God of Growing Times

GOD OF GROWING TIMES 

In the springing
  of the year
      to blossom
      flower and 
      fruitfulness
I asked the God
   of growing times
to mature me
   in His usefulness.

And quietly
   I stood
And waited
   through the springtime
   through the summer
   through the autumn
into winter.
Then He came to me.

In the stillness
   and the cold
was His appointed
   time
of visitation.

Now the Pruner
   leaves the tree,
master of selective
   cutting,
His eye is trained
   upon the harvest.

But I,
   reduced and bare,
      sad,
mourn
      the cuttings-off
      of branchings-out
that took my strength
and bore no fruit.

Fresh-shorn,
I tremble
   in the wind yet
feel the sunlight
penetrating
   stronger
   lightened
limbs relieved
   to lift
   now higher
   toward the sky
their latent fruit.
- Nancy Spiegelberg

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. John 15:2