Tuesday, June 16, 2009
abide in me and i will abide in you -jesus
I have no pictures or wonderful words to say, but I can share what God has been teaching me. I've always thought life was confusing, but I am even more lost as I think about how I really had no clue my relationship with God had fallen kerplunk (plus I can't spell). I thought my relationship with God was the best it could be, that I was doing all I could to keep it revived. But God has been teaching me about "the vine and the branches". I think I get most confused when I am looking at the world instead of in the Bible, which really means that I am not believing the Word is true (much of the time I feel like the world and the Bible do not correlate). Yet the word and its truth is truth whether I can feel it working in my life or not, because it is not about feeling but about what truth is. Therefore I am learning that I need to be in the word a lot more, even if it is hard to read at times. And how do we abide in Christ, by obeying His word. Therefore my goal is to try and read God's word more each day and trust that the truth will produce fruit in my life.
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3 comments:
I appreciate the important distinction you make between truth and feelings and how you prioritize the former.
"Abide in me" is a verse I have thought about a lot. I used to think that abiding in Christ meant merely reading and obeying God's word. The Bible is certainly powerful and full of truth that does not return void. By reading the Bible frequently you can expect to see transformation in your life. However, I think that there's a better way to understand this idea of abiding in Christ.
Before reading and obeying God's word, abiding in Christ involves BELIEVING his word--namely, believing the Gospel! We can't begin to obey God's word unless we start by believing the gospel. As I'm sure you know, when I say 'start,' I don't mean that believing in the gospel is a place we move past. Believing must be ongoing. Believing is abiding! Reading and obeying the Bible might be mixed in, but, when it comes down to it, abiding in Christ is believing the gospel.
"Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit in itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in me."
I think it is possible for someone to read the Bible and bear no fruit. I also think it is possible for someone to not read the Bible, but believe in the gospel, and bear much fruit.
Believing is the abiding, obeying (and even reading the Bible more) is the fruit. When we believe that there is nothing in our power we can do to save ourselves from the wrath of God we deserve for our sin and rebellion, and in light of this we trust that Jesus paid it all and we are recipients of his righteousness rather than wrath, (if we truly believe this) then fruit is inevitable.
So, yes: read God's word! Read it to see the gospel in it. Read it and believe it!
ps: I wrote this response not to correct you, 'cause there's nothing to correct, but to share what I've learned and also to remind myself of the importance of abiding/believing.
I don't think scripture makes the connection between abiding and beleiving (not that this is a wrong idea at all), but it rather says that abiding is obeying the commandments of God, hence to love one another. And as our friend James has told us, faith is dead without works. I like your idea about believing, but I think you need to go a step forward and emphasis obedience, not believing. I read a commentary just the other day, and it was on a passage where Jesus said he doesn't trust men because he knows what is of them...and the point that was so beautiful was that obedience does not just bear fruit, obedience gives us the heart of Christ. He is not going to give us His life until we give Him ours. I hope I can find that commentary and I think I shall post it. :)
as you abide in Christ Jesus, I am praying for you!
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