The figure Jesus used was apt in light of present circumstances. For the dead wood, Judas, was about to be cut off and the rest of the disciples were about to be severely pruned—“sifted like wheat” to use another figure employed to describe the testing of Peter’s faith.

The word of God prunes us. If you study your Bible and use it to scrutinize your own life and thoughts, you’re apt to find some places that need some trim work. “For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword…and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb. 4:12). Jesus said to His disciples in John 15 that they were already clean (related to the Greek word translated “pruned”) because of His words which they had received (verse 3).

God prunes us by allowing us to suffer the consequences of our own sins. We sow to the wind in our youth, we reap the whirlwind for a lifetime. Jacob deceived his father in his youth; he spent a lifetime being deceived—by his father-in-law Laban and then by his own children. But he was a better man in the end, “a fellow heir of the city whose architect and builder is God” (Heb. 11:9-10). God may allow us to suffer the consequences of our sin, just like He did Jacob, in order to make us better.

We sometimes receive the wages for our sins even after we repent. David repented of his adultery with Bathsheba, yet he still paid fourfold for his crime with the lives of his children—the unborn child, Amnon, Absalom, and Adonijah (1 Sam. 12:1-15). The fact that we suffer consequences does not mean that God has not forgiven us. Our suffering is a necessary display of God’s justice, and further of His love—“for those whom the Lord loves He disciplines…for what son is there whom his father does not discipline?”

Sometimes God prunes our plans and fashions them for His own good. How often Paul’s plans were averted! He wanted to go to Asia and Bithynia (Acts 16:6-7). God said, “You’re going to Macedonia.” The Lord has His own timetable for evangelizing Asia (Acts 19:1, 8-10). We don’t see the big picture either. Our prayers may be frustrated. At times God seems to reward our growth and good work with pruning. But He sees a bigger picture. He sees things ahead that we don’t see. All we can do is keep pressing, waiting, praying, like Paul. Perhaps, when we’ve gotten down the road a piece, we can look back and say like Joseph of old (Gen. 45:6), “Aaahh, that’s what the Lord was doing!”

God disciplines us for our good, that we may share His holiness. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness” (Heb. 12:9-11).