We don't like change. We don't want to be pruned or picked. We don't want to do anything contrary to the plan WE set for ourselves so when it's time to have those "useless" branches cut off we fuss and kick and fight even though in the back of our minds we know that God has a reason for everything. He has a purpose for us and in order for us to get to our purpose we must shed some weight along the way. His word tells us in Isaiah 55:8-9, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. v9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. Translation we don't know it all and He knows best.
This is an on time word for the journey Scott and I are taking right now in our lives! Yesterday we were discussing how God has made some major changes in our life in the course of 2010. We've stepped out on faith in major areas and he's removed many people from us that we are now looking at Him and saying Lord what is really going on. So far on this journey there have been moments of pain where we feel that, "perhaps we missed a memo." Perhaps the Lord tried to move us in one direction but we didn't hear His voice. However, when we have had those moments God has shown up and completely showed out and He's really blessed our obedience and our faithfulness. There are things/people in my life that God has called me away from and before I understood why I was mad. I would get annoyed and the frustration would be that of a two year old. Although painful to do obedience is never up for discussion so I followed God's lead and always believed He would reveal His purpose over time. Many relationships I ended when I knew I was afraid to be alone but God, my committed companion, began to reveal how those relationships weren't headed to the promises He had in store for me. I look back on those individuals and I'm so thankful that God snatched me out of those situations because I know for a fact my life would not the way it is now.
If there are people in your life laughing at your faithfulness. People that claim they believe in your obedience but still question how you are going to survive they are not living according to the word of God. They are those that I call "pretenders." Life is great while God is blessing but the minute trouble comes they panic. I encourage you to let God remove those branches from your life. Ron Hutchcraft writes below that, "before the fruit comes the pruning." It doesn't matter who it might be, friends, family, co-workers, church members, it doesn't matter. If you have received direction from God then it's not for everyone else to understand and they won't understand. Get to a place of peace to get pruned and praise Him through the transformation. Those people will be replaced and you'll be much happier that you decided to lay aside the weight.
"Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so a great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us."-Hebrews 12
Take care of yourselves and Happy Monday!
-Justice
The Painful Road to Greater Results
A Word With You - Your Most Important Relationship
Monday, June 14, 2010
When it comes to growing things, I'm not exactly Seedling Sam the Gardening Man. I grew up in an apartment in the city, okay? But my farm girl wife and some friends who have amazing green thumbs have taught me a lot about how things grow and flourish. I was reminded of one of those lessons when I read an article about growing blueberries in our local newspaper. The writer of that article is a recognized expert on blueberries. He explained how one of his most important steps in making blueberry bushes fruitful is to chop off branches. Sounds destructive, but actually it's constructive. He prunes away a lot of top branches so the interior branches are exposed to the sunlight. The result? Big blueberries and lots of them!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Painful Road to Greater Results."
I need to understand this pruning thing. It's one of God's most important tools in growing me - and you, for that matter. In fact, some of the difficulty and loss that you're experiencing right now may actually be your Heavenly Father cutting you back to help you grow. And the results are going to be far greater than they ever could have been if He left what He has been taking away.
As Jesus was in His final hours before the cross, He prepared His disciples for the battles and the assignments ahead with some powerful teaching. And since they saw grapevines pretty often, He chose that as an analogy of their, and our, relationship with Him. In John 15 , beginning with verse 1, our word for today from the Word of God, Jesus says: "I am the true vine, and My Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in Me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful." In short, leaving you less so you can do more.
Jesus went on to explain that all the things we do for Him have to flow from our deep relationship with Him - "I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in Me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from Me you can do nothing...If you remain in Me and My words remain in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be given you." If you keep loading up on Jesus and getting ever closer to Him, your life is going to be really fruitful. You're going to make a greater and greater difference with your life than you've ever made before. You're going to be more and more spiritually magnetic, and having you around is going to be more and more like having Jesus around.
But before the fruit, comes the pruning. I imagine if a vine could talk, he'd say to the pruner, "You're killing me, man!" And the gardener would say, "I know this hurts, but I'm actually removing things you don't really need so you can explode with greater fruit." That may be exactly what's happening in your life right now. It doesn't feel good, but it is good. God is lovingly removing things you think you need, but things that may be holding you down, holding you back, or holding you captive. The cutbacks are painful, but your Lord is taking out and subtracting so He can shine on what's left and do what He could never have done if you still had what you've lost.
Pruning is actually God's loving surgery to let His light go deeper into your life than it has ever gone before. You may not enjoy the process. You probably won't enjoy the process - but you, and everybody else is going to love the results!
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