Abiding

Have you ever had a moment where you had to stop and ask yourself what are you doing? I had a moment like that last week. Most days I stay relatively busy. I function well when I'm busy. However something just felt off. I didn’t feel like I was under attack nor that something was overly wrong. But something felt off. Like I was missing a piece of myself. I don’t know about you but I don’t like feeling that way. I don’t ignore that feeling because I have learned that often in those moments if I listen, God is speaking . So as I went about my morning I began praying, asking God to reveal to me what it was. Then like a Mack truck doing 100mph down the highway it hit me… I was lacking peace. “God” I said, probably whinier than I should have been, “ You are my peace, what is going on?” With the most calm and ever so small voice I heard Him reply to me, “it’s because you are not abiding in me.” That was a reality check I wasn’t prepared to receive! I had to stop everything and ask myself, “what are you doing?” 

Abiding is a requirement for Christians. Abiding in Him is our lifeline. Abiding, if we aren’t careful, is a place we can move out of so fast. I am blessed to be able to feel God's presence in my life and it grieves me tremendously when He departs. Am I in sin… that is usually my first question. However if that isn’t the case it’s usually because I am not abiding; I'm spending more time doing over Spending time with Him. See in our flesh we can try to mimic that which only God causes to grow in our life. We can so easily become a Martha preparing a meal that Jesus never asked for instead of being a Mary at His feet abiding. Martha wasn’t in direct sin, but her flesh allowed her to take her eyes off of what really mattered, ABIDING!

So what is abiding? If you look in the dictionary, you will find a few uses of the word abide: to bear patiently; tolerate, to endure; withstand, wait, accept without objection, to remain; stay, to continue. Looking at that definition it is easy to say I am abiding in You God. But biblically to abide is something much more than that. The word abide takes on a much more intimate definition. Biblically the word is showing us our need to rely on God in every aspect of our life. (In Him we live and move and exist acts 17:28)

The Hebrew word in the Old Testament is “yashab.” Its definition includes what our dictionary says, but it takes it to a deeper meaning: habitation, haunt, inhabit, keep house, marry, stay permanently, dwell, lodge, tarry. It implies a sense of permanence. In the New Testament Greek, the word most used for abide is “meno”. Like the Hebrew, meno conveys remaining, dwelling, or staying, implying a deep, intimate connection and an ongoing relationship.

If you haven’t figured it out yet our proximity to Him determines our abiding in Him! If your proximity to Him isn’t one of close fellowship then you are not abiding in Him and the evidence of a relationship with Him won’t be evident in your life. The call to abide in Christ is so profound. It’s a mandate, it is necessary, but it’s also an invitation to come close to Him and remain permanently. Abiding is about being in a place where you remain close to Him, where your relationship with Him is sustained. Abiding addresses our posture and proximity to Him. Abiding is not about our efforts. Abiding draws our attention to Christ. 

Psalm 91:1 (NASB) says, “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High Will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.”

Where it says dwell it means to live, or to stay. It says that the one who lives with God will find his life overshadowed by the presence of God. I don’t know about you but life has a way of making me so busy and so focused on things that eternally probably don’t matter. Life can cause me to move out of my dwelling place in Him and when that happens I always feel a loss. I begin to feel things that I know aren’t from God. Stress, insecurity, frustration, and annoyance with people; always become so much more grand when I am not abiding in Him.

You may be asking: why isn’t reading my Bible or saying a prayer of thanks for a meal not enough, why isn’t it enough to go to church and be fed on Sunday by the pastor. According to Scripture, we must rest and find shelter within God, we must remain in Him for life. The biblical concept of abiding really speaks of a permanent living and intimacy in Him. I have to pause and ask, are you abiding? See abiding is not something we have to strive and struggle to figure out. My proximity to my husband causes me to know him more intimately than just hearing about him or reading about him. When you are abiding you don’t just know of God but there’s a deep intimacy of truly KNOWING Him. Reading my Bible and going to church are good things, however they are not enough. 

The reality is your life is a reflection of who you spend time with. In other words, tell me who you are hanging out with, and I will tell you who you will become. Our lives will reflect who we spend time with. The most important relationship that you and I as believers have is our relationship with Jesus. When we spend time with Him and abide in Him, our lives will reveal and exhibit Christ. When it comes to abiding in Him, I can guarantee that if you are feeling stressed, worried, angry, frustrated; if you find yourself lashing out at a co-worker, friend or spouse, if there is bitterness, unforgiveness, or hopelessness in your spirit, you have stopped abiding in God. I’m not trying to 

accuse or point fingers at anyone. We all will be faced with opportunities to be stressed, bitter, and operate in our flesh. But we cannot remain in those and abide in Jesus at the same time.

Isaiah 26:3-4 (AMPC) says, “You will guard him and keep him in perfect and constant peace whose mind [both its inclination and its character] is stayed on You, because he commits himself to You, leans on You, and hopes confidently in You. [4] So trust in the Lord (commit yourself to Him, lean on Him, hope confidently in Him) forever; for the Lord God is an everlasting Rock [the Rock of Ages].” 

When you find yourself reflecting more of your fleshly nature rather than your new nature in Christ, consider it an indication that you have forgotten to abide. It is like a check engine light that goes on when the car is not functioning as it was meant to. That light means that something needs to be fixed or realigned. Is your check engine light on? Have you forgotten to abide?

John 15:1-11 (NASBS) says, "I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned. If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples. Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love. If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.”

Simply put, when we abide in Christ we bear fruit. According to the Son of God, it is the will of God that we “bear MUCH fruit.” The key is abiding, remaining, dwelling in Jesus. God said, abiding in Him, we bear much fruit; apart from Him, we can do nothing. I love what Andrew Murray said, “The great secret of abiding in Christ is the deep conviction that we are nothing and he is everything."

That’s the thing that we have to be absolutely convinced of: that apart from Christ we can do nothing. We are absolutely dependent on Him. Your life comes from Christ. He is the vine, we are the branch. If we are cut off from Jesus, the vine, we will not bear fruit. We are nothing without Him. 

So what is the fruit that we bear by abiding in Him? Galatians 5:22-24 (NASBS) says, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” The fruit is the actions and outcomes that come from abiding in Him. Abiding in Christ is the only way that the fruit Galatians 5:22-24, is talking about, will grow. What is the fruit that is growing in your life? Because I can’t be irritated and have peace, I cannot have hate in my heart and the fruit of love, I can’t indulge my flesh and expect self control to be growing. Joy and depression will not grow together on a branch connected to Christ. 

People who abide in Jesus are hungry people, ones who won’t settle. The moment He said to me, “you are not abiding in Me,” is the moment I fell on my face in repentance. Because I do not want to be separated from Him. We will never grow beyond our level of hunger. If you want more of God… evaluate your personal level of spiritual hunger. Are you consuming all that you can of God? Are you in desperate pursuit of Him? Are you abiding in Him?  Saying we want His Presence and feeling it on Sunday at church is different from abiding/ permanently dwelling in His presence. Abiding costs everything. When you abide; everything you say, think, and do is run through the filter of being close to God. You want His presence but do you deny the cost of abiding? The truth we may not want to hear is that those who don’t abide in Jesus are just pretenders who have no authentic connection to God.

I will leave you with Psalm 139:23-24 (NASB) that says, “Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me and know my anxious thoughts; And see if there be any hurtful way in me, And lead me in the everlasting way.” We have to acknowledge the ways we have relied on our own strength. If you have found yourself not abiding, with no fruit as evidence (of being connected to Him): repent and confess the areas of your life that have been disconnected from Him, that have become dry and unfruitful. Rekindle your desire to be close to Him and allow yourself to abide in Him once again. 

The beauty of God is this, if there is still life in your body and breath in your nostrils… it’s not too late. The key is abiding in Him.