I once asked our gardener, Don Alvaro, "Do you ever get tired of cutting the same grass and weeding the same flower beds? Is it frustrating to get everything looking tidy, and then to see it grow so you have to trim it all again the next week?"
He answered me by saying more or less, "It's a sign that everything is doing well."
I thought of the parallel to the vine and the branches in John 14. Jesus says, "every branch that does bear fruit he [the Father] prunes so that it will be even more fruitful" (v.2)
So, it pleases the gardener to see things grow! And, it pleases God to see us grow. The more we grow, the better! And in order to grow even more, and bear more fruit, we need to be pruned. Ouch. Then yummy.
It is also true that if the garden is healthy, everything grows, including the weeds. It's a sign of good soil. It is the same with us. The more we grow and flourish, the more competition we have from weeds. They are those ugly things that compete for our allegiance and our energies. The more we grow spiritually, the more the devil has to fight for our attention. Often the closer we get to Christ, the more we see our need for Him. His light shines into our dark corners (ie. on our weeds) and we need to clean them up.
Often now when I take my walks around our campus, I remember the value in growth. At times the property looks a bit unkempt, but just like my life, when the gardener finishes his work at the end of the day, it all looks a lot tidier, and it has the power, through his pruning and trimming, to grow even stronger, greener, and more fruitful.
So, our math (I mean, Bible) lesson is:
A wise gardener + a regular pruning = much fruit