Sermon Central
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The Year I Thought I Killed The Vine
Contributed by Martin Spoelstra on Feb 20, 2026 (message contributor)
Years ago, my wife and I moved into a new house in Fremont, Michigan. There was a grapevine growing along the fence. We were getting into gardening, and I thought, “This is fantastic. We have a grapevine.”
The first year, the vine looked amazing. It was long and healthy. It stretched along the fence, probably twenty feet in both directions. But it produced almost no fruit. And the little fruit it produced was tiny.
So I talked to a friend of mine about it. And he said, “Next fall, you need to cut it back.” I said, “Cut it back? How much?” And he told me, “Leave about three feet of branches on either side of the central vine.”
I remember thinking: "That sounds like murder." The vine was healthy. It was long. It was thriving. And I thought, if I cut it back, I’m going to kill it. But he said, “No. If you want fruit, you have to prune.”
So I did it. And the next year, the grapes came in. They were bigger. They were better. They would have been great to eat…But the squirrels got to them first.
But here’s the point.
The pruning didn’t kill the branch.
The pruning protected the branch.
The pruning strengthened the branch.
The pruning made room for fruit.
That is what Jesus is saying in John 15.
The Father is the gardener. And He loves His people too much to leave them unpruned.
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