This is the season of the year where we begin to look into our yards, our garden, and our landscaping surrounding the perimeter of the house to see what needs to be pruned.  Take a metaphorical stroll with me through my yard.  Surrounding the boundary of our porch (that wraps halfway around our home) are some plants that I placed in the ground during my husband’s second military deployment (2009), and so, these once-tiny plants have grown into older, more cantankerous plants.  Each February, I find myself pulling on my gardening gloves to protect my hands as I also grab my pruning shears.  Then, I begin the surgical process of detaching the branches from the base-vine.  My rose vines are the most challenging, but so then too are the Crepe Myrtles.  This year, my pruning occurred when my husband was away for a few days (another military commitment), so I placed the many branches in my oversized wheelbarrow, pushing on the top of the pile as it filled, ensuring that “all” of the pruned branches would fit into a single load.

Yesterday afternoon was pleasant, so after work, my husband and I took a hike across the farm and then cooled off while sitting on the front porch.  I noticed two things:  my pruned rose bushes and Crepe Myrtles remained “dead-looking,” dormant, un-growing, but the day-lilies and holly bushes were beginning to show signs of life.  What was the difference?   Then, as I looked out across the yard to our flowering pear trees, one of the eight trees that lined our driveway stood with its branches full of white blooms while the other seven trees were still slightly brown in color with only a few white blooms hidden inside the brownness.  What was the difference?

Jesus began to teach while sitting on the mountainside, instructing us about the way we can be blessed, about how believers are to be the salt and light of the world, about personal relationships, about sharing what we have with the poor, about where we must store our treasures, about the cure for anxiety, about judging others, the golden rule, about the way to God’s salvation, about the husbandry of trees, and about where our foundation rests.  The crowd listening that day was amazed at Jesus’ teaching, for Jesus taught differently from the scribes, “as one having authority.”   It is the husbandry of trees that I find myself focusing today.

A quick Webster’s dictionary search defines husbandry as “the care, cultivation, and breeding of crops and animals.”

The Care—

The Cultivation—

The Breeding—

I am sure that if we could become the rose bushes, Crepe Myrtles, and other vegetation that feels the deep cut of my garden sheers, they would exclaim, “Oh, no, not again.  Please don’t cut away the long limbs.  Please!!!”  Now, maybe that’s just silly to consider, but I often wonder if the older, more mature plants (those planted in 2009) feel any pain as I prune them each February.

Some people think that when we give our hearts to Jesus, when we become God’s children, that our lives will just suddenly go “right.” Unfortunately, after our Salvation from our past sins, still we remain on earth, living here among all the temptations, bad habits, and world tendencies.  Yes, sometimes, it is just so difficult to stand out, to be different, to be a tree that only bears “good fruit” because unfortunately we remain SO HUMAN as we walk toward our eternity with God.

That’s where we look out from the front porch to see the single tree standing among the other seven trees—different—in full bloom—white blooms—revealing to the world how THIS TREE is most ready to produce fruit.

The great Bible theologian Martin Luther tells us why.

“We must look away from our own person.  Christ and my conscience must become one, so that I can see nothing else but Christ crucified and raised from the dead for me.  If I keep looking at myself, I am gone.”

The beloved disciple John records the words of Christ Jesus, telling us why.

The writer of Hebrews tells us why.