But busy can hide something. A life full of activity can still lack fruit.

Jesus defines fruitfulness in a way that goes deeper. It shows up in the fruit of the Spirit and in bringing people to eternal life. (Read John 4:34-36) That’s the kind of fruit that lasts and what our kingdom assignments are meant to produce.

He uses a grapevine to help us see this clearly. “He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more.” (John 15:2)

A grapevine naturally produces abundant growth, with long branches and plenty of leaves everywhere. But left alone, it spreads its energy and nutrients everywhere and produces small, low-quality fruit. The vine looks full, but it’s not fruitful.

The vine can’t fix that on its own. It needs a gardener.

The gardener cuts back most of last year’s growth to remove what’s competing. This includes what’s dead and what’s alive and overgrown.

Each cut redirects the life of the vine’s energy and nutrients into fewer branches, allowing them to receive more. The result is that the fruit that grows is stronger, fuller, and more abundant.

This is how the Father works. Pruning means He is involved. He sees what we don’t. He removes what drains us and trims back what distracts.

In real life, pruning can look like closed doors that redirect your focus. Conviction that cuts away bad habits. Seasons of obscurity where roots go deeper. Relationships or commitments that are adjusted or removed.

Pruning looks like change, feels like loss, but actually gives us focus.

How can we trust the Gardener’s hand this week, and where may He be pruning?

When finances were tight, I prayed for God’s provision.
When I was sick, I prayed for healing.
When I faced a leadership challenge or needed direction, I prayed for wisdom.

I’m not saying this is bad to do. Scripture teaches us to bring our requests to God in prayer.

Here’s what I noticed. When I needed something, I prayed more. When life was good, I prayed less. My circumstances were determining my prayer life.

Over the last few years, the Holy Spirit has been convicting me to make an adjustment.

Many people have never been taught what prayer is actually for. Prayer is seen primarily as a way to get God involved in their lives or to ask God to bless what they’re doing.

Jesus teaches prayer as the way disciples align themselves with the Father’s will so they can participate in His kingdom work.

Here is the prayer that I’ve been praying every day for the last two years or so. It has changed my life, and I believe it can change yours.

May Your kingdom come, May Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And may it be done through me.

True friends have your back.
True friends call you out.
True friends have an unwavering commitment to stick with you through the highs and lows of life.

True friendship is God’s gift to us to not go through life alone. But it also gives us a glimpse of how we can relate to the Lord.

“The Lord is a friend to those who fear him. He teaches them his covenant.” (Psalm 25:14)

The fear of the Lord has a direct line to knowing Him as a friend. The Lord does not reveal Himself deeply to the casual observer. He draws near to those who honor and trust Him.

When you walk in a healthy reverence for the Lord, He will be a true friend to you.

He will have your back.
He will call you out.
He will have an unwavering commitment to stick with you through the highs and lows of life.

Too often, people approach Jesus that way. We want His guidance while remaining in control of our lives.

Psalm 25 shows us a different starting point. Hearing His voice begins with honoring Him.

“Who are those who fear the Lord? He will show them the path they should choose.” (Psalm 25:12)

If you need direction for your life, don’t start by seeking direction. Start with walking in the fear of the Lord. It is a gateway to living the life He desires and designs for us.

The fear of the Lord is living in awe and reverence before Him. It is recognizing He is holy, set apart as the one true God. It’s responding to His holiness by pursuing holiness.

To be holy means to be set apart as exclusively His. To tremble at His word. It’s seeing His authority as not optional.

The fear of the Lord forms the kind of person who can recognize His voice and walk in His ways. And the impact goes beyond you.

“They will live in prosperity, and their children will inherit the land.” (Psalm 25:13)

A life that honors the Lord leaves a legacy. Reverence for Him shapes the spiritual direction of generations that follow after us.

Here’s how David describes His leadership.

“The Lord leads with unfailing love and faithfulness all who keep his covenant and obey his demands.” (Psalm 25:10)

To lead means to go first.

In our relationship with Jesus, He went first. He loved us when we were unlovable. He remained faithful, even when we were unfaithful.

That’s the picture of His leadership.

It reminds me of when our children were born. Kelly and I did not wait to see if they deserved love, obeyed perfectly, or proved themselves worthy of our care. We faithfully loved them first.

Then, over time, we taught them what trust and obedience in a relationship look like.

The same is true in how we relate to the Lord. Before He asks us to lead others well, He teaches us to walk with Him. We cannot faithfully lead others while resisting His leadership in our lives.

Reflection: In what areas of your life are you trying to lead others without first letting the Lord lead you?

There’s an important step hidden in Psalm 25:9 that I believe is a gateway to knowing His will for your life.

“He leads the humble in doing right, teaching them his way.” (Psalm 25:9) Humility opens our eyes to see His direction. Pride is like a veil to it.

Here are a few questions for examining your humble level:

1. How do you respond when you’re corrected?

2. Do you listen to understand or listen to defend yourself?

3. How do you react when someone else receives credit you wanted or deserved

4. Do you make conversations regularly come back to yourself?

5. How do you respond when your plans are interrupted?

6. When you succeed, do you become more grateful or more self-centered?

7. Do you regularly ask God and trusted people to point out blind spots in you?

8. Is your identity rooted in being loved by God or in being impressive to people?

Humility is willingly placing yourself under God’s authority and using whatever He entrusts to you to serve others instead of elevating yourself.

The Lord leads that kind of person and teaches them His way.

As it started getting dark, we realized we couldn’t find our way back to the cabin. There was a moment when we all stopped and came to the same realization. We were lost.

It’s amazing how quickly fear can grow when you realize you don’t know where you are or how to get back home. One of the guys wondered whether we’d have to break into one of the vacant cabins we’d found and stay the night. My mind started replaying every survivor movie where people barely made it out alive.

Eventually, we found our way back just before dark. Everyone was safe. But I still remember the feeling of being lost.

What’s even more dangerous than being lost is not realizing you’re lost. You keep moving in the same direction, assuming you’re fine, until eventually you recognize you don’t know where you are.

The same thing can happen spiritually.

A person can slowly drift from the Lord. A heart can grow cold over time. Sin can shape a person’s direction. It’s possible to lose your way for a season.

That’s why Psalm 25:8 is so hopeful. “The Lord is good and does what is right. He shows the proper path to those who go astray.”

Notice what this reveals about the Lord. He still guides people because He is good. He still shows wandering people the right path.

A spouse promises faithfulness in marriage. A parent tells a child, “I’ll be there,” and shows up. A friend says, “You can count on me,” in a hard season. An employer promises to pay wages to an employee who commits to showing up and doing the job.

Underneath all of these examples is the same question: Can this person be trusted to follow through when there’s a real choice?

You can hear the same tension in how David prays. “O Lord, I give my life to you. I trust in you, my God! Do not let me be disgraced, or let my enemies rejoice in my defeat.” (Psalm 25:1-2)

Trust is the assurance of what we hope for. To be disgraced is often tied to being disappointed or humiliated after placing your trust in something that lets you down.

Trust only becomes real when there’s a choice. And when there’s a choice, that trust is tested.

David has chosen to trust the Lord, and now he is asking that his trust will hold.

This is where He stands apart from every human promise. A life anchored in the Lord will not end in disappointment, even if it goes through moments that feel uncertain.

What if the Lord’s silence means, “You decide.” Either way will be hard AND good.

The psalmist gave voice to this crossroad. “Show me the right path, O Lord. Point out the road for me to follow.” (Psalm 25:4)

At first glance, it sounds like there is a right path and a wrong path. But he’s not talking about obedience and disobedience. He’s expressing a desire to live in a way that honors the Lord in every step.

Instead of asking the Lord, “Tell me what to do.”

Pray, “Form me into the kind of person who can walk with You and decide.”

If it’s a matter of obedience, God has already spoken through His word. In those moments, the path is clear.

If it’s about direction, both options can honor the Lord. Both require faith.

If you find yourself at a crossroads and the Lord seems quiet, don’t assume you’re stuck. Maybe He is stretching your capacity to decide and trust Him.

Make the decision and walk it out with integrity. The right path is living faithfully to Him in all things.

Psalm 24:4 says, “Only those whose hands and hearts are pure, who do not worship idols and never tell lies.”

1. Pure hands are those who are blameless. A trustworthy person is not perfect, but has nothing hidden before the Lord.

2. Pure hearts are those who live with pure motives. A trustworthy person gets rid of all selfish ambition.

3. Not worshiping idols means guarding your allegiance. A trustworthy person gives their allegiance to the one true God.

4. Never tell lies means to be honest. Dishonesty is the language of the devil. A trustworthy person never tells lies.

Psalm 24 shifts the focus from “what am I doing?” to “who am I becoming?”

“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it. The world and all its people belong to him.” (Psalm 24:1)

Everything belongs to Him. The One who laid the foundations rules over all.
Everything I think belongs to me really belongs to Him.

My family. My friendships. My calling. My creative ideas. My job. My money. My property. My mind. My body. My health. My past. My present. My future. Me.

I belong to Him. So I look to Him for how to care for what He has entrusted to me.

When I no longer have to carry the burden of ownership, I am free to fulfill the responsibility of stewardship.

Do you live like you belong to God or like God exists to support what belongs to you?

Recently, I needed to replace the air filter in our fridge. AI knew what to do.

I asked for the step-by-step process of smoking chicken on our Traeger grill. AI knew what to do.

I took a photo of a page out of a book and asked it to turn it into a document. AI knew what to do. All of these things were helpful and saved time.

It’s easy to see how we can become more and more dependent. We need to know something? Ask AI.

There is a warning in all of this. Artificial intelligence is a helpful tool, but a terrible master. If we’re not careful, we can look to it to answer all of life’s problems, and without realizing it, replace God with human intelligence.

The development of artificial intelligence is the modern-day pursuit of intelligence as the highest goal. This has been going on for centuries.

Paul addressed it by pointing to the Scriptures that say, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and discard the intelligence of the intelligent.” (1 Cor. 1:19)

His concern is not practical intelligence but humans’ instinct to trust their own wisdom instead of God.

AI can tell you how to replace a filter, but it cannot tell you why you exist.

AI can summarize information, but it cannot reveal God.

AI can imitate intelligence, but it cannot produce the wisdom that comes from the fear of the Lord.

Don’t confuse information with wisdom. God has made the wisdom of this world look foolish. True wisdom begins with Him.

The message of the cross is that salvation comes through suffering and death, not power and dominance. People won’t understand it unless the Spirit of God opens their eyes to see it.

Jesus dealt with the sin problem we could not deal with on our own.

All of us have sinned. Sin doesn’t make you bad. Sin makes you dead. When you’re dead, there’s nothing you can do to “pull yourself up.”

Jesus didn’t come to give you a better life. He’s not trying to improve your life or be your BFF.

He rescued us.

This is the message of the cross, and it’s the power of God on full display.

The cross only appears foolish when people think they can save themselves. It becomes the power of God when they realize they cannot.

Social media platforms encourage following a person. They’re literally called followers. And the platforms feed you their every move, keeping your attention fixed on them.

It’s a healthy practice to examine your social media habits, including videos, podcasts, etc.

Do you have more commitment to following a person than to Jesus?

This has been an issue long before social media. Paul addressed it to the church in Corinth, where some of them were saying, “I am a follower of Paul.” Others were saying, “I follow Apollos,” or “I follow Peter,” or “I follow only Christ.” (1 Cor. 1:12-13)

The issue is that they were finding security, identity, and belonging in human personalities rather than in Jesus.

Paul warned that this leads to quarrels and factions in the church. And it is not good!

Everyone follows someone. Are the people influencing you helping you follow Jesus or replacing Him?

Here are some questions to evaluate:

1. Who do you follow?

2. Whose words carry the most weight in your life?

3. Whose actions capture your attention and imagination?

4. Do you have more interest in what they are saying than in what Jesus said?

5. Do you have more interest in what they are doing than in what Jesus has already done?

6. Are the people you follow pointing you toward Jesus or becoming a substitute for Him?

By definition, diversity means different. Varied. Unlikeness.

We are different. We think differently. We have different experiences, preferences, gifts, and perspectives. Two people can walk through the same situation and come away with completely different conclusions.

Human diversity is one of God’s gifts. The problem is not our differences but what happens when they become more important than our shared purpose.

Without something greater to unite us, diversity eventually turns into division. Paul addressed this challenge in the church, and his words ring true today.

“Let there be no divisions in the church. Rather, be of one mind, united in thought and purpose.” (1 Cor. 1:10)

Being of one mind is oneness, not sameness.
Being united in thought and purpose is unity, not uniformity.

Paul was not asking everyone to have the same personality, preferences, opinions, or ideas. He was calling them to unite around one Lord, one mission, and one Kingdom purpose.

Oneness is built on every believer’s understanding that their life belongs to Jesus. We are in partnership with Him, under His authority, advancing His kingdom. Within that mission, there will be different gifts, different approaches, and different expressions.

When you’re part of a local church, unity gets tested. Spiritual maturity is often revealed by how a person responds when they don’t get their own way.

Can you disagree without creating discord?
Can you debate and discuss without devaluing another person?
Can you celebrate someone else’s idea as enthusiastically as your own?
Can you submit to the mission of Jesus even when your personal preference isn’t chosen?

Living in harmony with one another sounds like everyone holding hands singing ‘kum ba ya.’ It’s not. Harmony is an active commitment because no church will drift into unity.

Here are some lessons from harmony musically that can be applied spiritually.

1. Harmony complements the melody.

It’s not the main part, but it makes the main part richer and more beautiful.

2. Harmony has specific parts.

Each part must be learned.

3. Harmony parts must be learned and practiced.

If the part is not practiced, it will be easy to sing out of tune or rhythm.

4. Harmony means two or more singers are singing together.

Each part is different and important.

Just as musicians learn and practice their parts, disciples must learn and practice living in unity.

Imagine a church putting Paul’s words into practice.

Each person is part of the overall kingdom mission, a shared partnership with Jesus and His people (the song). Each person recognizes that they have a specific part (melody and harmony). Living in harmony means each person learns and practices their part. There are no solos, and no one is isolated doing their own thing.

Following Jesus is a shared mission. Every believer has a unique part to play. Harmony happens when we learn and practice our part together.

A marriage partnership is based on a mutual commitment to each other and a shared burden of building a home.

A business partnership is based on a shared vision with shared responsibility.

A property ownership partnership is based on shared resources.

A pickleball doubles partnership is based on shared skills and effort.

In every partnership, there is something shared. For a partnership to work, mutual trust is essential.

In 1 Corinthians, Paul explained how God’s holy people have been invited to a partnership with Jesus.

“God will do this, for he is faithful to do what he says, and he has invited you into partnership with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.” (1 Cor. 1:9)

God sustains His people and makes them guiltless through Jesus, which shows He is trustworthy. He will do what He says He will do. His people have been invited into partnership with His Son.

Partnership = shared responsibility.

We can participate with Jesus in what He’s doing. This partnership is built on mutual commitment, a shared burden, a shared vision with shared responsibility, shared resources, and shared skills and effort.

Jesus gave a similar invitation to all who are tired from living their lives their own way. He said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you…For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)

We were never meant to live independently from Jesus. We were created to partner with Him.

When I see the two words strong and free, I immediately think of human qualities like power, physical strength, overcoming, freedom, independence, no boundaries, and no one telling me what to do.

If we want the mind of Christ, we need spiritual understanding.

God’s grace belongs to those who belong to Jesus. When a person places their faith in Jesus and what He did on the cross for our sins, we’ve been adopted as sons and daughters of almighty God.

Many Christians live somewhere between pride and insecurity.

Pride says, “I’m strong enough.”
Insecurity says, “I’ll never be good enough.”

The message of Jesus frees us from both by teaching us that God sustains us by His grace and makes us blameless through Him.

How can sinful, imperfect people remain faithful to the end and stand guiltless when Jesus returns?

The God who called you is the One who keeps you.

1. You remain strong because God sustains you.

2. You stand free because Jesus paid for your sin.

3. Your confidence rests in God’s grace, not your ability.

Paul connects this human activity of giving and receiving gifts to what we have received from God by His grace.

He writes, “Now you have every spiritual gift you need as you eagerly wait for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Cor. 1:7)

These spiritual gifts enrich the church in what they say and what they know. They help us endure with eager anticipation of Christ’s return.

Many people try to earn from God what can only be received from God.

Here are seven lessons on receiving spiritual gifts because of God’s grace.

1. Spiritual gifts are freely given, not earned.

2. You don’t choose what is given.

3. You can accept a gift or ignore it.

4. The Giver knows what you need, not just what you want.

5. Spiritual gifts are to be utilized, not just admired.

6. Spiritual gifts help you speak in alignment with God’s truth.

7. Spiritual gifts help you walk in God’s ways.

Thank God for the gift of His grace!

Here’s the foundation for every person’s calling:

1. God called you to be His own holy people.

Being holy does not mean being perfect. It means being set apart because of who you belong to.

Our behavior does not make us holy, but our behavior should reflect who we belong to.

2. You are made holy by Christ Jesus.

Jesus did what no one else could do. He dealt with our sin problem. Sin makes us dead, and dead people can’t become anything more than dead. He made us holy by what He accomplished on the cross.

By His grace, He made us alive in Him. He saved us, and we respond by calling on His name. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

3. Live differently.

We don’t strive to be holy. We strive to walk out what we already are.

Kelly and I have been married for twenty-eight years. I am committed to her as her husband. My life should reflect that by honoring her and protecting her. I don’t strive to be married. I strive to walk in the relationship I already have.

It’s the same in our relationship with God. Being holy means living set apart as His alone.

Don’t copy the patterns and behaviors of this world, but be transformed every day by the renewing of your mind. Together we can become a display of His grace and holiness.

Clarity about your specific assignment begins with understanding your primary calling. You belong to Jesus, have been made holy by Jesus, and are called to live differently because of Jesus.