April 15
Verse of the Day for April 15
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.John 15:2 KJV
The Key of Renewal · Day 15 of 30
Reflection · 4 min read
He Purgeth It
Jesus describes his Father as a husbandman, and then says something about vine work that most readers would rather not hear.
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.
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.
Two branches, two treatments, and the second is the surprising one. The branch that is working gets cut.
Purgeth is pruning — the removal of growth that is alive and healthy but is drawing energy away from fruit. A vine left unpruned produces a great deal of leaf and very little else.
So the presence of cutting in your life is not evidence of failure, and it is not necessarily discipline. In this passage it is what happens to the branches that are already producing.
The stated purpose is more fruit, and the timing is not the branch's decision. No vine has ever understood the pruning while it was happening.
The branch that is workingis the one that gets cut.
Losing something good is the hardest kind of loss to interpret, because there is nothing to repent of.
Sometimes it is not correction. It is a gardener with a purpose you were not consulted about.
Carry this today
What good thing have you lost that you cannot explain?
Pray
Read John 15:1–5
1I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. 2Every 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. 3Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. 4Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. 5I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
Keep praying
Reflection by Collins Asein, from the daily devotionals in the PrayerKey app. Bible text: King James Version.