No doubt about it, sometimes life is painful.

When tragic things happen, and life doesn’t make sense, there is one thing we can know with absolute certainty: that through everything that happens to us, God is working on our hearts.

Sometimes a good metaphor, or word picture, brings much deeper meaning and understanding to how God works. George Herbert, a 17th-century pastor and “devotional lyricist” was a master at it.

PARADISE

I bless thee, Lord, because I GROW

Among thy trees, which in a ROW

To thee both fruit and order OW.

What open force, or hidden CHARM

Can blast my fruit, or bring me HARM,

While the inclosure is thine ARM.

Inclose me still for fear I START.

Be to me rather sharp and TART.

Then let me want thy hand and ART.

When thou dost greater judgments SPARE,

And with thy knife but prune and PARE,

Ev’n fruitfull trees more fruitful ARE.

Such sharpness shows the sweetest FRIEND:

Such cuttings rather heal then REND:

And such beginnings touch their END.

Here the Christian is portrayed as a fruit tree, growing in God’s orderly orchard, enclosed in His loving arms, protected and cared for. But part of that care involves pruning. 

Pruning seems counterproductive. Cutting off branches? It seems you would want to let them all grow! But branches that die can be dangerous; they can harbor disease and decay. Chopping off dead branches makes way for new and healthy growth.

Herbert welcomes pruning, asking for God to take away the parts of his life that are unproductive and ineffective, so that he may become stronger and able to bear even more fruit (and as he does so, he cleverly “prunes” a letter from the words at the end of each stanza).

This is a very brave request. I’m not sure I want to go through the pain of God cutting out what I don’t need. Am I able to ask God to do that in my life? Do I have the courage to open myself up to his pruning?  But Herbert, who struggled with poor health and setbacks in his church, challenges us to remember, “Such sharpness shows the sweetest friend.” God’s intention is not to rend (to violently break something out of anger). No, quite the opposite! Those painful trimmings are what allow us to grow and mature. Every trial we face helps shape us into a person God can use. God is more concerned about what we can produce than allowing us to grow wild and free, living lives of ease and comfort! He prunes us in order to make us stronger and better able to serve Him.

So this spring, as you watch the trees bloom, remember and be thankful for the way God lovingly cuts and trims us into the most beautiful and productive trees possible!

“Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does not bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.” John 15:2