{"id":61963,"date":"2021-06-01T17:08:27","date_gmt":"2021-06-01T21:08:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.biblegateway.com\/blog\/?p=61963"},"modified":"2022-05-31T10:54:16","modified_gmt":"2022-05-31T14:54:16","slug":"what-does-it-means-to-abide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biblegateway.com\/blog\/2021\/06\/what-does-it-means-to-abide\/","title":{"rendered":"What Does It Mean to Abide?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"JodieBy Jodie Berndt<\/strong><\/p>\n

When I read John\u2019s Gospel<\/a> and got to chapter 15<\/a>, I didn\u2019t really think it was intended for me.<\/p>\n

I mean, I know that all<\/em> of God\u2019s Word was written for all<\/em> of his people, but this particular passage\u2014one where Jesus tells us 11 times in only ten verses to \u201cremain\u201d in him\u2014just seemed so passive<\/em>. Like it had been written for people who had time to be still\u2014people with fewer children and less laundry than me. People who were content to sit and wait for their name to be called, like you do at the DMV.<\/p>\n

DMV people<\/em>, I thought, would appreciate John 15<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

[Read the Bible Gateway Blog post, Jesus\u2019 Model for Prayer<\/em><\/a>]<\/p>\n

The fact that I had memorized huge chunks of this chapter (well, a few verses anyway) in the King James Version<\/a> for my grandmother, who wanted Bible verse recitals as her Christmas gift every year, didn\u2019t help. King James did not say remain<\/em>. He said abide<\/em>. And even abideth<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t even know what that meant.<\/p>\n

Nor did my much younger brother. We\u2019d grown up going to a Christian family camp every summer, one where we learned to sing a song called Abiding in the Vine<\/em>. Having no idea what that was, four-year-old David sang what he thought were the lyrics: Fighting in the barn! We\u2019re fighting in the barn!<\/em><\/p>\n

And honestly? To me, David\u2019s version made much more sense. I mean, anybody could picture what a barn fight looked like, but abiding?<\/em> In a vine?<\/em> Not so much.<\/p>\n

Still though. Eleven mentions. In just ten verses. Clearly Jesus thought that abiding\u2014or remaining or whatever it was\u2014was something important.<\/p>\n

[Read the Bible Gateway Blog post, Praying the Scriptures for Your Teens: An Interview with Jodie Berndt<\/em><\/a>]<\/p>\n

What It Means to Abide<\/h2>\n

I needed help. I needed wisdom from a varsity Christian. I turned to Warren Wiersbe<\/a>, a Bible brainiac with a knack for putting the grass where the sheep can reach it. I opened his Be Transformed<\/em><\/a> and read this: \u201cTo \u2018abide\u2019 … means to keep in fellowship with Christ so that His life can work in us and through us to produce fruit.\u201d<\/p>\n

I liked that. The idea that God can work in us and through us to do stuff excites me. It makes John 15<\/a> sound dynamic. Active. Productive\u2014in the best kind of way.<\/p>\n

I wanted more.<\/p>\n

I picked up Andrew Murray\u2019s Abide in Christ<\/em><\/a>, a book that was originally published in the late 1800s. The language has supposedly been updated for the \u201cmodern reader,\u201d but buckle up, because it\u2019s no People<\/em> magazine:<\/p>\n

“If, in our orthodox Churches, the abiding in Christ, the living union with Him, the experience of His daily and hourly presence and keeping, were preached with the same distinctness and urgency as His atonement and pardon through His blood, I am confident that many would be found to accept with gladness the invitation to such a life, and that its influence would be manifest in their experience of the purity and the power, the love and the joy, the fruit-bearing, and all the blessedness which the Saviour connected with the abiding in Him.”<\/p>\n

I read that\u2014that one single sentence\u2014and I felt like Murray was getting at something really profound. But I wasn\u2019t exactly sure what. So I read it again.<\/p>\n

And again.<\/p>\n

And then, the third time through, it hit me. Murray\u2019s point, in a nutshell, was this: If Christians got as excited about staying connected<\/em> to Christ as we did about coming<\/em> to him in the first place, we\u2019d experience more power. We\u2019d feel more joy. We\u2019d become people of impact. The deepest cry of our souls\u2014for an encounter with Jesus that will sustain us even when our hearts fail and our prayers feel empty and flat\u2014would be satisfied.<\/p>\n

I could feel my toes starting to tingle. John 15<\/a>\u2014and the whole idea of abiding\u2014was not as dull as I had thought. I went back to my bookshelf and dug out R. A. Torrey. He wrote How to Pray<\/em><\/a> in 1900.<\/p>\n

(And if you think you are sensing a theme\u2014as in, a lot of input from dead authors\u2014you are right. My library is full of old stuff. I figure that if somebody\u2019s work has lasted for 50, 100, or even more years, it must be good. Not a passing fad. Not like platform sneakers, for instance. Or kale.)<\/p>\n

And sure enough, Torrey delivered:<\/p>\n

“To abide in Christ … is to renounce all life independent of Christ, and constantly to look to Him for the inflow of His life into us, and the outworking of His life through us. When we do this, and in so far as we do this, our prayers will obtain that which we seek from God.”<\/p>\n

Our prayers will obtain that which we seek from God<\/em>. Oh my goodness. Could there be a more captivating invitation than that which leads to tangible answers to prayer? Taken together with Wiersbe\u2019s promise of a fruit-bearing life and Murray\u2019s assurance that abiding opens the door to things like power and joy, Torrey\u2019s idea\u2014that connection to Christ is what facilitates a powerful prayer life\u2014was enough to push me over the edge. I was ready to abide.<\/p>\n

[Read the Bible Gateway Blog post, The Abide Bible: Engaging Scripture, Engaging God<\/em><\/a>]<\/p>\n

It\u2019s Not Up to Us<\/h2>\n

But … how? I knew what it looked like to come<\/em> to Christ in the first place\u2014to acknowledge my sin, to receive mercy and grace, to enter into a love relationship with the Lord\u2014but what did it look like to stay?<\/em> What if I got distracted? What if I wound up like my dog Minnie?<\/p>\n

Minnie is a white Labrador puppy. She comes when she\u2019s called, and she will gladly sit still for a treat. But then, once she\u2019s inhaled whatever bone-shaped snack you give her, her attention is prone to wander. She loves us, to be sure, but throw a squirrel or a ball in the mix and she\u2019s gone.<\/p>\n

Could that happen to me? When I come to God\u2014when I taste and see that he is good\u2014how can I be sure I won\u2019t go running after some squirrel? How can I know I will stay? Is abiding a willpower thing?<\/p>\n

I went back and reread all the biblical scholars and\u2014to a person\u2014here\u2019s what they said:<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not up to us<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Sure, we can choose whether or not we want to lean into God, and whether or not we\u2019ll surrender to him. But when daily life presses in\u2014when we have to stop being \u201choly\u201d and attend to the toddler who\u2019s sick, the coworker who misunderstood our email, the spouse who can\u2019t find the butter\u2014that doesn\u2019t sever our connection to Christ. God\u2019s grace does not stop working once we get saved.<\/p>\n

Paul talks about this very thing in his letter to the Philippians: \u201cHe who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion<\/a>,\u201d he writes.<\/p>\n

\u201cGod is working in you,\u201d he continues, \u201cgiving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.\u201d (Philippians 2:13<\/a>, NLT.)<\/p>\n

And then, lest there be any doubt that God is the one who always makes the first move, Paul adds this: \u201cI\u2019m not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me.\u201d (Philippians 3:12<\/a>, The Message.)<\/p>\n

When we reach out for Christ, we discover that he has already reached out to us. The love that saves us is the same love that keeps us attached. We don\u2019t have to struggle or strive for connection; rest is a gift, and abiding is what equips our soul to receive it, even when our minds or our bodies are occupied elsewhere. \u201cCome to me,\u201d Jesus says to the weary and burdened, \u201cand I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.\u201d (Matthew 11:28-29<\/a>, NASB.)<\/p>\n