Flawed Christmas Tree

The picture above is of a recent Stone Gables Christmas tree, not the one featured in the following story.

Some trees are crooked, one-sided, thin, somehow flawed. This one appeared to be perfect. It was thick, beautifully shaped, a fifteen foot cedar chosen from our own Pinedale woods. We as adults with our children had gathered at Mamma’s house, Stone Gables, to dress the tree. The rafters fairly rung with our jubilant merriment. A great fire crackled in the fireplace. Scents of cedar, a freshly peeled orange, and hot apple cider spiced the air.

The great room at Stone Gables is open to the rafters on one end with open staircase circling to the second floor. The Christmas tree had been tied to the bannister in the corner where Christmas trees had been set for sixty years. When we were children we had waited in the kitchen on Christmas Eve while Mamma and Daddy decorated the tree and lit the real candles. But now as adults we had a wonderful time dressing the tree ourselves. In order to reach all the lovely branches, some of us worked on floor level, some on the balcony, and some on a step stool.

Mamma sat by the fire in a rocking chair basking in the merriment and fun, making occasional quiet suggestions concerning placement of Aunt Emma’s crocheted white bells or the clip-on candle holders.

It was nothing short of a perfect tree and a perfect scene–until Ginger, standing on the step stool, let out a scream that halted everything. There, draped over a couple of boughs only a foot from her face, was a brown snake skin. After a breathless pause, we all began to speculate and babble about how the repulsive skin happened to be there.

Mamma looked at Nathan, my nephew who was good at playing pranks. But Nathan adamantly denied knowing anything about the snake skin. Our brothers said the snake skin was not there when they hauled the tree in from the woods and dragged it through the double doors. I shivered at the thought that the snake itself might be right then hiding behind the piano or under the couch.

Of course someone, probably not Ginger and certainly not I, disposed of the snake skin. We finished trimming the tree until it was a glorious sight before we sat down to enjoy ginger snaps and hot cider.

It’s not a very good analogy, I guess, but remembering that scene reminds me that we are all flawed in some way or in many. But one day God, through the blood of His perfect Lamb, Jesus, will remove the ugliness from us–all the unkindness and deceitfulness and disobedience–and make us pure and even beautiful, like a perfect Christmas tree! In the meantime, I like my tee shirt that reads “Flawed but still worthy.”

By the way, we never learned how that snake skin snuck into our Christmas tree.