What Are You Abiding In?

                                                                               

When Jesus was crucified all His disciples were scattered abroad everywhere. You might have had great difficulty in finding them if you had tried to.

Two of them went down to Emmaus. Where poor Thomas was hiding himself we do not know, nor where Peter had gone to after denying His Lord. 

They were all broken and scattered.

Do you notice what happened after the Cross, when Jesus was raised from the dead?

He knew where every one of them was and He brought them all back together.

He reunited them in Himself and the last picture we have of them is that they are all together in Christ. 

They would agree that it is nothing but desolation to go out from God. It is not a garden, but a wilderness. Peter would agree with that, and so would Thomas.

When the Prodigal Son went out from his father's house, he went out to bankruptcy, from a garden to a wilderness.

When he came home he came to a life of fruitfulness and of rest.

Do you see something of what the Lord Jesus meant when He said "Abide in me"?

Outside of Me it is just a wilderness. There is no fruit there.

If you abide in Me you bring forth much fruit

Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit (John 15:8). 

God's satisfaction is the one great thing through all the Bible. His satisfaction is now in His Son, and if we abide in Christ we abide in God's good pleasure and shall bring forth much fruit.

If we have the Holy Spirit dwelling in us as we are supposed to have we shall know in our hearts whether we are out of fellowship with the Lord or whether we are abiding in the Lord.

And we shall know because we shall feel that we are in the wilderness when we are out, and that we are in the garden when we are in.

Jesus was very emphatic about this. He knew what a tremendous thing it was and so, eleven times in a short chapter, He said "Abide... abide abide in Me."

May the Lord keep us abiding in Christ!

All other things will prove to be false and only what is true will stand us in good stead to the end.

I am the true vine... Abide in Me. That is only one way of saying: 'We must know the Lord and our place in the Lord'.

What are you abiding in? Are you abiding in people? Are you abiding in conferences? Are you abiding in a religious system?

Well, all these things will pass, and the time will be when there will not be any more conferences and when you will not be able to depend upon any people.

The whole religious system will disappoint you.

But if you know and  abide in Jesus Christ it will be all right to the end.

~T. Austin Sparks~