Pruning

Pruning

[Jesus said,] “I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more.”

John 15:1-2

We might tend to think that once a crop is harvested, the work is done for the year. But when it comes to fruit, the work is never finished.

Following their harvest of apples and pears every year, Amish farmers take on the chore of pruning all the orchards. The Amish long ago discovered that trimming limbs, and removing the dead wood, has a powerful and regenerative effect. Sufficient pruning stimulates new growth ensuring next season’s crop is both bountiful and flavorful.

But nature makes a grower pay a steep price when branches are sheared too severely. Trees take longer to recover and fruit yields are substantially reduced. Consequently, a fear of over-cutting makes pruning ones’ own groves a particularly tenuous and even painful task.

The Amish, however, found a brilliant solution to this dilemma, one that reveals a keen understanding of human nature. They discovered it was much easier for them to pare-down someone else’s trees rather than their own.

On a designated day at the onset of winter, all the farmers meet, shake hands, and then set off to independently perform a neighbor’s trimming. At dusk, the men return to the town square to express their mutual appreciation. Each returns home certain they were more the beneficiary than the benefactor in the exchange.

Some of us have friends we can turn to for help with our pruning. “Can you point out my weak or dead areas?” we might ask. A good friend won’t be too kind or too harsh.

If you don’t have a friend like that, there is Someone else you can turn to. God the Father cuts off every branch that does not produce fruit because He knows that proper pruning stimulates new growth and ensures that next season’s crop is both bountiful and flavorful.

“When you follow God hard, things can get messy,” says my friend Lisa Whittle. “Don’t hate the pruning. The exposure of your flaws may be hard, but it is a gift that leaves you with no choice but to need Him.”

Dear heavenly Father, I turn myself over to You in complete trust.