Olive Trees – Holy Week Day 1

Psalm 128:3 compare your kids to olive trees because, like kids, olive trees take a long time to mature. This scripture also talks about having your olive trees around your table. We are trying to be intentional about having our olive trees around our table.

Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house, Your children like olive plants around your table.

Psalms 128:3 NASB2020

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, the Lord has impressed upon me that His traditions are not only good but made to point us to Him, and bring Him glory. I would not usually have really put much thought into Palm Sunday, but times are changing. Usually I just note that it’s that Sunday and move on. However, because the Lord has emphasized this tradition, I took note. After my kids had watched their services this morning, we are still not going to in person services, I asked if they’d talked about or told them what Sunday this was? For all our kids, the answer was no, which surprised me.

Something we’ve been doing more of lately is having sit down discussions about things with our kids. Some discussions are in reaction to something that’s happened in the house or the world, and some are planned. Overall I think these discussions have gone well. The kids ask some really good questions on spiritual and non-spiritual topics. Honestly, I really love that they can think so deeply and articulate their questions well at their ages.

So today, after realizing the church hadn’t done anything to highlight this day and it’s meaning, we had another sit down discussion. Now I don’t think I realized how much I got out of these discussions until today. I loved asking them questions about Palm Sunday and what they knew about it. What was cool is they each had something to add to the conversation. I was able to read Matthew 21 to them and discuss some of the added historical context behind the entrance. They all seemed to enjoy the conversation and get something out of it.

As I mentioned previously, while we were talking I recognized the importance of these moments. These are psalms 128:3 moments. It really blessed me that the Lord had led me to this. I would not have had that moment without His leading and emphasizing His traditions. Through this we also decided to take communion on the same day that Jesus would have had the Lord’s Supper/Passover. We’ve never done communion as a family, never really even thought about it. When I think about it, it almost feels as if this is what the Lord is leading to.

I can’t remember the last time I took communion. As the Lord reminded me in my post yesterday, communion is the only tradition Jesus actually institutes. He doesn’t institute celebrating Good Friday, Palm Sunday, Lent, or even celebrating Easter Sunday. He only says,

¹⁹And when He had taken some bread and given thanks, He broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is My body, which is being given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.”  ²⁰And in the same way He took the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup, which is poured out for you, is the new covenant in My blood.

Luke 22:19-20 NASB2020

We have not been honoring His tradition and command. To have our olive trees around our table as the Lord institutes this tradition in our family is a blessing from the Lord.

I pray that we would continue to be intentional about having our kids around the table. Whether for spiritual or non-spiritual conversations. He has called us to do this. I thank the Lord that He continually sanctifies us and brings us more in alignment with Himself and His teachings.

May our olive trees see Him in us and what we do. Lord willing, they will bring their own olive trees around their table.

God bless, and Lord willing, I’ll see y’all tomorrow.