Abide

The Ministry of Intercessory Prayer by Andrew Murray, copyright 1981, 2003 Bethany House Publishers page 56-57.

Consider what it means: it is said that of all fruit-bearing plants on earth, there is none that produces fruit so full of spirit and from which spirit can be so abundantly distilled as the grapevine. And so for all fruit-bearing plants there is none so prone to produce wildwood and for which pruning is so indispensable. The one great work that a vinedresser has to do for the branch every year is to prune it. Other plants for a time can do without it and still bear fruit; the grapevine must have it. So the branch that desires to abide in Christ and bring forth much fruit and be able to ask whatsoever it wishes, must do one thing: it must trust in and yield itself to this divine cleansing and pruning.

What does the vinedresser cut away with the pruning knife? He cuts the wood that the branch has produced—true, honest wood with the true vine nature in it. 

Why must this be cut away? Because it draws away the strength and life of the vine and hinders the flow of the juice to the fruit. The more it is cut back, the less wood there is in the branch, and the more all the sap can go to the grape. The wood of the branch must decrease that the fruit for the vine may increase. In obedience to the law of nature, death is the way to life, gain comes through sacrifice, the rich and luxuriant growth of the wood must be cut off and cast away that the more abundant life may be seen in the cluster of fruit. 

Jn 15:1-7(KJV):

15:1 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

15:2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.

15:3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

15:4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.

15:5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.

15:6 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

15:7 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.

Answered prayer is connected to abiding in the vine (John 15:1-7)

Contend for a move of God,

-Mary