Isaiah 53 tree

Sara's face tells the beginning of the tale of our ugly Christmas tree.  Over the past few years, our family has decided to just walk outside on our acreage and select a tree from our fields of growing white pines that we sell to folks as a little family landscaping tree business. In this the third year of doing that, Sara is finally catching on to her dad's strategy for choosing the family tree.

As Sara walks along the rows, she enthusiastically points out the best looking, fullest trees in the bunch.  My husband, Mike, usually responds with something like, "Keep that one in mind, and let's keep looking for a bit."  As we walk along further, he points out the trees that are crowding a neighbor or have some deformity and says, "How about this one?"  After loud protests and further haggling, we usually end up with some kind of compromise.  Well, until this year, that is.  One of the rejects definitely won out...I think because it has two trunks, and got named "Twin Trunks" with the promise of being "one of the most unique trees in all of the Cedar Valley."

After dragging the tree into the living room, Mike and Nathan made their traditional retreat to the basement to watch TV, while I turned on some Christmas music, opened the box of lights and ornaments, and made up some hot chocolate for Sara and I to get down to the business of decorating.

This year, however, I was met with a teen who could not believe that we would ever actually go through with getting a Charlie Brown tree for the house.  Amidst the refusal to decorate such a pitiful tree, I decided to begin alone and try to find the bright spots.  "Look, we'll be able to see the decorations so much better this year because the tree is so bare." And, "Just think, this tree will help grow our compassion level.  No one else would choose such a tree, and here we are, getting the chance to show it a little love."  Or, "Look at it this way...it's a memory maker!  You'll not forget the Christmas of the "Terrible Twin Trunk Tree."  Beginning to pick up ornaments and decorate, Sara said, "Ya, it'll be like our golden 10th birthday when you took Nathan and me to a laundromat for the afternoon."  (whole other story!)

As we began to decorate together with lightened attitudes, Nathan came up the stairs, took one look at the tree, and threatened to take the mood south again by saying, "That is the most god-awful, ugly tree there is." I had a quick inspired thought, grabbed my Bible off the window sill, opened to Isaiah 53, and told the kids that maybe this tree was closer to the reality of Christmas than we think, then shared the words written of Jesus in Isaiah 53:2-3...."...He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.  He was despised and rejected by men..."  

In a rare and captured teachable moment, something changed at the reading of those words.  There was a holy pause and a brief in-breaking of the upside down Kingdom of God.  The kids came over to the Bible to read it for themselves.  Suddenly, all of the outward beauty and adornment of Christmas decor got trumped by a much more profound beauty and truth.  Everything seemed to turn around in a brief Spirit-filled moment, and the next thing I know, Nathan and Sara determined that we should put a sign below the tree that reads "Isaiah 53 Tree", and they began snapping photos of the newly respected tree with their ipods.

As I look at this less-than-desirable-looking tree lighting up our living room this season, it may prove to be the most meaningful Christmas tree we've ever had...pointing us to a Savior who reminds us to look beyond the outer appearance and deep into the heart.