Pruning

Have you ever felt like you have you have been cut short of success? Have you had someone tell you that you did not do as well as you thought you did? Have you had to live through some hard knocks? Did make a certain amount of progress only to have to take two steps back?

Doing your best and being told it isn’t good enough is hard. Pouring everything you have into something only to fall short of the goal can be heartbreaking. When that happens, we can fall hard and remain in the bottomless pit, or we can choose to find the positive in the experience.

I know, finding the positive in a failure can be difficult. But take a look at what Jesus tells us in today’s passage. When we produce fruit for God, he prunes us. That pruning can feel hurtful at times. It can feel like we are being forced to take a step back. Yet, there are times when we must take a step back in order to go forward again. Perhaps going forward again means taking a slightly different direction.

We may produce fruit in one area of our life and God decides it has been enough of that specific fruit. Now, he wants us to produce a different kind of fruit. Our responsibility is to recognize first that God is in control. Second, trust that God knows what he is doing. Third, follow his lead. God trims us along the away so we can produce the fruit he desires us to produce.

I pray we all seek to produce fruit for God. I pray we view his pruning as a positive. I pray each one of us will trust God knows what he is doing and follow his guidance for our lives. Seek to produce fruit. Trust God. Follow God’s guidance. Choose to follow the path God wants you to follow.

John 15:1-2 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit.”