I've been camping out in John 15:1-2. 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. I think I've always read this verse with the understanding that if I don't perform & bear fruit, that God just might cut me off. It sounds so silly now. It's not at all what it says. His agenda is not to cut me off; It says that He cuts off pieces of me that aren't healthy. But at the same time, he takes the fruitful branches and cuts them back, prunes them. The concept of pruning got me to thinking. I remember as a kid when Dad would prune the trees. 

I'd always think, why did he cut the trees and made them ugly and bare. They were so pretty before, then he butchered them. But he knew exactly what he was doing. So in the same way, why does God prune us? It sounds painful, it can leave us feeling bare and ugly. But He's the gardener, he knows what he's doing; those areas he's pruning will eventually bear more fruit than ever before.  They will again bloom and fulfill His purposes in a greater way.

As God is pruning me, He's calling me out with some tough stuff. I'm finally willing to embrace it as I feel Him cutting off parts of me that don't glorify Him. It's that dang pruning process. But I'm choosing it. One of the areas He's bringing up in me is control. The picture he gave me was white knuckles.  There are things in my life that I've been holding tight onto, in hopes of maintaining control.  It's been a process, but this past week, I finally came to a place where I began to let go of some of these things, as he's highlighting areas of my life He wants to control.  It's not all going to happen at once, He keeps showing me more areas to trust him in.  But I feel like I'm making major strides in the right direction.