An Advent Tradition...the Jesse Tree

"A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse;
from his roots a Branch will bear fruit."
Isaiah 11:1

Today is the first Sunday of Advent! Time to prepare for one of my favorite traditions--the Jesse Tree! For the past few years, Thomas has enjoyed hanging Jesse tree ornaments on our small tree in the keeping room. It is my "ambition," to share our family's tradition on our blog...

Here are the preparations I have made:
*Little tree set-up and ready
*Ornaments printedon cardstock , cut out and hole punched
--This year I'm using most of the ornaments from Faith Magazine you can find by clicking here. (I printed the small size...using the multiple pages option on my printer so they are actually smaller than the small size.) Here is a list of the symbols/ornaments I'm using. I'm doing a few of them in a different order and I had to draw Joseph's coat of many colors and Rahab's rope.
*I've clipped the ornaments in order around this precious banner Thomas made last year in school...I contemplated clipping them to a garland on the mantel or on a ribbon hanging on the wall (starting with 1 on the bottom), but I discovered this banner when I was going through my boxes!

Today's symbol:
Tree or branch or whatever will be used to hang the ornaments

What we're going to talk about:
A family tree shows how people in a family are related to each other. Since we are members of a family, we can find our place on our family tree. Jesus was in a family, too, and his family started long long before he was born in Bethlehem. Long before Jesus was born, God's people were very sad because they were living far from their promised home. A messanger named Isaiah was sent to God's people to give them hope. He told them to wait and trust in God because God would fulfill his promise of a forever King and that that King would come from the family tree of a man named Jesse. That King is Jesus and as we prepare for Christmas we will learn about many important people in Jesus' family tree. You can read more about it in Isaiah 11.

Ideas to do:
**Draw a simple family tree showing how family members are related.
**Talk about how special it is to be a member of God's family, too.
**Set up where you will hang the ornaments...on a tree, a stick from the yard, on a paper tree on the wall--whatever works for you!

Lord Jesus, give us grace as we prepare our hearts and homes for Your Coming...amen.


Upcoming on Tuesday, December 1...God's Good World...