Ecclesiastes 3 tells us that there is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the heavens:2 a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, 3 a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, 4 a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, 5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, 6 a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, 7 a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, 8 a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.I’ve always taken great comfort in this set of verses, not only because there is such a poetic and rhythmic balance in them, but because they’ve always been a reminder that God is the appointer of all times, and that these seasons are cyclical. Weeping and mourning, searching and silence, hate and war…all have an end. There is always a season of healing, building, laughing, and dancing…of loving, mending, and peace around the next turn.All of these times serve a purpose in our lives—even some of the ones that might not seem ordained by God, like killing and tearing down, scattering stones, hating and making war.All of these seasons, in some way, demonstrate the necessity of death. In order for there to be life, there must be death. In order to build, things must be torn down. In order to have peace, sometimes we need war. And in order to see new growth, trees need to be pruned.I was thinking of the way Autumn brings the breathtaking view of bright colors and hues of fall leaves, but as beautiful as a mountainside of fall foliage can be, that gorgeous vista is a trumpet declaration that winter is coming—in just a few more weeks, those leaves will be stripped from those trees, and those branches will be bare. In order for Spring to bring new life, new vision, and new hope, the glory of the past season has to die. There is always, always a winter.The world believes that life precedes death, but we who have been made alive in Christ know that the exact opposite is true. It is death that produces life. Is it little wonder that each new year begins with winter, not spring or summer? Death is the starting point, not the ending point. And because winter is the first season, something critical and preparatory happens in that colorless season—when God strips us of old growth, old fruit, and old glory.John 12:24: “Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.”1 Cor 15:36: “When you put a seed into the ground, it doesn't grow into a plant unless it dies first.”In order for there to be new life, new growth, and new fruit in our lives, God ordains seasons of death—a time when he puts on his gardening gloves and grabs his pruning shears and begins to tear down, to uproot, and to scatter stones. Those seasons are painful. Those seasons also seem to be times of silence; when God seems to be refraining from embracing me. I can’t always hear him. And those times usually mean he is asking me to sit still under his quiet discipline. Because in those moments, he is speaking to me, not with his words, but with his HANDS.Prov 3:11-12: “My son, do not despise the LORD’s discipline and do not loathe His reproof; for the LORD disciplines those He loves, as a father the son in whom he delights.”Heb 12:7: “Endure suffering as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is not disciplined by his father?”When God puts on his gardening gloves and puts his hands on the things in my life that need his attention, I can be certain of three things. It’s going to hurt. It’s absolutely necessary. But the hands that are doing it will be full of love. And he’s doing it because I am a child that he loves—one in whom he delights.I am learning that when I am in these seasons and I feel the weight of God’s silence and the painful work of his hands on the clay of my soul that my one and only question needs to be:“What is it that needs to die, Lord? Where do you need to lay your blade?”God will inevitably point me to one of three things on the tree of my life:The roots. The shoots. The fruits.The roots. The health of the roots is all about the soil. How well planted am I in the things that nourish me? Has there been a loosening of that soil? When I’m not planted in the House of God, the Word of God, and the service of God, the soil that keeps me upright begins to loosen, and I begin to lean. Because leaning will become bending and bending will become breaking, I have to look closely at where the winds of distraction are eroding soil and uprooting me from where God has asked me to stay firmly and immovably planted. When I’m not well planted, my ongoing ability to stay upright and fruit-bearing is at risk:QUESTION: “What needs to die, God?”His answer is inevitably too much work, too many “yes’s” that should have been “no’s,” too much time on social media or watching TV, too much running and not enough resting, too much burning the candle at both ends instead of lighting the candles of Sabbath. God takes the blade to my control, my comfort, and my commitments.The shoots. The most painful pruning for me is when God takes his blade to the weeds that are shooting up from the soil and creeping into my soul. We will find those weeds thriving in the same soil where we are most deeply planted, which is why they can go unnoticed for so long. The weed of offense is most likely to grow in the same soil where I am being physically or spiritually provided for. The devil plants weeds where we are being fed. But if those weeds grow strong enough long enough to get to the branches of my tree, they start choking my growth and poisoning my fruit---that’s when it’s visible and taste-able to others in my life. When God forces me to look at that fruit, there is never a deeper more anguished cry of my heart in those moments that I fall to the floor and literally beg God to pull out that blade and lay me bare.QUESTION: “What needs to die, God?” His answer is almost always pride, offense, unforgiveness, a lack of mercy, self-absorption, frustration, and all the ways the devil encourages me to over-operate in my SELF-ness. God usually chooses to reveal these weeds in the form of stark self-awareness or the hurt feelings of a friend. And truly, the natural consequences of allowing these weeds to destroy my fruit are perhaps the most deeply cutting slice of God’s blade. He prefers to do it gently and cleanly by putting his pruning shears in the hands of a grace-filled friend who loves me enough to speak the truth into my life I need to hear. But if no friend is willing to do it or I’m not willing to listen, God will let the raw, undiscriminating, and humiliating blade of an enemy to do it for him. By any means necessary, the weeds have to go.The fruits. The fruit of a tree is only produced on its branches. It’s produced when the tree is well-rooted and well-planted and only when the tree can bear the weight of its own fruit. When God pulls out the pruning shears and directs his attention to our fruit-bearing limbs, his goal is never to decrease or diminish us, but always to stimulate new growth and new fruit.QUESTION: “What needs to die, God?” He inevitably swings his blade at two kinds of branches—the ones that used to bear fruit and the ones that never will. When I have the courage to ask Him what I have given my time, talent, and treasure to that will never or no longer bear fruit, the Holy Spirit will show me the things that need to die, or be cut out of my life, in order to stimulate fruitfulness in the areas God has called me to do . Being Sisterhood coordinator was an incredibly fruitful limb on my life for a very long time, but pruning it was necessary for him to produce the fruit that is budding now on new limbs.The song below is from a singer I didn’t know and a song I’d never heard of before writing this devo. No one has ever better put to words what the painful but beautiful journey of being an “extra” in the hands of God has been. When you’re an extra, there is a lot of cutting. A lot of pruning. And a lot of stripping. Because…you know…”too much.”The song is called The Cut by Jason Gray, and it’s based on Psalm 119:67-77. When interviewed about the release of this song, Jason shared:“I have a friend who visited a vineyard and in the spring they harvest the first grapes and throw them away. I was curious about this, as it seemed wasteful. My friend explained that by throwing away the first grapes, the grapes that grow back are heartier, tastier, and better grapes. They want to cut the first fruit to get to the good stuff. It was a terrifying story. It made me think of the verse in John where Jesus talks about the vine and the branches and that any branches that don’t bear fruit will be cut off and burned up. I thought my ‘fruit’ was safe. It made me wonder about many of the good things I do—going to church, tithing, giving to the poor. How many of the good things am I doing to get God to leave me alone? Look, Lord…look at all this fruit. Don’t mess with my life. He loves us more than that. He wants to get to the good stuff. He looks at our lives with His pruning blade. God cuts, it hurts, it is difficult. Hopefully, we can have courage and take strength in knowing that whatever God cuts does not diminish us, but makes us more."THE CUTMy heart is laid Under your blade As you carve out your image in me.You cut to the core And still you want more As you carefully, tenderly ravage me.And you peel back the bark Tear me apart To get to the heart of what matters the most. I’m cold and I’m scared As your love lays me bare. But in the shaping of my soul, The cut makes me whole.Mingling here, your blood and my tears As you whittle my kingdom away. But I see that you suffered, too, In making me new For the blade of love cuts both ways.As you peel back the bark And tear me apart To get to the heart of what matters the most. I’m cold and I’m scared As your love lays me bare, But in the shaping of my soul, The cut makes me whole.Hidden inside the grain Beneath the pride and the pain Is the shape of the man you meant me to be, Who, with every cut now, you try to set free.Come set me free…You peel back the bark And tear me apart To get to the heart of what matters the most. I’m cold and I’m scared As your love lays me bare.And every day, you strip more away.As you peel back the bark And tear me apart To get to the heart of what matters most. I’m cold and I’m scared As your love lays me bare.In the shaping of my soulI know the blade must take its toll God give me strength to know…That the cut makes me whole.None of us are ever eager for the discipline of God, but the God-first soul will sit under it no matter how hard or how often it’s needed. If God places his pruning shears in your hands and asks you to apply them to the life of a close friend, prayerfully obey Him! It can be very difficult to speak necessary but loving truth into the life of someone we love, but do we realize what is at risk if we do not obey God in those moments? When we do not hold each other accountable in love, we leave that precious friend EXPOSED. We open him/her up to the destructive wounds of an enemy, the harsh discipline of natural consequences, and for God to chastise that person publicly when he would rather do it lovingly in private.I would much rather have a thousand clipping, healable cuts from a friend than to have my friends and family stand by and watch a weed choke me to death and spoil the fruit of God’s call on the tree of my life.“Wounds from a sincere friend are better than many kisses from an enemy.” ~ Prov 27:6