In John 15:2 Jesus said, “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit.” As branches in the Vine, God is always working, training and disciplining us to produce more fruit in and through our lives. The branches, or unfruitful are “taken away”, while those that are fruitful are pruned in preparation of more fruit. The difficulty we have with this is that when we are fruitful we often feel accomplished and become comfortable in our current state. This can feel like a battle, we are satisfied with our current fruitfulness but God is leading, guiding and pruning us to more fruit.
In John 14 Jesus told His apostles that those that believed in Him wold do the works that He did, but even more, they would do “greater works”. Jesus has always had an eye on more. He knows what the Spirit within us is capable of doing through us. He is fully aware of what He has planned for our future and He knows the fulfillment of all that He will accomplish. He rejoices over us in our obedience while, at the same time, prunes and prepares us for greater obedience. It is not that God is not pleased with us, it is that He is not finished with us.
I equate Jesus’ teaching about pruning and more fruit with Hebrews 12 and the discipline that God gives to His children. The author of Hebrews tells us that discipline produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who are trained by it. Are we being trained by the discipline and pruning of God or are we simply hoping to endure it? There is a purpose to God’s work in your life. He is not and does not remove unfruitful brancehs; mold and change us on a whim or in an effort to harm us; He is working to produce more fruit than we have ever imagined and more righteousness and peace than we could have known we could enjoy.
Today my prayer is that we would learn to submit to God’s pruning process in our lives so that we are not found resisting His will for our lives. Too many times we extend the seasons of discipline simply because we stubbornly hold on to things that God says have finished their course or lost their fruitfulness in and through our lives. No matter how you have been used or God has ministered to you there is a promise in John 15, there is more fruit! We don’t grow by staying the course, we grow by submitting to discipline. I encourage you today, yield to the Vindresser, trust His love and submit to His discipline. Pruning will not feel pleasant at the moment is begins, but it will yield more fruit, it may just lead to the “greater works” that Jesus has promised