A slightly modified version of a blog post from years ago.
What’s with all the services where Christians worship under branches? We hang greens in the sanctuary in Advent, we decorate Christmas Tress, we burn branches for ashes on Ash Wednesday, and we wave palms on Palm Sunday. Is there any Biblical reasoning behind these practices?
You betcha! It’s all about being a part of God’s Big Story.
That Story begins with Adam and Eve being placed in the Garden to worship God in the cool of the day, to feast with Him on the fruit of tree limbs, to commune with Him in the shade of their branches.
That same man and woman fall from glory. And it is again under branches, in the shade of a tree, that we find them when they fall.
And again, when God searches for them where have they hid? They have hidden in amongst the trees, hopping to hide themselves in the shadows, and, when that doesn’t work, they suture-together garments made from fig leaves, the leaves of a tree, (a pun) tree-shirts.
God picks-up this theme again when He installs the Feast of Booths. It is an annual festival during which the people of Israel dwell in sukkot —tents or tabernacles made from the branches of trees. It is a time of merriment and joy. God, the God of the Garden, the God of trees, is the God who finds us when we hide in shadows. He has redeemed us and brought us again in glad festivity to dwell with him under branches.
When David goes to fight against the Philistines in 2 Samuel 5, the Lord stops him and tells him to wait in the forest. While waiting the army of the Lord passes long the tops of the trees. God fights his battles for his people. He is the Tree-Lord. The Branch-king who does great works for his people.
When Christ is welcomed into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, these stories play at the edges of the drama. Cutting branches and waving them as you hail someone “Messiah” and “Son of David” are not coincidental. They are intentional. The people know what they do and say. They are consciously welcoming Christ as the Yahweh’s Messiah (the anointed one of the Lord of all the trees of the forest).
Palm Sunday announces Christ’s Kingship with a confusing conflict of emotions: On the one hand we are celebrating that He is our King, we begin by shouting “Hosanna!” and waving palm branches wildly (and please, do it wildly, tell the story well).
At the same time, we are already in our hearts preparing to join the mob and shout “Crucify Him!” and “Tolle, tolle! Crucifige!” just as soon as He fails to meet the unstated expectations we have placed upon Him. We wanted Him to be ‘king’ and ‘god’ insofar as those things meant what we wanted them to mean.
When Christ is crucified he is nailed to a Tree. Again, the Tree-Lord, the God of the Garden, the Savior of Sukkot, the Branch-Commander of David’s victory, the Rood from the stump of Jesse, saves his people in the branches of a tree. There he hangs, this Son of Mary, the Fruit of the virgin’s womb has become the Fruit of the Tree of Life where God offers to the fallen race of Adam and Eve the promise of resurrection. Blessed art Thou o branches of the cross, to have such lofty fruit hung from your limbs!
We are proclaiming that the only god who can save is the God who saves on the branches of a Tree. Perhaps we might consider the ways in which, during Advent or Christmas or Lent its not so much that the branches are hung up and hoisted in the church, but rather the way in which the church hangs on those branches —hangs our hopes, corporate and personal, on the promises of the Branch-King Jesus.