PWOC International Blog

“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.”  John 15:1-2

This verse came to mind after I had been sitting in my living room and my eyes landed on my once beautiful bright green potted vine plant that decorated my top shelf in my living room corner. Sadly, the plant I was looking at just then was drooping and gloomy, with leaves beginning to turn yellow. One vine in particular was now completely brown and hanging lifeless down my cabinet.

Obviously this plant had not gotten that way overnight. In fact, I had been watching it slowly begin to wither ever since I had brought it home with a few sun-scorched leaves. You see, I had taken the plant to use as a prop at a church function and when I brought it home it was left out in the trunk of my car for a few hours because I had completely forgotten it was there. Once I remembered it, I ran out only to find that the Fort Irwin desert sun had heated up and burned one of the vines. I took it inside and naively hoped that if I hydrated it enough, it would respond quickly and pop back to life, so after three or four days I nearly drowned the plant’s roots with water, but to no avail.

Being discouraged by my attempts and my lack of ability to rescue the plant, I found myself giving up hope and started to ignore the plant entirely. It was as if I was so overwhelmed by the looks of this one sun-scorched vine that I didn’t want to deal with any of it at all. I have also found the same to be true with me and laundry, e-mails, dishes, phone calls, and friendships. I have managed to allow the one dying vine to cause me to run in fear.

How often do we do this also with sin? How often does one bad sin habit cause me to over compensate with too many “good” acts or ridiculous restrictions, and then when they fail to produce any fruit I begin to ignore it completely. I allow one sin that may have only affected one part of my life to begin to affect my entire spiritual life, which then affects the rest of who I am and who I come into contact with.

I have since found that God may have been onto something in John 15. I got up and I cut off the branch that was dead and I began to slowly water it back to health. Within days my plant was in much better condition than before and so was my soul. When sin creeps its way into our lives and we try to drown it out by all the “good” things we can think of, we will soon burn out and give up. One sin left unattended can cause my spirit to run dry and begin to wither.

Thank you Jesus that it does not have to be this way. Thank you that you are the gardener and that I can come to you and you will prune away the branches of sin in my life through forgiveness. The pain and time to lose one branch of sin in my life is much less painful and damaging than to allow it to begin to wither my entire spirit. The best part is that you will begin to water me with your mercy and grace, so that I may be fruitful once more.

Jeni Kopp

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