Pruning

P 2985 Learning to soar.

/ DVH

Anything that talks about soaring above the difficult things in this life will grab my attention. So today I want to read Paul’s idea of soaring above the cares of this world —- from Galatians 5:16-18 TPT. “Let me emphasise this: As you yield to the dynamic life and power of the Holy Spirit, you will abandon the cravings of your self-life. When your self-life craves the things that offend the Holy Spirit you hinder Him from living free within you! And the Holy Spirit’s intense cravings hinder your self-life from dominating you! So then, the two incompatible and conflicting forces within you are your self-life of the flesh and the new creation life of the Spirit. But when you yield to the life of the Spirit, you will no longer be living under the law, but soaring above it!”

Eagles soar. Have you ever noticed that chickens are always looking down, kicking up dust, looking for worms, scratching and pecking …  But eagles!! They fly higher and higher above this world’s activities, enjoying the warmer air that helps them fly. They see this world from a different vantage point.

I think this is part of Paul’s point today. We can face this life one of two ways. After the dust of trouble and strife has settled, we can choose to mount up on eagle’s wings. Thank you Isaiah 40! Or we can go on scratching about in this world’s ideas and clever trends, and miss seeing the vastness and incredible plans of God Himself. But we will need to choose to rise up and see what’s going on from His point of view. 

Sometimes, I end up being a chicken! Life can seem like one ghastly event is followed rapidly by another and then another — and I end up thinking “If I could only just get a moment to catch my breath!’  But the waves of life’s difficulties keep coming … and coming … and coming! Suddenly you have the horrid thought that you may be stuck in an endless sea of trouble, and it seems like you’ve been there for months! In the end I asked the Lord “Jesus, what is going on?”

Yeah! Have you ever had one of those moments when you wish you hadn’t even thought to ask a question…because you were pretty sure the answer was not going to be all that great?? I hear ya! This is what the Lord said to me, and I have to be honest – because I promised I would be honest on this blog …I was not over-the-moon thrilled with His answer. He talked to me about pruning. You know that stuff you have to do when you have a garden and the rose bush is heading for another state and your trees are hanging over into your neighbour’s yard? “I’m pruning you,” He said.

That’s when I realised I’d asked a question that I didn’t really want an answer to because I had already decided what kind of answer I would like! Which is an incredibly dumb idea. What I really wanted to say was: “Lemme outta here, I’m drowning. I need a happier times fix!” Eventually I sat and read the book. So far I’ve read John 15 about six times because it talks about pruning. Spiritual pruning didn’t sound all that much fun. The first thing I noticed is that if a branch in my life is fruitless … then a-pruning He will go! That pretty much emphasised the fact that being fruitful is extremely important to the Lord, even though I believe being fruitless can happen to all of us..

The secret to being fruitful is to stay in Him and His ways. This is what came up for me, as I was meditating on it. Remaining in Him, means I live this life aware of what I have been given by Him, but it is not just a happy thought I visit every now and then. Everything I am now, comes from that place of grateful recollection of Him saving me, plus everything He died to give me. I need to live my life, my very ordinary life, aware of the incredible exchange Jesus Himself provided for me. His eternal life for my death to self. His righteousness for my sinfulness. His perfect love for my own natural human affection …His peace for my irritability etc.

At the same time, I will have to actively cultivate and deliberately let what He says in His book remain in me – in my life and my thoughts. So now His Word becomes my reference point for everyone I relate to, everything that happens to me, and everything I do. It becomes my new conscious-thought pattern. Which sounds remarkably like “renew your mind” to me! The Lord cannot be an add-on —. He, and His life in me, are to be my focus. Living like this will lift me up above life’s difficulties and give me an eagle’s view instead!

We all want to be productive for His kingdom. We may be daily growing in knowledge, but if we are not bearing fruit, then we will eventually need to be pruned. Not because He is mad at us, but because pruning produces … fruit! Maybe we have all lived in the natural for so long, we’ve turned into chickens and the things of His kingdom seem hard to scratch out and find. We will have everything we need for whatever comes our way, if we let Him teach us how to soar, and cutting off the old dead wood is a good start. Bye. 👋

P 2839 Waiting precedes fruitfulness.

/ DVH

I enjoy this time of the year because I love looking at, and smelling the fruit of summer. Plums, apricots, peaches, mangoes, nectarines, raspberries, strawberries etc. However, waiting for harvest is time consuming. All that weeding, fertilising, watering etc. as well as pruning, which creates more fruit – it all takes time. Fruit trees can even  take a long time to produce fruit – most immature trees take 3-5 years. 

Our mango tree, which was originally grown from a seed, took about 7 years to start fruiting. But boy! That first crop was sooooo yummy. 🥭 Meanwhile, we had to fight birds, possums and creepy crawlies to get it. We have a pretty lush front garden, but it is periodically invaded by big fat locusts. Hubby kills them off one at a time and it gives him great pleasure. There is no John the Baptist at our house! We enjoy our plants and fruits, and we ain’t sharing it with bugs! Sadly, insects love those fresh green shoots – it’s all salad greens to them.

In the natural, there is no point in periodically digging up a newly planted seed to see how well it is growing. You will kill that plant stone dead!  So, today, I want to briefly look at Mark 4:26-29 – Jesus knew a lot about horticulture, He often used illustrations about growing things. “He (Jesus) also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. ALL BY ITSELF the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.”

When it comes to growing stuff, we’ve found experience helps, but everyone is in the dark, until that fledgling seed pops its stalk and leaves through the ground! Then we are off. Clipping this, feeding that, regularly watering and protecting the plants. I have huge admiration for farmers! Such patience. The time it takes for any sort fruit to grow is labour intense and tedious. We’ve had a lot of storms this year, and they’ve manage to whittle down and eliminate the potential little nubs of our would-be mangoes. Fortunately we have still had had a good crop – some were 900grams!  

The thing is, when it comes to spiritual fruit, the process of growing His graces in our lives is very similar to growing actual fruit.It takes time!  First God plants the seed, (the Word) and then it is fertilised by His Grace kissing it. We know we have a seed that is just for us because He highlighted something when we read that particular scripture and now we’ve start praying about what we are to do about it. That kind of waiting on God waters the seed. We are saying to the Holy Spirit: “What You have given me is important, and I am paying attention to it.”

Feeding whatever grace the Lord wants to bring out in our life, comes from seizing opportunities. This, just like edible fruit – is not an instant process. Unfortunately, right after we have read the Word, our enemy often comes along to steal it. he will try to explain it away, or point out that you were given it so you can tell someone else. he will do anything to distract us and prevent growth in that seed. Father God, however, will bring opportunities across our path for us to cultivate this new fruit. I would just like to mention that those opportunities are hardly ever convenient, and they involve dedication.

What keeps us, keeping on, is the fact that God is at work, to His will and good pleasure!! This is what makes His Word flesh in our lives. It goes from theory, or thought into actions. I need to mention here that the first few times we try to obey might be quite difficult. We have already a tidy little group of cultivated weeds in our lives  – they are excuses, happy little reasons why that scripture isn’t there for my attention so I don’t have to do whatever it is. 

Then comes the assault of the rampant weeds, which grow more quickly than your plant!  Weeding is hard work. It goes against the grain and it pains the back!! Two roads face us at this moment, one leads to the death of that seed God Himself spoke into life, and the other leads to dying to self, so His seed will prosper inside us and start pushing against any resistance. The seed of God’s word will always seek the light of His love and His enabling. Remember, the Holy Spirit is always there to help us – but He will not do it for us! 

But ignoring our weariness in the well-doing, our feelings or even stinky attitudes is actually hard work. As soon as I get to this stage, and I know that have done everything He asked me to do – I stand. The bible says in Ephesians: “…and having done everything, … stand!”  Whenever the enemy fires fiery darts at me from others or my own thinking I give the whole situation over to the Lord and leave it there. On purpose. 

There are times when I have to give stuff back to Him over and over again, because those weeds of doubt and insecurity have grown quite large. So if He gives me something to do as all this is happening, I do it. I am enlivening my faith – that is hard work. Then I go back to standing and WAITING. Growing God’s fruit of Grace takes time, and I want to be in this battle for the harvest of fruit in my own life. I want to see that fruit growing so I can share it with others… Bless you, bye for today. 👋

P 2373 Pain is often inevitable.

/ DVH

Pain can happen when His will crosses ours – so we are going to need to learn how to dig through that pain to find a pool of blessing. “Even when their paths wind through the dark valley of tears, they dig deep to find a pleasant pool where others find only pain. He gives to them a brook of blessing filled from the rain of an outpouring.” Psalms 84:6 TPT. I have to tell you I need to take a permanent shower in this word for about a year! It shows what the Holy Spirit does with a precious totally-yielded soul. It also explains that God’s ways are not our ways. A pleasant pool actually puts me in mind of a trouble-free existence – obviously that is not what the Lord means here! He says we must dig to find the blessing in the middle of the hard bits.

I already know the location of one of these pools because I am totally blessed to know people who are like this psalmist. Even though I’m not always there yet, these people always treat me like royalty. That’s the hallmark of the children of the kingdom – they value other people above everything else … apart from the Lord Himself. When I meet people like this, I immediately feel like I can be bigger. They know how to dig one of those pools! Their kindness and love can open doors that have remained shut because of fear and pain.

Pain, BTW, is often inevitable, especially when His will crosses ours. Boy my voyage of inner self-discovery this year has been eye-opening. There was all this hideous stuff hiding around corners inside my heart and it didn’t show up until life squashed me! When everything goes well, I can be as ‘nice’ … as anyone else, but when the ceiling falls in – hmmmm…. that’s a whole other story. That’s when I’ve begun to realise that pain is an opportunity to dig for more – it kind of sounds like Ps 23:5.: “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.“ 

Digging deep produces blessings – when we dig deep we will get a POOL of blessings, like this Psalmist said. Most of us just want to run away from pain and hardship – but this man has learnt a better way. Sadly when I get into digging it seems like the first thing I find is a stinky attitude in me!  Father God is so kind, He has explained to me that this is a symptom and I need to extend forgiveness to myself, others and the world around me. My next response is to tell the Holy Spirit if He doesn’t help me I’m sunk. I am permanently grateful we have a Helper – especially while I am looking for that pool… because HE knows where those pleasant pools are!

Ya gotta wonder if those pools in Psalm 84, actually come from the dark valley of tears this guy just crawled through … but NO! That pool comes from a brook of blessing that came from an outpouring. Wouldn’t it be great if we  could just skip the hard times and go straight to the brook and the outpouring? That’d be ACE! There are times I stumble over that prayer I prayed eons ago – to be like Jesus inside and out – you can’t complain when you asked for it can you? But there is a blessing in there – God is answering that prayer. Maybe that is why you gotta learn to dig beyond your current circumstances.

There are times that I learn great things, retrospectively. It would be so much better to know that piece of info before the bad stuff rushes over me like a rampant river and threatens to drown whatever faith I have. At the same time the bible mentions another pool provider — regular pruning. The Lord loves to prune the bits that aren’t fruitful …! 😱 Wark! I know the Lord loves to do it but pruning can be hard – it mostly happens when you think you are getting somewhere – at last! 

You are going along, a happy little branch on the vine and you discover this nice green little shoot popping out right near the end of your branch. Goodie! New life you think – aha!  And then the Shepherd/Gardener comes along and prunes the whole branch back to a nub!  The indignation is almost palpable. Why would the Gardener prune something that had so much potential? To get more, that’s why. Right there, when it seems your hopes have taken a nose-dive …is some of that blessed pool potential. God is so happy with our progress and He can see even more is possible. That’s an instance where He does not think like we do. 

Here’s a tip on digging a pool – get used to using your faith in His goodness, no matter how things look – because that is the thing that our enemy challenges all the time. Holding on to our faith is part of the excavation to find that pool of blessing in the middle of the hard bits. Sometimes it’s important to simply choose to embrace the mystery of Who He is, to keep your faith in Him strong. Pain is often an inevitable part of this life, we can do it alone, or with Him and learn the art of excavation – our choice. 👋🏻

Ps the Apostle Paul was a fantastic digger – he knew how to find the blessing in the middle of a trial – look out for it when you are reading the Epistles, EG. 2 Timothy 2:9 “…for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal. But God’s word is not chained.” 

P 2323 Fruit inspection.

/ DVH

John 15:1-4 “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. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in Me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me.” Matthew 7:18-20 “A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them.”

When things go upside down, one of the first things we need to look at is what kind of fruit is being produced from our lives. That’s a big clue for us to diagnose whatever is coming OUT of us! God good … devil bad. Bad fruit = not God. Don’t blame someone else –  instead face your own flaws. A-N-D … please don’t make excuses for yourself either: – “I’m sick.” “I’m tired.” “Life’s too hard.” “My family is like this!” “You’ve been mean to me.” Excuses. Face whatever has happened with honesty, humble yourself and repent.

The place where we can fall over is when we analyse or judge what other people are doing. Learn to accept that your reactions are just your reactions – they may be born out of experience and pain – but they are not always truth! Our feelings, or even any mental knitting we might do, are not good spiritual barometers. The minute we start analysing situations so we can defend or even explain ourselves – is the minute we start walking away from His guidance.

Sometimes fear gets in the way of facing reality. Our God took CHAOS and made something glorious out of it. And we are still enjoying His Creation today. God is not scared of, or intimidated by CHAOS. Even the chaos of our thoughts. That kind of stuff can become His building materials for a brand new day and world. So don’t be afraid of chaos … HE CAN TRANSFORM ANYTHING. He is Lord over any chaos. 

Evidence of the Holy Spirit’s fruit does not rely on external circumstances. Rather each one of these fruits is an expression of our Heavenly Father’s nature. His Personhood, His Character. His love can touch places inside us we didn’t even know we had, and when it does it does something permanent. Plus it opens our eyes to Who HE is. Then slowly but surely, that revelation takes His knowledge out of the realm of feelings into fact. 

God’s love has never relied upon US. It is a product of Who HE is. It is simply part of Him. Likewise His joy is not dependant on circumstances, like ours is. “For the joy that was set before Him, Christ endured the cross.” Hebrews 12:2. Joy is not human happiness, or satisfaction, it is actually a product of His ability to see further ahead than we can! We are often focussed upon the immediate and how stuff effects us – sometimes the greater good is coming towards us.

Lastly the Lord’s peace does not rely upon circumstances, because it is an INTERNAL thing. Jesus Christ said: “peace be still” to a stormy sea. He spoke out what was already inside Him, into this earth’s atmosphere and changed it. Understanding this will change how we pray for the sick. Peter said to the lame man, right before the guy was healed: “Silver and gold have I none but such as I HAVE give I thee.”

We can struggle and strain to BE something Christ’s death has already given us.  All we need to do is to follow Him, do what He says, and yield to the Holy Spirit, just like Jesus Himself did. We must stop trying to fit the Holy Spirit into our plans and instead find out what HE is doing, and do that.  

Christians can become obsessed with anointing and gifts – and skip over character. We’ve gone after the gifts instead of the GIVER. We desperately want the gifts, but we expect God to do all the work of transforming us. Both things will happen as we yield, and live our lives for the sake of letting His kingdom come. Inside and out! We have to learn to co–operate with the Holy Spirit. That’s when we will produce fruit that LASTS.

Each time we say ‘yes’ to His way and ‘no’ to ours – we die to self.  This is the pruning process, the stripping away of our own concepts and hopes for ‘self.’ So when we read His book, we discover what God’s love really looks like – human emotions are no substitute for it. Then we need to look at our own lives, as well as what we give away. Start with the way you treat those closest to you. Sadly we can all look good – superficially. 👋🏻

P 2302 Jesus is wholehearted.

/ DVH

By that I mean that He is not half-hearted about anything, and He is especially passionate about us. So much so ‘that Jesus ever lives to intercede for us.’ The bible also says this about our Heavenly Father:  “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with Whom can be no variation, neither shadow that is cast by turning.”James 1:17 He is Who He says He is – He can’t be any other way – HIS LOVING NATURE IS FIXED.

Our God does not have any secret unpleasant agendas. He is not hiding behind some curtain or or in some doorway waiting to jump out and say: ‘AHA! I’ve got you now. I caught you! I’ve got you dead to rights!’  Fat chance. That is just not Who He is. Even though the bible tells us ‘that Jesus Himself knew what was in the hearts of men’ – YET – He still chose to come and save us all anyway! 

So when Christ tells us to:“… love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because He is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.”Luke 6:35 NIV.

— we can instantly see that He is not just whistling ‘Dixie.’ He means what He says, because He did it first … That means it can be done …! Jesus was a human being just like us – He simply lived His life connected to the Holy Spirit. He was surrounded by people who misunderstood Him and hated Him … unto death. And some of them were His friends!! He knows about cost personally, and in order for us to effectively follow Him, we will have to go down the same roads of total surrender and relinquishment He walked down.

It is imperative that we remember that Father God did not spare His only Son, Jesus Christ. So all the whinging, whining, squalling, complaining and bawling we can turn on, will not exempt us from trial and trouble. By all means ‘ask and keep on asking’ etc. but remember that our goals may seem godly to us, but they can also be self-serving… all at the same time! Pruning away stuff in our lives we don’t need is painful — however purifying our motivations can be revolutionary and revelatory. At the same time we need to cultivate a firm trust in Him and act according to His Word. We cannot afford to give in to inactivity and doubt.

Doubt, you will remember, leads to double-mindedness. Thoughts like: ’Is this God? IF He’s a good God, why would  He hurt me?’  Our feelings and logic cannot be trusted when it comes to knowing God. What does His BOOK say? We need more than a passing acquaintance with the bible. At any unclear moment I ask for WISDOM. “ If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, Who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.” James 1:5. It’s hardly rocket science. 😶 Unfortunately we can’t expect to follow Him without bumping in to our own unredeemed selves, as well as other people’s agendas… therein lies most of our conflicts.

There have been times in my life when Father God has surprised me with ‘more than I had ever hoped or dreamed’ and other times when He does something so wonderfully and gloriously sneaky, I have no words left. I usually get the giggles instead. Because He has not just surprised me – He has delighted me as well. Psalm 37:4 says, “Delight yourself also in the LORD and He shall give you the desires of your heart.” 

Pastor Chuck Swindoll says this: ‘God is full of surprises. But it takes a sensitive spirit to see them, to be jolted by them. Too many Christians are lulled into languor. Some can warble all the Christian songs, recite all the right Bible verses, and quote this preacher and that teacher, but their Christian lives, down deep inside, are jaded. Are you in that condition? When that happens, you become calloused and insensitive, and you’re in for a life of boredom and mediocrity. How tragic for that to happen! The walk of faith is designed to be a walk of adventure, filled with periodic and delightful surprises.’

My sentiments exactly. Jesus is passionate – that’s what we are aiming at too.  Bye.👋🏻