Abiding in Christ: Part 1

John 15:1-11

  

Lesslie Newbigin quote: But it is necessary to “abide” in Jesus, and this means a continually renewed action of the will. It is the continually renewed decision that what has been done once for all by the action of Jesus shall be the basis, the starting point, the context of all my thinking and deciding and doing. The link between verse 3 and verse 4 is brought out in another Johannine saying: “Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you will abide in the Son and in the Father” (1 John 2:24). This “abiding” means “holding on loyally to the decision once taken, and one can only hold on to it by continually going through it again”; but “the loyalty demanded is not primarily a continual being for, but a being from; not the holding of a position but an allowing oneself to be held” (Bultmann).

The one who “holds” is Jesus himself, and therefore “abide in me” must be linked at once with “and I in you.” And this mutual indwelling is the absolute condition of fruit-bearing, as the production of much fruit is the purpose of the Gardener.” — Lesslie Newbigin in The Light Has Come: An Exposition of the Fourth Gospel

Book referenced: You Are What You Love by James K. A. Smith