A Shady Family Tree

Isaiah 11:1-5

April 21, 2024 • Mount Pleasant UMC

So when I started working on this sermon, I was sitting in one of my favorite places in the world: my deck on the back of my house. We had it redone a few years ago and a couple of summers ago we added an awning that brings much-needed shade in the afternoons. And while I was out there I got to thinking about the title I had selected for this sermon: “A Shady Family Tree.” I realized the word “shade” has a lot of different meanings, and it all depends on the context as to what you mean when you say it. If I say I’m sitting in the shade, you get one image, but if someone tells you I’m doing some shady things, you get a whole other image, right? One means I’m relaxing out of the sunshine, and the other means I’m doing something that my mom probably would not be proud of. So which meaning do we have in mind if someone has a “shady family tree?” And who is it whose tree is shrouded in shade?

In this sermon series called “Sticks,” we’ve been journeying through stories of trees in the Bible for the last couple of weeks, and talking about how spending time with these particular trees can help us make decisions. So we spent time with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden two weeks ago, where they made the disastrous decision to abandon God’s way. And last week we hung out with Moses at the burning bush and talked about learning to pay attention when something is out of the ordinary in life. God might be trying to speak to you through that event. Now, if you spend much time in the Old Testament in particular, you’re going to find a lot of other trees. Noah, for instance, had to cut down some trees to build his ark. Abraham was under the oak tree when God visited him, and he found a ram caught in tree branches just seconds before he sacrificed his son. Moses, when he went to confront Pharaoh, carried a wooden staff, so a tree gave part of itself to enable Moses to perform miracles in Pharaoh’s court. The prophet Amos took care of sycamore trees, Jonah pouted under a tree when God decided not to destroy Nineveh, and Jeremiah told the people they were a tree that needed to be planted near water (Armstrong, Sticks, pgs. 63-64). We could spend a lot of time on Biblical trees, but we only have so much time and next week we’re going to transition to the New Testament. So this week I want to look at a metaphorical tree, a family tree. And it’s described by the prophet Isaiah centuries before it’s completely grown. Today we’re going to look at the family tree of the Messiah, the one Isaiah said was coming to save Israel from her rebellion. And to describe it, Isaiah uses the imagery of a stump.

My Old Testament professor specialized in Isaiah and he believed you could lose the rest of the Bible except Isaiah and still know everything God wants us to know. Isaiah is the longest of the prophets’ books and his ministry spans the reign of four kings of Judah, the southern kingdom centered in Jerusalem. His name means, “God is salvation,” but much of what he had to tell the people, at least in his early years, is about the destruction that was coming. Because the people had been unfaithful to God, they were going to be conquered and taken into exile for a time. It was not a happy message, and as you might imagine it was not a popular one. But the reality is that the people had been inconsistent and unfaithful. Some wanted to live God’s way but came up short. And others had no desire to even try to live God’s way—and they succeeded. The kings had proven to be inconsistent as well. Some led the nation faithfully and others not so much. In fact, when you read the historical accounts in the Bible, you find each and every king is judged by how faithful (or not) they were in their relationship with God, and whether or not they served God with an undivided heart (cf. Grogan, “Isaiah,” Expositor’s Bible Commentary, Vol. 6. pg. 88). And as the years went on, they got worse and worse. During Isaiah’s ministry, the northern kingdom of Israel was conquered by the nation of Assyria and the southern kingdom of Judah was conquered by Babylon. Many of the people were taken away into exile, and most of them would never return home. In Isaiah’s understanding, the “tree” that was Israel had become so broken, so corrupt, that it had to be cut down. All that was left was a stump (cf. Armstrong 64-65).

So we do need to say a word about divine punishment because for a lot of people that’s an uncomfortable or even a taboo topic. There are people, even some scholars, who claim that the God of the Old Testament is different from the God of the New Testament, that one (the Old Testament) is all about wrath and punishment while the other one (the New Testament) is all about love and mercy and grace. But there are not two gods here; we worship only one God, and because he is the creator and the Lord over it all, he can do with his creation as he sees fit. And sometimes he finds himself in the position of needing to correct his people. If you’re a parent, you know what I mean. What happens to a child who is never corrected, never told that anything is wrong, never pointed toward a different path? You’ve known some, I’m willing to bet. They end up entitled, spoiled, and bratty. And sometimes they end up in public office, but anyway. Actually correcting, even punishing, your child is an act of love. Those who love their kids want the best for them, and sometimes that involves correction. There’s a difference between telling your kids they can do and be anything they want to be and allowing them to get away with everything. There is unlimited potential in God’s creation, but there is also a right way to live and a wrong way to live. And there were times and are times when God has to redirect his people, and sometimes getting their attention unfortunately required drastic measures like exile. Like being conquered. Like being taken away from your homeland. Like even using secular leaders as his instruments. God can do what he wants to do. He is the judge of all the earth (cf. Genesis 18:25) and he is also patient beyond measure (cf. Numbers 14:18). That’s why “judgment is never God’s intended last word. It may be his last word, but that is up to us. His intended last word is restoration and deliverance” (Oswalt, The Book of Isaiah, Chapters 1-39, pg. 28). The bottom line is this: our sins and our rebellion against God have consequences. There will be accountability for what we have done and the ways we have veered from the path God laid before us (cf. Armstrong 71). But that’s not the end of the story.

So Isaiah says that “a shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse” (11:1). Do you know some trees are really hard to kill or destroy? A couple of summers ago, our neighbor had a tree taken down that sits on the property line between our homes; she asked us about it first and we all agreed it was dying and more of a danger than a help. And they took it down as much as they could but there is still a stump left. So we still get shoots that spring up from the stump and even moreso from the bushes that surrounded the tree (which were probably what killed it in the first place). We have to attend to the shoots if we want the tree to stay down. But in Isaiah’s case, he’s not telling the people to take the shoots out. In fact, from what he can see, a shoot coming out of the stump is the only hope for the people’s survival.

It’s a shoot from the stump of Jesse, which is a little unusual. We would expect it to come from the “stump of David,” because David, even though he messed up several times in his life, was known as a “man after God’s own heart” (cf. 1 Samuel 13:14). He is, in fact, the standard by which every king who comes after is compared to. So who is Jesse? Well, that’s David’s dad. You could say Jesse is the root from which David came. Without Jesse, there is no David. So I think the image Isaiah is getting at here is taking everything back to before things went so wrong.

Maybe you’ve had one of those unfortunate times when your computer or your phone has crashed and nothing will work. And so you call tech support and the first thing they ask is if you have it plugged in. Then one of the other things they might ask you is if you have a backup. Sometimes the only way to get rid of your technology problems is to take the whole thing back to a point in time when you know there weren’t any problems. You reset; you reboot. You maybe go all the way back to the beginning. That’s the image I get here. A shoot is going to grow out of the stump of Jesse. Let’s take things back to before we got into all these problems. Let’s take things back to the root. Let’s try again.

But it’s also important to note that Isaiah doesn’t describe the hope for a nation as a mighty oak or a tall tree. He describes it as a shoot. A shoot is the opposite of tall or mighty. It is weak and vulnerable. It can be easily damaged or destroyed. A shoot needs tender care, and it’s no one thinks of taking a shoot when you run into battle. A shoot is humble, and that’s why Isaiah uses that image to describe the hope for the nation. They need someone who will not be arrogant like the kings before him. They need someone who relies on God in a way like never before. His power will not be his own; it will be the power of God working through him. As Dr. John Oswalt puts it, “It would not be some crafty human court counselor advising him, but the transparent Holy Spirit” (29). In other words, “This shoot from the stump of Jesse will be everything the people of God are currently not” (Armstrong 74), full of compassion for the weak and toughness toward the oppressors (cf. Goldingay, Isaiah for Everyone, pg. 51).

So the tree that has been the people of Israel will be cut down, but that’s not the end of the story. Yes, judgment is coming, but that’s not God’s endgame. In the chapters to come, Isaiah tells of one who will emerge from the trials, a “suffering servant” who will in fact redeem the world. Several chapters over, Isaiah returns to this image of a shoot. Listen to one way he describes the servant of the Lord: “He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground…Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering…he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed” (53:2, 4-5). If you’ve spent much time in the church, you hear those verses and understand them to describe Jesus and his suffering death on the cross. And you’re not wrong, but from what I read in Isaiah, I believe God’s original intent was that the people of Israel, the ones who would come back from the exile, were to be that suffering servant, giving themselves for the sake of the world. And when they did not, when they doubled down on being exclusive and protecting their own land, that’s when God came in the flesh in the form of Jesus. So, ultimately, Jesus is the suffering servant. He is the shoot from Jesse’s stump.

And so the shoot became a tree, a family tree, the family tree of the messiah. But it is not a tree that grows straight and strong. It twists and turns. It has breaks and bends. And it’s pretty shady. From the very beginning, things went badly. Adam and Eve made the wrong choice, and found themselves exiled and banned from Eden. The people in Noah’s time got it so wrong that God sent a flood to destroy the earth and reset creation. Abraham chose to pursue his own plan instead of God’s plan to provide an heir for his people, and his wife’s maid gave birth to Ishmael, the father of the Arab people. The conflict between the two branches of Abraham’s family lives on still today, three thousand years later. Jacob, Abraham’s grandson, tricked his father into giving him a blessing (which was a bigger deal than you might think), tricked his father-in-law into a bigger inheritance than he might have had otherwise, and lied consistently to his twin brother. But, to be fair, his father-in-law also tricked him into marrying the sister of the woman he was really in love with, and then ended up having him marry both women. So, you know, Jacob was married to sisters, which had to be fun. Moses killed a man. Samson loved pagan prostitutes. King David killed the husband of a woman he had gotten pregnant. And his children were involved in incest, rape and murder. Solomon, the son who succeeded David as king, was the wisest man who ever lived, but he gave into worshipping other gods because he “loved many foreign woman” (1 Kings 11:1). So maybe he wasn’t that wise after all. And then after Solomon, the monarchy fell apart and the people were taken into exile.

And, then, of course, there are some suspect people who were directly in Jesus’ family tree. We talked about some of them during this past Advent. Tamar seduced her father-in-law after he refused to follow the custom that would have allowed her to marry his youngest son. That seduction led to twins, one of whom carried on the direct family line. A few generations later, a prostitute married into the family because she helped the people conquer the city of Jericho. Bathsheba was seduced by David but later was instrumental in manipulating David into installing Solomon as his successor. And that’s only a small part of the broken family tree that leads to Jesus. Those are only the parts we know about! So I tell you all of that to say this: if you think your family tree is broken or that God can’t use you because of your messed-up family tree, you could not be more wrong. Every family tree can be rebuilt. Every family can have a new shoot. Every life can be redeemed.

That new shoot from Jesse’s stump became a baby in Bethlehem. He was born in a backwater town on the edge of the Roman Empire and grew up mostly in obscurity—in fact, we have precious little information about his growing up years. When he entered into his public ministry, he spent only three years teaching, preaching and training followers before he made the religious leadership mad enough that they had him put to death. What they didn’t know is that his death was part of the plan all along, and three days later he was raised from the dead. He was the suffering servant promised in Isaiah’s ministry, the one who perfectly fulfilled Israel’s original mission to bring the world back to God the Father. And still today those who trust in him find hope and life and joy. He is the shoot from the stump that grew into a true tree of life.

So, there are a couple of things I think this shoot from Jesse’s tree can teach us or challenge us. The first thing is this: you are not doomed by your shady family tree. Your family tree might have some parts you try to keep hidden. You might be ashamed of some of the characters in your family. You might even be ashamed of some of the parts of your own past. But you don’t need to be. As Paul said to the church at Rome, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). How many did he say have fallen short? How many have sinned? Some? A few? One or two? Only the non-church members? Nope. All. All have fallen short of what God’s plans are for them. As Bible teacher Kat Armstrong says, “We are a motley crew of screwups and sinners” (86). All of us.

The good news from the Scriptures is this: even if your family tree or your life is torn down to a stump, your story is not over. Jesus still reaches out and grows hope. A friend of mine didn’t begin to deal with the challenges and the issues in her shady family tree until everything was cut down to a stump when her husband committed suicide. It was only at that point that she began to find the courage to confront the brokenness in her past and in her husband’s past and present and begin to ask Jesus to do some healing work. It has not been easy and it has not been quick and it’s still not over. Healing is still taking place, but she has begun to learn that she is not doomed or defined by her past or by the things that have happened in her family. She is a child of God, the God who grows new things from stumps, the God who overcomes the shadiest of family trees.

So, since you are not doomed by your family tree and since you can’t use that as an excuse anymore, here’s the other challenge: bloom where you are planted right now. Sometimes we treat our spiritual life as a greenhouse, where little seeds are planted in pots and kept safely inside the house, never to be taken out. For instance, a few years ago I had a woman ask me about joining a particular small group. But in our conversation I found out she was already going to three different Bible studies during the week and wanted a fourth one. So in the kindest way I could, I responded, “You know, maybe you don’t need another group. Maybe you need to find a way to put what you’re learning into practice. Maybe rather than more study you need a place to serve.” In other words, maybe you need to take the plants out of the greenhouse, the seeds that are sprouting, and replant them so they can grow, so they can bloom. Jesus specializes in replanting. The church would not have survived this long if he did not because the church is made up of human beings—weak, fallible, broken and breaking human beings. None of us are perfect. None of us are whole. And yet, Jesus will take all of that brokenness, all of that shadiness, and he will still grow something beautiful out of your life. After Paul tells the Romans about the imperfection of all of humanity, he goes on to say this: “And all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:24). Now, the “where you are planted right now” is important, too, because God has put you in this place at this time for a reason. God can use you anywhere, of course, but he has led you to this place at this time so that he can use you here and now. You are not a mistake and your presence here is not an accident. You may feel like a stump right now, but I’m here to tell you this morning that God loves bringing new shoots out of what appears to be a dormant stump. The resurrection shouts to the world that God brings life out of death, every single time because—why?—the worst thing is never the last thing. God’s final word is not judgment. God’s final word is not death. God’s final word is always life.

“A shoot,” Isaiah says. “A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse.” It might not look like much right now, but out of that shoot, when it is given time to grow, will come the hope of the world and the hope of your life and mine. “From his roots,” Isaiah goes on, “a Branch will bear fruit” (11:1). You are not bound by your shady family tree if Jesus is living in you. I love the way Paul puts it in Colossians when he wants to encourage them to live out their calling. He says this: “The secret is simply this: Christ in you! Yes, Christ in you bringing with him the hope of all glorious things to come” (Colossians 1:27, Phillips). If Christ is in you, what’s holding you back from blooming where you are planted? What’s keeping you from blooming today? Spoiler alert: the answer is (or should be) “nothing.” Christ in you, bringing all the hope to all the people right here and right now. You are more than your shady family tree. You are the light of Christ shining in the world, bearing fruit where you are planted. So, friends, hear the word of the Lord: be a shoot. Let’s pray.