IS GOD PRUNING YOU!

Wednesday, March 20, 2019

IS GOD PRUNING YOU!

John 15:1-2

15 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.

           Spring has come and my wife’s roses and crepe myrtles had welcomed the sun with some wild growth. Rather than rejoice at all this new growth she could hardly wait to take her pruning shears to their branches. Roses, she told me, need to be “cut back” for their own good. All the new growth seems to demand the life energy from the prickly stalk, making it less able to supply the blooms. Pruning helps the roses – but it looks like she is trying to kill the plant.

           The goal of the grapevine is to produce grapes. It also needs to have the dead twigs cut away. Jesus, as quoted by John, was not talking about grapevines but believers! Every now and then God takes something away from us so that we can grow and produce more fruit. We don’t always understand, and we usually think God is trying to kill us. We moan and wail that He has removed not only the dead twigs but has cut deep into the living ones as well. We feel we have suffered loss but the result – after some healing – is even more fruit.

           The word “taketh away” is the Greek airo and it means “to lift up; to suspend; to sail away.” It is interesting to note that one of the possible translations of this word is “to make to doubt!” Why would God lift us up and away or to make us to doubt? Immediately we cry out to God and claim that he has made some horrible mistake by taking away a perfectly good branch. It seems healthy enough, but we don’t see like the husbandman. His plan is not only fruit – but more fruit.

           The word “purge” is the Greek kathairo which means “to cleanse.” God allows tribulation to come into our lives. He allows us to suffer loss and, after the pain has subsided, we are able to see what God saw. What we lost was keeping us from bearing fruit; keeping us from growing in the way He wanted.

‎           “The vine-dresser will often feel himself compelled to lop off a branch that is large, apparently thrifty, and handsome, but which bears no fruit, and which shades or injures those which do. So God often takes away the property of his people, their children, or other idols. He removes the objects which bind their affections, and which render them inactive. He takes away the things around man, as he did the valued gourds of Jonah (Jonah 4:5-11), so that he may feel his dependence, and live more to the honor of God, and bring forth more proof of humble and active piety.” (from Barnes' Notes.)

1 Peter 1:6-7

6 Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations:

7 That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ:

Dear Lord, I yield my branches to your pruning knife. Let me be a fruitful vine. AMEN