The Pruning Process
If you are a gardener, you know the principle that in order to promote proper growth and production of fruit on a tree; you must occasionally prune the branches. There are multiple reasons why we need to cut the branches back. First and maybe most important is so that they don’t become a safety hazard for someone. We don’t want a dead branch to fall on a person’s head or a low hanging branch to hit someone in the face.
We also clip back branches that are unhealthy or that have become infested with insects. This makes the whole tree healthier and more productive. And finally trees are pruned to make them more beautiful and shapelier.
God does the same thing in our lives. He prunes us so that we are not a danger to other people and He trims us to make us more beautiful on the inside, but He also snips off the parts of us that are not healthy, so that we can become more productive for His plans and purposes.
This struck me recently as God has just opened the door of opportunity for me to go back to work after being a lady of leisure for about eight months. I know I am much more productive when I am working, probably because I have to be more organized in order to get everything done. Is this a method of pruning me? I think so. God had to get rid of the extra time in my life that I was wasting. It’s not that I was doing anything wrong with the leisure time, but I wasn’t using it completely for His good and His glory, so away it went.
Has God done some pruning in your life recently? Has He taken away a relationship? Or a position? Or an activity? Or maybe it is something entirely different? Look at it as a good thing, even though it might hurt right now, in the long run it will make you strong, healthy, productive and even more beautiful. God’s loving hands will never cause you harm, but will bring benefit to His people and His kingdom.
John 15:2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.
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