GROWING PAINS

I have this calamansi shrub in our front yard. For years, it was bearing good fruit, and we had more than enough to share with our neighbors. But one day we noticed that we hadn’t t harvested anything for the last few weeks. I tried to check the plant, and there I saw that a portion of it was slowly decaying. As if some disease landed on it. At first, I didn’t know what to do until our helper advised me “𝑆𝑖𝑟 𝐾𝑎𝑖𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑎𝑛 𝑛𝑎 𝑝𝑜𝑛𝑔 𝑝𝑢𝑡𝑢𝑙𝑖𝑛 𝑖𝑡𝑜𝑛𝑔 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑒 𝑛𝑎 𝑡𝑜 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑎 ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑑𝑖 𝑚𝑎𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑜𝑛 𝑦𝑢𝑛𝑔 𝑏𝑢𝑜𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑎𝑙𝑎𝑚𝑎𝑛.”

So with a saw, we cut away that dying portion. It was hard to look at cutting nearly half of the plant, but as we did that, new shoots started coming out surrounding the cut portion.

I think that is how God feels whenever He takes away something from us. He knows that the process is painful but necessary. It is painful even for Him to look at it because He knows it will hurt us. But He also knows that from this pain a new and better version will come out.