Preparing for the More God Has for Me: Prune Me Before You Increase Me

I've been thinking a lot about preparing for the “more” God has for me in my business.

More responsibility.

More leadership.

More employees.

More resources to steward.

More of whatever God has for this growth season of my entrepreneurial journey.

But I've realized something uncomfortable:

God's preparation for more might begin by giving me less.

Jesus gives us this strange picture in John 15.

“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

A branch is producing fruit.

It's working.

It's healthy.

And what does the gardener do?

He cuts it.

Not because it's failing.

Because it's fruitful.

That's different from how I naturally think as an entrepreneur.

When something works, I want more of it.

When I see an opportunity, I want to pursue it.

When I have an idea, I want to build it.

When someone approaches me about another venture, my entrepreneurial brain immediately starts figuring out how we could make it work.

For years, I thought my ability to carry many things was one of my greatest strengths.

Multiple businesses.

Different ventures.

A nonprofit.

Godpreneur Academy.

My staffing company.

Different projects inside each of them.

And technically, I could carry a lot of it.

But eventually I learned a painful lesson:

Just because I have the capacity to carry something doesn't mean I'm called to carry it in this season.

One of the hardest examples was a nonprofit I started after my brother passed away.

My brother died in 2008. He was 33. I was 28.

He was my only brother.

We had plans together. Suddenly those plans were gone.

A couple of years later, I started a nonprofit connected to that experience. We raised money and took medical students on medical mission trips.

I did it for more than a decade.

It mattered to me.

It meant something.

And eventually...

I had to let it go.

Not because the mission was bad.

Not because helping people was wrong.

Not because honoring my brother didn't matter anymore.

I had to let something good go because I was beginning to understand what season I was in.

My staffing company needed me.

And every hour I gave somewhere else was an hour I couldn't give to the thing God seemed to be growing right in front of me.

I've experienced something similar with Daily Godpreneur.

I have a vision for what this could eventually become.

I believe there's a future season where I'll spend much more of my life teaching, speaking, coaching, and helping Christian entrepreneurs.

I've tried pressing PLAY on that calling before.

I've built things around it.

And eventually I had to admit:

I don't think it's time yet.

That was difficult.

But something changed when I stopped interpreting waiting as abandoning the calling.

Maybe this current season isn't delaying the next one.

Maybe it's preparing me for it.

Maybe the company I'm building today is producing the stories I'll teach tomorrow.

Maybe today's leadership challenges are producing tomorrow's wisdom.

Maybe today's mistakes will become tomorrow's lessons.

Maybe God isn't saying no.

Maybe He's saying: Not yet. Carry this first.

That's why I've started thinking differently about “more.”

We usually imagine more as addition.

More opportunities.

More businesses.

More revenue.

More influence.

More responsibility.

But before my Camino this year, I'm starting to wonder whether God's pathway toward more might actually involve subtraction.

Jesus says the Father prunes fruitful branches so they can become more fruitful.

That's the paradox.

The branch loses something...

and gains capacity.

Maybe that's what God is doing with me.

And maybe that's what He's doing with some other entrepreneurs reading this.

Perhaps the question before the next season isn't:

“What else can I add?”

Maybe it's:

“What needs to be removed?”

What responsibility am I carrying because nobody else can do it—or because I don't trust anybody else to do it?

What opportunity am I pursuing because God called me to it—or because my ego likes being needed?

What project belongs to my future but is stealing energy from my present?

What good thing has become the enemy of the thing I'm actually assigned to right now?

What am I carrying simply because...

I can?

As I prepare for Camino, that's becoming part of my prayer.

Because this year I'll actually be carrying my backpack.

And before you walk hundreds of kilometers carrying everything on your back, you become very interested in one question:

Does this really need to come with me?

Every unnecessary ounce eventually matters.

I'm starting to think the same thing may be true spiritually.

I don't just want God to strengthen my back.

I want Him to examine my backpack.

So my prayer today is:

Father, prune me before You increase me.

Show me the good things I've confused with assigned things.

Give me the courage to put down what belongs to another person, another season, or another version of my life.

And if You are preparing me for more, don't just increase what I can carry.

Teach me what not to carry.

Because maybe preparing for more doesn't begin with picking something else up.

Maybe it begins with finally putting something down.