Why the most important thing you do this year may be what you don’t do
I went out to visit the grapevines this past Christmas at my parents’ farm. Summer’s vibrant green had long since faded, replaced by dappled yellows and browns. Lifeless vines sprawled from each plant in every direction, winding around one another and into neighboring rows.
My dad taught my brothers and me to prune when we were boys. I remember a winter morning, cool and foggy, Dad in a flannel shirt, showing how the vines were to be cut. He carefully selected the healthiest and best-directed branches, reduced them sharply, then pared off all the others entirely.
It felt brutal. Vines twenty feet long were reduced to a few feet, or inches, or nothing at all. Surely this would cause irreparable harm. How could the plant recover?
“It might seem harsh,” Dad said. “But if you don’t cut like this, here’s what will happen: next summer you’ll have lots of grapes — but they’ll be small and flavorless, even bitter.”
Come July, he was right. We’d cut deeply, and the harvest was delightful. “To get the best grapes,” he told us, “you’ve got to prune much more than you’d think. That fruit you hope for won’t come any other way.”
Overgrown
Need we say it out loud? Our lives and work so often resemble that sprawling vine, a riot of branches winding every which way. There’s lots of activity, even growth. But altogether, it is woefully overgrown. There may be lots of grapes next summer, but many will be small and bitter.
If that’s true for you — and I suspect it is for most of us — then an essential decision lies before us. It is less, not more, that may be the singular path to the good fruit we desire.
We must learn to prune.
Happily, this work is not ours alone. Jesus told His disciples, “Every branch that bears fruit He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.” (John 15:2) Pruning is ultimately God’s work.
Yet, as with so many things, God invites us to participate. Not because He needs our help, but because He loves to be with us — and to see us become more like Him as we labor at His side. This invitation lies at the heart of our CAFO2026 theme.
Pruning overgrown lives is our Father’s work, and He welcomes us into it.
Pruning is an act of faith and focus
Pruning can be painful. Yes, there are easy targets — the low-value activities we know we won’t miss. Even those first cuts can make a remarkable difference. But the wise farmer never stops there.
The harder cuts often involve things we enjoy, prize, or have even built our identity upon. It can feel brutal. Will the plant ever recover?
And yet, few choices hold greater promise. Even as we cut on a cold winter day, eyes of faith already glimpse the next summer’s harvest.
Pruning, then, is an act of faith. We choose reduction with confidence that God can — counterintuitively — bring future growth, fruit even better than the good we have now.
Pruning is also an act of focus. It channels finite resources toward fewer branches. It is the intentional reallocation of life toward greater fruitfulness.
Through pruning, less becomes the path to more — not always bigger numbers, though sometimes that too — but certainly more of what matters most: a harvest that is fuller, sweeter and more enduring.
What must be cut?
The term addition bias describes a powerful human tendency. Almost inevitably, we try to solve problems by adding things — new activities, features or resources — rather than by removing or simplifying what already exists.
The term was popularized by research led by Leidy Klotz, including the 2021 Nature articletitled, “People systematically overlook subtractive changes.” Through many experiments, Klotz showed that when people are asked to improve objects, plans, or systems, they default to adding things — even when subtracting would be more effective.
That’s true for all of us. We’re almost irresistibly drawn to add … and rarely consider reducing. Just knowing this — and choosing to seriously contemplate strategic subtraction — is a key part of the battle.
Strategic pruning falls into three categories: the bad, the neutral and the good-but-not-best.
- Parasites (the bad) bring only harm. They attach quickly and drain life. Scripture is unambiguous here: “cut it off and throw it away” (Matthew 5:30). Examples: addictive behaviors, pornography, gossip, corrosive entertainment, media intake that produces anxiety, envy or despair.
- Suckers (the neutral) are branches that look healthy and grow fast but yield little fruit. They’re a less obvious enemy than parasites, but can reduce a harvest greatly — quietly draining resources from productive vines. A wise farmer is merciless with suckers. Examples: low-value entertainment, endless news consumption, involvements that keep life busy but shallow, all-consuming sports or other activities that crowd out family and spiritual life.
- Good-but-not-best growth is the hardest to prune. These are healthy branches — roles, programs, habits — that’ve borne fruit but perhaps divert energy from something better. Pruning them frees up resources for what’s most important and for what God may call us to next. Examples: former leadership roles, healthy practices that consume too much focus, organizational programs that remain positive but no longer strategic.
The goal here is not ease or convenience. Yes, pruning may lighten our load. But God calls His people to lay our lives down for Him and for others. That service may seem to have little obvious fruit in the short run, like faithfulness to a difficult friend or spouse, caring for a child with special needs, or nursing an ailing parent. God’s Kingdom grows especially through these small acts of self-giving love, regardless of visible results. We prune not to avoid menial tasks, but to give ourselves more fully to the few tasks and people God has set before us.
Good for us in every part of life
Like all deep wisdom, pruning brings benefits across many spheres of life.
The business classic Good to Great offers myriad examples of how the most effective leaders tend to be almost obsessive in pruning. It highlights the Pareto Principle — sometimes called the “80-20 Rule” — the observation that in many settings, a surprisingly small portion of inputs produces a huge share of outcomes.
For instance, for many companies, a small subset of their products or service lines — often around 20 percent — generate the majority of profits. Meanwhile, another small segment consumes outsized attention and energy yet produces far less yield. Effective leaders are continually looking to prune — willing to sacrifice even things to which they’ve been emotionally tied — so as to redirect finite resources to where they can bring the most good.
The same principle applies in athletics, education, nonprofit work and personal habits. The goal is not cold efficiency. Rather, it is a fundamental shift — not just in how we allocate resources, but also in our hearts. Wise pruning helps us move from a frenetic, scattered, always-on activity to a clear-eyed focus on the few things that make the biggest difference. It is simultaneously calmer and yet also more productive in the most essential ways. Fewer branches, better fruit.
The opposite of pruning
The opposite of pruning is clinging. It grasps and refuses to let go.
This impulse is a form of greed, which Scripture names as idolatry (Colossians 3:5). It may aim at many superficial ends — comfort, achievement, pleasure. But lurking at its depths is fear — a suspicion that we are nothing apart from what we possess or achieve, and a quiet dread that what we have now is as good as it gets. When our heart believes such lies, we find ourselves unable to prune — less is only loss.
The result is predictable: overgrown lives — spread thin, distracted, anxious, incapable of both effective work and true rest. Using a slightly different metaphor, Jesus describes such lives as wheat choked by thorns — still growing, but ultimately “unfruitful.” (Mark 4:19)
My friends, I say this gently but resolutely: a great many of us, even the most earnest Christians, live today among these thorns. Our faith is alive but weakened by our overextension and splintered attention. There is growth, but not the harvest that could be.
By God’s grace — and our willing participation — we must cut back what now splinters and spreads thin our time, energy and attention. The good fruit we desire will come in no other way.
Sometimes our part is only to receive
By his 30’s, John Milton had distinguished himself throughout England as both a gifted poet and political leader. Grounded in an earnest Christian faith, he championed freedom of conscience and other principles on the national stage to great effect. But even as he rose, Milton’s eyesight began to fail. By 43, he was completely blind.
Milton penned an anguished sonnet, “When I Consider How My Light Is Spent,” lamenting all he’d lost. It felt like death — not only of personal enjoyments, but of his capacity to serve God. And yet, as the poem concludes, a soft voice gently reminds: God’s capacity is infinite. He does not need our service. Our yielded heart, not grand accomplishment, is all He asks. Milton finishes with a quiet confidence, reminding himself: “They also serve who only stand and wait.”
Sometimes our part in God’s pruning is only this: not to act, but to humbly receive, even when we can’t understand. We’d never have chosen these reductions — the illness, unemployment, confinement. But still we reverently kneel before the One who prunes, confident that every cut is made tenderly and with eyes for a harvest to come.
We’ll not likely see the full harvest until heaven. But sometimes we catch glimpses. For Milton, blindness constrained life, yet it also narrowed his focus, from politics back to a prior love: poetry. In total darkness, he composed the epic poem, Paradise Lost. Even today, it stands among the greatest literary works in the English tongue. Many believe its profundity would never have been possible had Milton’s efforts been spread wide across a far-reaching public life.
Where do we start?
Pruning does not begin with tactics. It begins with worship. Why? Reverence right-sizes our measure of things. God is infinite. We’re creatures — dearly loved yet also profoundly small and finite.
That means our time and energy will run out long before our opportunities. If we attempt everything, we will do most things poorly — and remain anxious and exhausted as well. There may be many grapes, but the fruit will be small and bitter.
In worship — awash in God’s infinite power and goodness — we desire not what our feeble hands can grasp, but rather what He alone can grow. We yearn for the best fruit — what Jesus called “fruit that will last.” (John 15:16) Cutting back the bad, neutral and good things requires longing for even better.
So at the heart of pruning is a simple question: What matters most?
Not merely bigger numbers or faster growth. Yes, sometimes more is better. But, to paraphrase Jesus, what shall it profit us to change the world but lose our soul (psyche) — our calm, joy and Christlike character?
Likewise, what good is it for a ministry to triple its size or services — yet leave both staff and those served feeling unloved and untransformed? And what’s the use of all the activities and outputs in the world if they fail to produce the few things that really count?
For the Christian, the ultimate purpose of a well-pruned life is not merely greater efficiency or even simplicity — though these benefits will often come as well. It is to grow like Jesus. The highest good is to see more of his calm and gladness, generosity and attentiveness, tenderness and love growing within us … and then help grow that same delightful fruit in others’ lives as well.
The scale is God’s business — and of equal value in His eyes, whether small or vast. (I Samuel 16:7, Matthew 25:21). Our part is faithful love, including whatever role He may ask us to play in the essential work of pruning. When we join our Father in this, we live with deep confidence: the harvest we long for, His good fruit, both in us and through us, will come in time as well.
What’s the CAFO2026 theme?
And here we arrive with gladness at the theme for CAFO2026:
This is no call to small dreams or pampered lives, but to a faith-guided focus on things that matter most. Gathered in Atlanta this September, we’ll dig deep into the key questions that pruning requires — in our strategies, organizations and personal lives. We’ll examine inputs that make the biggest difference, which priorities deserve greater focus, and which activities may need to be cut back. Amidst all this, we’ll talk and laugh, pray, and eat side-by-side — all of it grounded in rich worship. And ultimately, by God’s grace, we’ll see Him growing in each of us the calm heart and fruitful joy that come as we learn to prune alongside Him.
Let’s start now.
If you long for this fruit as I do, we can start the journey now! When we gather in September, it’ll be all the richer to share and explore together what we’ve already begun learning and acting upon.
Later this week, the CAFO blog will offer five very practical steps to begin.
Join us at CAFO2026 in Atlanta, GA | Sept. 23-25
CAFO Summit is an unforgettable gathering of Christian leaders, professionals and parents who are passionate about effective care for vulnerable children and families. For more than two decades, CAFO has united a movement on behalf of orphaned and vulnerable children and families, achieving far greater impact together than any one organization or church could do alone. Join us this year in Atlanta, Ga on Sept. 23-25.
