“It’s Not About a Christmas Tree”
By
Bishop Melvin L. Maughmer, Jr.
SCRIPTURE: - Jeremiah 10:3-4 “For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not”.
PRAYER
OPENING: - I Love the Christmas season, the decorations, the joy everyone has, the time with family, the gifts, the music my favorite Christmas song is At Christmas Time by Luther Vandross, some will not agree with that, but that’s o.k. because it is my favorite song.
The one thing about this time of year is how people will claim Christmas is from the pagan origins of the Roman Saturnalia a festival honoring Saturn the god of agriculture and the Germanic Yule traditions which celebrated the rebirth of the sun and incorporating things like feasting, gift giving, mistle toe, evergreens, and placing Jesus’ birth on December 25 to coincide with Sol Invictus the “Unconquered Sun” celebration. Although that is true when you understand TRUTH and you teach TRUTH and are not persuaded by the washed down colonized sugar-coated superficial version of Christianity you can separate the origins and just enjoy a good time with family and friends because you know the TRUTH and the TRUTH has made you FREE. We know Jesus, whose actual name is Yeshua was not born on December 25 but was born during the Feast of Tabernacles most likely on September 15 the month of Tishrei (Tishri spelled either way), but that is another lesson.
As I stated I enjoy the Christmas season and my wife loves to decorate our house starting Thanksgiving Night after dinner the Christmas Tree goes up. I showed the tree was up on FB and some said beautiful, lovely tree, so pretty and many other comments. However, there are always those that want to try to quote scripture and will misinterpret scripture and try to condemn people with something that does not apply because they fail to fully understand truth, they fail to rightly divide the word of truth and will use it to judge people and benefit them in any way possible. That is what the colonizers, the slave-master, the papacy and people have done down through history, they manipulate, abuse, twist, rewrite, and wrongly use scripture and we end up with all kinds of doctrines, denominations, Bibles, churches, confusions, and idiotic fallacies of scripture that do nothing but harm instead of doing good, uplift, and setting people free.
Every year people want to jump up and say the Bible says it is a sin, and God forbids Christmas trees and you call yourself saved and a Bishop and you have a Christmas tree you are going to hell. So let me break this scripture down and let the Bible explain itself and prove that this is not about a Christmas Tree once and for all.
Let’s read the passage. Jeremiah 10:1-4 “Hear ye the word which the Lord speaketh unto you, O house of Israel: Thus saith the Lord, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not”.
This passage of scripture is talking about wood that is cut down from the forest then is carved, shaped, formed and decorated with silver and gold and fasten down so it will not fall over. This is talking about making an idol, a false image, a totem pole, or what they call an Asherah Pole, a wooden statue and an altar this is talking about idol worship. This is of course a great sin condemned throughout the Old Testament NOT CRISTMAS or CHRISTMAS TREES.
Exodus 20:3-6 “You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments”
Idolatry, the worship of anything or anyone other than the true God, is a recurring theme throughout the Bible. It is a sin that God consistently warns against, as it undermines His sovereignty and distorts humanity’s relationship with Him.
Asherah or Ashtoreth, whose name means “she who enriches” is the Canaanite fertility goddess, she was the mother of Baal and is the supreme Canaanite goddess of fertility, sun, and storm. Asherah or Ashtoreth is both the Hebrew name of a pagan fertility goddess and the wooden cult object dedicated to her. Nearly all instances of “Asherah” in the Bible refer to a sacred pole constructed by human hands and erected in honor of the fertility goddess. Asherah appears 40 times in the Old Testament, with 33 of these occurrences referring to the sacred Asherah poles used in pagan and heretical Israelite worship only 7 are to the goddess herself.
THE ISSUE
The people were carving Asherah poles decorating them, fastening them to the floor, setting them up as altars and worshipping them and using them in all kinds of immoral and occult practices. Vs#9 says, “Silver spread into plates is brought from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz, the work of the workman, and of the hands of the founder: blue and purple is their clothing: they are all the work of cunning men”. Cunning men means skillful, technical, an artist, a craftsman. Jeremiah describes how the limited power the craftsmen have in fashioning the idols with gold and silver how they work it with their hands and dress it with blue and purple but all of that is useless in comparisons to the supernatural power of God.
In Vs#10-14 he says, “But the Lord is the true God, he is the living God, and an everlasting king: at his wrath the earth shall tremble, and the nations shall not be able to abide his indignation. Thus shall ye say unto them, The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, even they shall perish from the earth, and from under these heavens. He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion. When he uttereth his voice, there is a multitude of waters in the heavens, and he causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth; he maketh lightnings with rain, and bringeth forth the wind out of his treasures. Every man is brutish in his knowledge: every founder is confounded by the graven image: for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them”. These verses express the true nature of God incomparable, living, and everlasting with the man-made Idols which are powerless, emphasizing that God is the true source of life, power, and all creation while idols are nothing more than wood and metal that have no breath, can’t speak, do no good at all or harm, and will perish leaving their makers ashamed and foolish for trusting in them instead of the One True God who control the wind, rain, and thunder.
God does NOT share His worship. God commanded the people to destroy the idols to tear down the altars.
Deuteronomy 7:5 says, “But thus shall ye deal with them; ye shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire”.
Exodus 34:13 “But ye shall destroy their altars, break their images, and cut down their groves”.
However, in Jeremiah 10 the people were in a backslidden condition and were building Asherah poles worshiping the idol, committing spiritual fornication, spiritual adultery and this is what God was condemning. These idols these Asherah poles were formed with characteristics of human form, but they were like scarecrows in a cucumber field and they cannot speak, they must be carried for they cannot walk they can’t speak they are powerless.
Psalms 115:4-7 says “Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but they speak not: eyes have they, but they see not: They have ears, but they hear not: noses have they, but they smell not: They have hands, but they handle not: feet have they, but they walk not: neither speak they through their throat”.
Isaiah 46:6-7 says, “They lavish gold out of the bag, and weigh silver in the balance, and hire a goldsmith; and he maketh it a god: they fall down, yea, they worship. They bear him upon the shoulder, they carry him, and set him in his place, and he standeth; from his place shall he not remove: yea, one shall cry unto him, yet can he not answer, nor save him out of his trouble”.
Jeremiah 10:5 “They are upright as the palm tree, but speak not: they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be not afraid of them; for they cannot do evil, neither also is it in them to do good”.
This describes manmade objects that are worshiped not a Christmas Tree that we are NOT WORSIPING. Believing that Jeremiah was talking about Christmas Trees is Anachronistic. Anachronistic is placing something in a period where it doesn’t belong. The Christmas Tree tradition started about 1605 A.D. while the book of Jeremiah was written about 630 to 580 B.C. therefore, it is poor theology to say the least to try to condemn someone for putting up a Christmas Tree and quoting scripture that is Anachronistic at best. So before you try to condemn someone with scripture make sure you know the truth of scripture.
CLOSE: - Jeremiah 10:3-4 deals with the practice of idol worship, specifically the worship of Asherah the fertility goddess and how they would cut a tree down and carve it into a pole called and Asherah pole and adorn it with gold and silver and fasten it to the floor, turn it into an altar and worship it. Idol worship, especially Asherah worship represents a profound deviation from the worship of the one true God, emphasizing a human tendency to erect physical representations or images in place of divine reverence.
The underlying message of these passages indicates that idol worship is not merely about the physical act of bowing before an image but represents a heart posture that values created things over the creator.
Asherah represents a complex theological issue within the biblical narrative, symbolizing the challenges that the Israelites faced in maintaining fidelity to their covenant with Yahweh amidst the pervasive influence of surrounding cultures. The worship of Asherah often manifesting through wooden poles or sacred groves, was a direct affront to the monotheistic principles commanded by God.
The cultic practices surrounding Asherah involved rituals that emphasized community, fertility, and agricultural bounty. Unlike other gods who often required sacrifices, Asherah’s rituals frequently included offerings of produce and libations, aligning her worship with the harsh realities of farming life.
These practices could include the planting of sacred trees, festivals celebrating the harvest, and communal meals. Notably, in 1 Kings 18:19, the presence of prophets of Asherah at passive shrines indicates a structured form of worship that extended beyond mere idolatry, suggesting that Asherah held a vital place in the hearts of the people. The allure of her worship, often depicted in biblical critiques, illustrates the ongoing struggle against polytheistic tendencies.
So, we see Jeremiah 10:3-4 is not about the decoration of a Christmas Tree, but it is about the heart condition of Idol worship.
Bishop Melvin L. Maughmer, Jr.
