The Necessity of Pruning

     Here is the first of the garden analogy devotionals of the year…you knew they couldn’t be far away.

     I was working on the area that is to be my new Japanese Tea Garden yesterday morning. This is a labor of love toward making a 9 year old dream come true for a private, serene ‘secret garden’ of my own for prayer, meditation and the gracious practice of the tea ceremony. At this point in the game, it is all foundational work of taming the unruly vegetation into the base for the vision that lives in my head, heart and now committed to paper…well, computer screen anyway.

     I was pruning the four Yaupon trees for clearance to walk under and to eliminate the sucker branches. As I stretched up to cut limbs over my head, the usual Holy Tap on the shoulder came and I felt the Lord asking, “Do you see the analogy in this?” “Yes, Sir, I do.”

     Pruning serves several purposes: it is used to help shape the tree, to cut away any damage that could be a danger, and to remove any diseased unhealthy areas. Sounds very familiar to the pruning the Lord does in our lives, doesn’t it. Pruning is not a ‘one time and you’re done’ project. It is required maintenance on an ‘as needed’ basis in both our lives and trees.

     There were a few dead branches in all four trees- areas of our lives that no longer work to edify, uplift and encourage growth. Those had to go! I could not help but recall scripture talking about Jesus cursing the fig tree that did not bear fruit. It was common to destroy trees that were not bearing good fruit to make way for those that did. Water was (is) a valuable resource and was not wasted on those not producing what was good and beneficial. "Dead" areas in our lives must be cut away, too, if we are to grow in healthy fruit of the spirit.

     Cutting away the little sucker branches is an ongoing process, too. They drain the tree of energy and strength needed for the canopy branches and fruit. We have little suckers in our lives, too. Bad habits take our time and resources and people that drain our energies with negativity. If removed when small, it is easy to pluck them out without much issue. Wait until they are larger and the work required becomes greater. All the while, they are draining and taking from the tree…err, our lives and well being. Pruning, Friends, may be painful but avoiding it only makes the need to cut deeper.