A Prayer to Help You Prune Your Spiritual Branches This Lenten Season - Your Daily Prayer - March 18
A Prayer to Help You Prune Your Spiritual Branches This Lenten Season
By: Peyton Garland
Bible Reading:
“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. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.” - John 15:1-4 (NIV)
Listen or Read Below:
I remember my first “attempt” at Lent. I chuckle at even using the word “attempt,” which hints at just how deep those Southern Baptist roots were planted in my college-aged heart. Undoubtedly, I was ignorant of the rich, full meaning of the Lenten season that my church denomination didn’t practice.
But what better way to cut back on my chocolate intake than to throw a little spiritual motivation behind it, right?
Wrong. Oh, so wrong. I barely made it two weeks before indulging my sweet tooth, and I left the practice of the season behind, including any soulful lessons it could have taught.
I hold no ill will towards the Southern Baptist denomination. It’s old hymns and emphasis on the individual working out their faith are beautiful parts of my Christian walk today, but I’ve certainly dug a bit deeper into Lent and now recognize that this season is much more than putting away a favorite dessert or temporarily deleting a social media app.
It’s about self-awareness, asking the Holy Spirit to reveal the pieces of my sinful heart that need to be cut off and thrown in the fire. In this understanding, it’s less about giving something up for a set period of time and more about looking to the eternal weight of my habits and choices. It’s about seeing what needs to go, for good, and what needs to be cultivated—all for the good name of Christ.
The Holy Spirit grants us His divine power to cultivate the fruits of His character. We have full access to His love, patience, kindness, gentleness, self-control, etc., but this access, though granted, doesn’t force itself upon our hearts. Just as God is the ultimate Gardener, taking time to nurture and safeguard each branch we bear, so we are called to take time to nurture His attributes.
This isn’t natural for us, submitting ourselves to faithfulness and maintaining perfect peace, but God’s supernatural love within us calls us to actively work out these gifts.
This means that we don’t wake up feeling joyful simply because joy is a fruit of the Spirit. It means we seek God’s design for joy. We choose to curate it, cultivate it, and invite others into it. We must find the beauty in a day, even when it’s hard. We must choose laughter when sadness wants to win. We must shout for victory and cling to God as our contentment, even when joy feels buried six feet deep.
We must prune our perspective, our thoughts, and our wants so they don’t fixate on our goals, even good ones like abstaining from sweets, but draw us to the character of God.
Whether you’ve never participated in Lent or it has been a beautiful part of your Easter tradition since birth, I encourage you to let God prune your heart this Lenten season.
Wrestle with the uneasiness of a still and quiet prayer that’s less about your demands and more about God’s desire for your soul. Let Him shed light on the sins that need to go and the habits, even “good” ones, that need to be reprioritized. In this process, practice love, practice joy, practice peace and patience and goodness and gentleness.
Let this Lenten season be less about abstaining from a certain thing and more about refusing to remain spiritually idle.
Allow the good Gardener to tend the branches of your heart and soul so this resurrection celebration sustains you long after the Lenten season has passed.
Let’s Pray:
Father, as we enter this Lenten season, spur us to open our hearts to your leading. Grant us your heavenly peace to sit in the still and quiet as we allow you to convict our hearts. Show us which branches need to be cut away and which need to be pruned.
May we see Lent as less of a short-term challenge to improve our daily habits and more of an opportunity to work out our salvation as we trust you, our good Gardener, to nurture and grow our hearts. Thank you for your resurrection and the new life you awaken in us.
In your holy name, Jesus, Amen.
Join the conversation! Share how today’s devotional spoke to you on the Crosswalk Forum.
Photo Credit: iStock/Getty Images Plus/Chad Elberson
Related Resource: What If God’s Heart Toward You Is Kinder Than You Think?
In this episode of Talk About That, you will laugh along with stories about children’s books, volleyball mornings, St. Patrick’s Day, and even the questionable legacy of the Power Team, but underneath the humor is a thoughtful conversation about one of the deepest questions of faith: how God truly sees us. John and Jonnie reflect on weakness, mercy, and the struggle many believers feel in accepting that God is not only patient with them, but genuinely pleased to call them His own. It’s an honest, encouraging reminder that our relationship with God is not built on performance, perfection, or “having it all together,” but on His love, grace, and fatherly delight in His children. You'll come away challenged to see yourself less through the lens of self-criticism and more through the steady, compassionate eyes of a God who knows you fully, loves you deeply, and may just be rooting for you more than you realize. If you laughed out loud listening to this episode, be sure to follow Talk About That on Apple and Spotify!
