the Tree by Kaylee Birdwell

My dad has a tree, that he’s been tending and caring for ever since I can remember. A few months ago we had some bad storms in our area and the wind was so strong the top of the tree cracked and it’s oldest strongest branches were broken beyond repair. So my Dad being the knowing man that he is, cut off the broken branches and I’m telling you these branches were thick they’d been blown and tossed and swayed by storms before and survived, for years these​ branches gave small animals and birds a home, food, and shelter. But now they were unable to preform the task that they’d once flourished in. Now the trunk of this tree was left in the middle of the planter my dad had painstakingly built around it, because as many of you know if the trunk is still alive it has the means to grow new branches and that’s exactly what this tree began to do. It has always amazed me how quickly new sprouts can grow from what looked like a five foot stump, leaves followed quickly giving it kind of a green leafy Afro. I was so delighted to see the new life replacing the old. Then one day o come home from work and the new branches were almost all GONE! I was shocked! Because this time it wasn’t a storm that had taken the branches off this tree. It was my dad. I didn’t understand, so I asked why? Why would he prune these young branches that had barley had a chance to begin. He told me simply that “those branches were not growing in the right direction.” His answer didn’t satisfy me at the moment. I assumed in my own knowledge that any branches were better than none. As my thoughts were grappling with my dads words Holy Spirit began to speak to me. He said, “Kaylee, your life is like this tree. Storms have come in and traumatized your relationships, killing the very things you’ve spent years of dedication hard work blood sweat and tears to grow and it was so hard for you to accept that after they were broken they had to be removed. But you began to grow, new relationships began to sprout and you were scared but happy to see the new relationships being formed, but I am the gardener, and because I love you, and have your best interest at heart, I began to prune some of these new growths that were not growing in the right direction.”

John 15:5 says “I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in me and I in him produces much fruit, because you can do nothing without me.”

So I invite you today to yield yourself to the one who always has your upmost best at heart, to abide in He who loves you and to know that sometimes even after the loss and the trauma there will be a pruning. It will hurt, sometimes it hurts in my so bad I can not see through it. But I trust and remind myself of every heart ache and failed friendship that He is working all things together for my good. (Romans 8:28)