet projects are “too big to fail”. The truth is,
though, that the things we think will be there forever, can topple and fall in
a moment, especially if all we are focussing on is the top growth, the bit that
shows, and not paying enough attention to the health of the roots, and the soil
in which they’re growing.
There were some ripples of anxiety
running around in church circles this week, when the 2021 Census data revealed
that those ticking the “Christian” box on it had fallen to 46% nationally. How
useful that statistic really is is very much open to question. It obviously
doesn’t translate into actual churchgoing, and never has done. I would love to
have 46% percent of the parish expressing their Christian faith in church on a
Sunday, though we’d need a pretty huge extension, because that would be about
800 people… If we had that many listening to the podcast I would be delighted, but
I’m not holding my breath!
But our reaction to that
statistic tells us something important, nonetheless. If our faith is shaken by
the prospect of not being quite so much at the centre of national life as we
once were, if it depends on a sense of historical power and influence – then it’s
a faith which probably needs re-examining. If we want a faith that’s deep
enough to weather the storms of life it needs to be one which is personal,
ours, rooted in our knowledge of the love of God for us, practiced and
expressed in our own daily life. That kind of faith will endure, sustain us and
overflow to others, whether the church is strong or weak, rich or poor, at the
centre or out on the margins, plentiful or just “two or three, gathered in
his name”.
In the Old Testament reading,
Isaiah speaks to a nation which was going through a devastating fall from
power, defeated by the Babylonians and taken into exile. It was as if the
mighty tree of the nation, and the faith it was built on, had been felled,
leaving nothing but a bare stump. But trees are amazing things, says Isaiah.
Left to their own devices, if the roots are healthy, the stump will send out
shoots. That’s what God will do with them “A shoot shall come out from the
stock of Jesse”, he says. Jesse was the father of King David, far from an
obvious candidate for kingship, a little shepherd boy, the overlooked youngest
son of his father, but the greatest king that Israel had ever known.
God isn’t done with us, says
Isaiah, and John the Baptist echoes his words, as he points forward to Jesus,
the “one is coming after me…who will baptise with the Holy Spirit and fire.” All
we may see above ground are ruins – the stump of the tree - but God sees
the possibility of a wonderful kingdom of peace and justice, and of glorious
diversity – lions and lambs coexisting in harmony. God isn’t limited by our
imagination, our understanding of what is possible. It’s not the grand top
growth that matters to him, but the roots, the hidden parts of the tree, which
no one sees, but which bring life out of what appears to be dead.
Today’s readings, then,
invite us to ask ourselves where our roots are. Circumstances can fell the
strongest of us, but if we’re rooted in God, if our sense of worth and purpose
come from the knowledge of his love, then his life will spring up in us again,
and we will be trees that are fruitful and life-giving to those around us too.
Amen
No comments:
Post a Comment