True You By Michelle DeRushaSample

Day Two: Pruning Open

Scripture: Psalm 103:11-12, John 15:2, Philippians 1:6

The practice of “pruning open” is not an easy one. Gardeners familiar with this technique know that the secret to healthy plants and trees lies in subtracting rather than adding. Pruning open creates spaciousness and light where crowdedness and dark had previously existed. 

Similarly, we begin to flourish as we let go of our false selves and allow God to prune us open. In both gardening and in life, it’s a skill that takes discipline, insight, and years of trial and error, and in many ways, it goes against the grain. 

Pruning may not be a popular practice but it is an essential one, not only for trees, but also for ourselves and particularly for our souls. It is only in moving toward smaller and less—in cutting back in order to open up—that we uncover who we are at the very center of our God-created selves.

The truth is, God does not wish for us to stand stubborn like an oak tree, cloaked in a façade of protection, our truest, most authentic selves obscured beneath a tangled bramble of false security: “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 15:2). 

God yearns for us to live wholeheartedly and truthfully as the unique, beautiful, beloved individuals he created us to be. Most of all, God’s deepest desire is for us to know him, to root our whole selves in him like a tree rooted by a stream, and to know his deep, abiding love for us. God yearns for us to live in the spacious, light-filled freedom of Christ and to know ourselves in him, through him, and with him.

As you let go of your false self, branch by branch, leaf by leaf, and layer by layer—as you finally begin to relinquish, open up, and allow God to prune you from the inside out—you will grow in ways you never imagined: in your relationships with loved ones; in connection with and love for your neighbors; in your vocation; in your heart, mind, and soul; and in intimacy with God himself. A spacious place is waiting to be revealed, and exuberant life is waiting to unfurl and blossom. 

Pruning open is the way in.

How do you feel as you sit quietly in silence? Are there any branches you sense that need pruning?