12/7/2025 - Shoot from the Stump
Isaiah 11:1-10
Matthew 3:1-12
Robin Wall Kimmerer Gathering Moss, Believer Magazine
Creation—nature itself—has been my teacher for as long as I can remember. In recent years, the writings of Indigenous Potawatomi botanist, Robin Wall Kimmerer, have become a steady companion, inviting me to slow my pace and keep watch with greater attentiveness.
In Gathering Moss, she describes moss as a humble, resilient teacher—an ancient, miniature world that invites us to slow down, kneel close, and learn from its quiet, attentive way of being.
If we are rushing past or only looking up, we will miss the tender beginnings of new life. To notice what is being born, we have to kneel. We have to draw near to the ground. Only then can we witness the quiet miracle.
As I have navigated seasons that feel dark or heavy, are endings, or feel hopeless —
I go to one of my regular parks. I walk it — looking for a dead or dying plant to accompany me. Mornings and evenings as I walk my dogs, I stop and spend time with it. Looking slightest sign of new life — one small shoot pushing through the soil, one resilient green unfurling.
This is, for me, the shoot of Jesse.
That inner longing: that hope that something new is preparing to rise from what_feels lost.
In Isaiah’s world, that stump symbolized the collapse of the Davidic monarchy. Jesse is the father of David — the “stump of Jesse” means the Davidic line cut down, the monarchy devastated, the national story arrested. Historically, Isaiah speaks into a time when Assyria had ravaged the region, and Judah lived under threat, humiliation, and political collapse.
That tree that once symbolized God’s promise — David’s royal house — is dead.
That tree that once held promise, stability, and identity is gone.
And what I cling to is that Isaiah does not deny the stump. He doesn’t pretend the tree is still standing. And he definitely doesn’t offer cheap optimism.
Isaiah dares to proclaim — this stump, this dead lump, this visual reminder of devastation — this is precisely where God chooses to begin again. ḥoter, the Hebrew word for “shoot” suggests a tender twig or sprout — something small enough to be missed or mistaken if you’re not looking carefully. It’s fragile, vulnerable.
Throughout Hebrew poetry, new life emerging out of impossibility is just that. And the fragile, vulnerable new life is a consistent sign of God’s power to redeem — not by avoiding suffering but by getting near to it, tending to it, breaking through it.
Matthew takes us to a stump of a wilderness. Into this dry landscape of John the Baptist — a prophet calling people to repentance, not because they are miserable but because God’s newness is already pressing in.
His message feels just as stark as Isaiah’s:
“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
“Kingdom of heaven” is Matthew’s way of speaking about the reign of God — the same reign Isaiah envisioned, the same reign that brings justice for the poor and righteousness for the meek.
But for John the Baptist, the kingdom is not a distant promise; it is “near,” right at the threshold, pressing into human history.
John’s call to repentance (metanoeō) means a change of mind, direction, orientation.
Its goal is not shame or fear.
It is a turning toward what God is doing.
Repentance is not the price of admission; it is the way we clear space so we can recognize and let what God is doing now — grow.
On Wednesday, we talked a lot about the fierce imagery in this text: axes at roots, winnowing forks, unquenchable fire.
And, in the ancient world, both the axe, winnowing fork, fire were instruments of restoration.
An axe clearing diseased wood so new growth can come.
A winnowing fork separating wheat from chaff so the grain can nourish.
Fire purifying metal and burning away brush that chokes crops.
John’s call to “Repent”—is an invitation to pay attention.
A restorative repentance — God clearing the ground so new life can grow.
The turning of the eyes, a reorientation of heart, a clearing of the clutter allowing us to perceive the new shoots breaking through.
There’s a deep connection here between repentance and attention. John wants the crowds to see differently — to look where they’ve stopped looking, to notice where God is alive in places they have written off.
Robyn Wall Kimmerer encourages us to pay attention to the small lives at our feet, when we do, entire universes open up.
This is why I go searching for that plant or tree that looks hopeless or dead. It is why I come back to it day after day — when my view of the world or my life feels narrow and bleak. Slowly watching life grow from stumps and dead things tells me that life will emerge from mine too.
Like plants that have meristems, those tissues where cells remain undifferentiated so they can keep dividing and become whatever the plant needs (new leaves, roots, stems, healing tissue, etc.)...
You, I, this universe of which we are a part of, also has within our very fabric, the tissues and cells that will help us become what God sees.
I don’t believe the peace Isaiah imagines is some naive fantasy — the wolf dwelling with the lamb, the child safe at the adder’s nest.
It is the universe, the world, my life, your life, as God sees it.
This is the world that God is already growing — it’s up to us to stop, see, and tend to what seems small, impossible, or beneath our notice.
Looking closely, this thing Advent is all about, as Kimmerer says, reshapes the one who looks.
Our despair loosens. Our vision softens. Our imagination expands.
She reminds us that the overlooked things of the forest are often the ones that teach us how to live. The overlooked shoot, the unpromising stump, the wilderness — they teach us to hope again.
Beloveds, may we slow down and look closely.
Looking at the places in our life where something small and green might be pushing through.
Looking at the wilderness or at the stump, and daring to believe it is the soil of God’s future.
May we trust that though it may be small, it is enough.
Though it may be fragile, it carries the whole kingdom in it.
Amen.
