The Pain Of Pruning
I enjoy yard work for the most part (weeding excluded). That probably sounds crazy to most, but I find it to be somewhat therapeutic and the ability to create a beautiful landscape within which to live is exciting to me. Although I don’t have any real landscaping skills, I get a great deal of satisfaction from watching plants come into their own as they establish strong roots and grow season after season.
A couple years ago I purchased two small lilacs to plant with the hope that they would grow into nice, big, fragrant additions to the yard. When Monika and I moved into our house four and half years ago there was very little done in the way of landscaping and so I took it upon myself to change that. Since then I have planted, and transplanted dozens of plants, loaded and unloaded yards upon yards of bark and added new garden space.
I have also pruned like crazy.
Sunday night I was out working in the yard, mowing the lawn, and pruning these two lilacs as they have grown quite significantly over the last two years and I was struck by how counter-intuitive it seemed to be pruning them. Both plants had beautiful deep green foliage and looked incredibly healthy. Moreover, I was pruning them because they had grown to be quite tall, just like I wanted.
With each cut I made I had to keep reminding myself that this is in the best interest of the plant and that new growth will be fuller and even more lush. This may sounds ridiculous, but it wasn’t easy to do.
As I was part of the way through pruning the second plant I was reminded of John 15:2 where Jesus says. “[2] Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit” (ESV).
How often in life do find ourselves sitting complacently by, thinking that we have arrived, rather than taking a close look at areas that need to be pruned either because they actually aren’t producing fruit or because with a little time and effort they could produce so much more.
When it comes to our spiritual lives, it’s easy to look at Sunday morning church attendance, mealtime prayers and Bible study involvement as signs of a growing Christian. And they might be. But how much more growth could take place, if instead of staying home to watch our favorite show on TV we got out of our house to engage in community service? What if instead of taking that big extravagant vacation we went on a mission trip? What if instead of X we did Y?
Pruning areas of our lives is even more difficult than pruning what appears to be a perfectly healthy and growing plant, but the end result is also so much more significant.
When was the last time you pruned your life? Are you willing to make the cuts necessary to spur on even more growth?
image via http://www.thedigitallobe.com/
Posted on June 29th, 2011 by David | 6 Comments »
I definitely understand what your saying, but as you quoted John 15, He is the One who is pruning. I know if I tried to prune myself I would think X was more important than Y and go after the wrong things (I speak from experience!). So thankful for His word and the Holy Spirit who shows us things and walk us through the pruning process. I can’t say I like that word “pruning” but I do understand the necessity! Thanks David. Great post.
Great thoughts Jason, I totally agree! He is the one who ultimately is doing the pruning by pointing out areas of our lives that need to be reshaped in order for more growth to take place. But when the rubber meets the road we need to be open and willing to make those cuts that we feel God leading us to make. Whether it’s making adjustments to our schedule so that we have more time for Him, changing the way we interact with people so that we can better reflect Christ, etc. We have to practically make those changes.
Thanks for the great insight.
Nice post, David. It really is amazing how these shifts in perspective can realign us with our path! Doing something that may appear to be difficult can, in the long run, transform us and bring us to a higher place… “What we push against, lifts us up”
Aaron! I really appreciate you swinging by the blog. You are right on, it is often times those challenges that we overcome that help transform us and prepare us for the next challenge.
Such a good analogy. Pruning is very painful because it is the death of us and the beginning of Him.
That’s it and there is no doubt about the fact that it can be painful to give up control of the thing that I often seem to love the most…myself.