Tradition Tuesday – Advent Devotion for December 14, 2021

A memory of a beloved Christmas tradition

from one of our own Christ Our Shepherd family.

Shirley Brown

Please enjoy this thoughtful writing about the tradition of the Christmas tree, written by Shirley Brown. She and Robbi Martin own the nursery and landscaping business, ART OF LANDSCAPING, in Fayette County.

HURRY, HURRY, HURRY! ‘Tis the season for me and my family to sell Christmas Trees from dawn till dark, while also taking care of all the other things to do that Christmas brings. So, for the past thirty years, my primary focus when it came to Christmas Trees, was to have them ready to sell by Thanksgiving, sold by the week before Christmas and hopefully get my own put up before the family arrived for our tradition of eating breakfast at night and exchanging gifts. Like most things in our lives, since we’ve joined Christ Our Shepherd, I’ve taken a little bit of time to reflect not only on the true meaning of Christmas and the miraculous birth of Christ our Savior, but also why Christmas trees are so important and what it means to my family and me to decorate one every year.

Did you know that, according to the History Channel, “It is a widely held belief that Martin Luther, the 16th-century Protestant reformer, first added lighted candles to a tree. Walking toward his home one winter evening, composing a sermon, he was awed by the brilliance of stars twinkling amidst evergreens. To recapture the scene for his family, he erected a tree in the main room and wired its branches with lighted candles.” Well I sure didn’t.  I must admit it made me giggle a little to read that!

For me, the Christmas tree represents a place to gather around, a place to slow down and reflect, and a place to recognize and focus on family. My favorite night of the Christmas season is when we decorate the tree.  Sometimes just Robbi and I, sometimes with nieces and nephews.  We finish the decorating, light a fire in the fireplace (sometimes we have to turn on the air conditioning too!), and turn off all the lights.  That evening of sitting there, looking at our tree, listening to Christmas music, always puts me in the mood for Christmas and takes away the worries of work and the job of selling the trees.

Some years ago, Robbi’s great aunt passed away just before Christmas.  She was one of the sweetest people I’d ever known but we had not spent a lot of time together.  A few weeks later, Robbi’s mom asked us to come to her house, saying that she had something for me.  To my utter surprise, Aunt Ready had left me all of her Georgia Bulldog Franklin Mint ornaments because she knew I was a die-hard Bulldog. So now, I have a second tree – The Dawg Tree.  It reminds me every Christmas that no matter how busy we get or how far we move or even how much we argue, family matters.  And it matters that we get together this season especially, not to exchange gifts, but to exchange grace and love for one another as Our Father loves us.