Abide
in Me… —John 15:4
In
the matter of determination. The Spirit of Jesus is
put into me by way of the atonement by the Cross of Christ. I then have to
build my thinking patiently to bring it into perfect harmony with my Lord. God
will not make me think like Jesus— I have to do it myself. I have to bring
“every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5).
“Abide in Me”— in intellectual matters, in money matters, in every one of the
matters that make human life what it is. Our lives are not made up of only one
neatly confined area.
Am I preventing God from doing
things in my circumstances by saying that it will only serve to hinder my
fellowship with Him? How irrelevant and disrespectful that is! It does not
matter what my circumstances are. I can be as much assured of abiding in Jesus
in any one of them as I am in any prayer meeting. It is unnecessary to change
and arrange my circumstances myself. Our Lord’s inner abiding was pure and
unblemished. He was at home with God wherever His body was. He never chose His
own circumstances, but was meek, submitting to His Father’s plans and
directions for Him. Just think of how amazingly relaxed our Lord’s life was!
But we tend to keep God at a fever pitch in our lives. We have none of the
serenity of the life which is “hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:3).
Think of the things that take
you out of the position of abiding in Christ. You say, “Yes, Lord, just a
minute— I still have this to do. Yes, I will abide as soon as this is finished,
or as soon as this week is over. It will be all right, Lord. I will abide
then.” Get moving— begin to abide now. In the initial stages it
will be a continual effort to abide, but as you continue, it will become so
much a part of your life that you will abide in Him without any conscious effort.
Make the determination to abide in Jesus wherever you are now or wherever you
may be placed in the future.
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