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.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Am I
getting nobler, better, more helpful, more humble, as I get older? Am I
exhibiting the life that men take knowledge of as having been with Jesus, or am
I getting more self-assertive, more deliberately determined to have my own way?
It is a great thing to tell yourself the truth.
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