3rd Sunday of Easter, 2022 - The "How To" of Abiding

Abiding in Christ — staying connected to the Risen Christ — being attentive to the Spirit’s movement and work in our lives — living intimately in relationship with God as a beloved child: such is the heart of the spiritual life of a follower of Jesus.

How do we do abide in Christ? What does it mean to be led by the Spirit (Romans 8:14) and to live by the Spirit (Romans 8:1-17; Galatians 5:16-26)? What does it look like to live in intimate relationship with God as a beloved child?

Our inclination is to answer these questions out of our default merit-based thinking. We talk about the things we do — attending worship, being involved in church activities and Bible study, doing things to help others. These kinds of things are just another expression of our being productive and staying busy mentality. They are about doing, not necessarily about abiding. They are things we substitute for abiding because we don’t understand how to abide.

Abiding is more than doing. It is more than practicing certain behaviors. Certainly, abiding produces doing. It changes our behavior. The change of behavior is the fruit that abiding produces. Abiding, however, takes place in a different dimension of our lives, on a deeper level than behavior. Abiding takes place in the realm of the heart. It has to do with the thinking that shapes our lives, the attitudes that grow out of that thinking, and the resulting spirit with which we live.

Abiding is rooted in grace. Jesus said our abiding in him is a mutual abiding. “Abide in me as I abide in you” (John 15:4). Through the indwelling Spirit, Jesus and the Father live in us. “We will come to them and make our home with them” (John 14:33). This mutual indwelling is a gift of grace. It is what God, living out of divine love, does. Living out of self-giving love, God embraces us as beloved children and lives in us. We are able to abide in Christ because Christ first abides in us. Grace, expressed in mutual abiding, is what makes abiding possible.

We cannot abide in Christ as long as we live out of merit-based thinking. Functioning out of merit-based thinking, we live with an acute awareness of how we fail to measure up. We are hesitant to approach God because of this sense of inadequacy, accompanied by the guilt and shame it spawns. We look for something to do to compensate for our failure, making our relationship with God based upon what we do, i.e., merit. A relationship based on merit is always conditional. It is always tentative and uncertain. It is a barrier to abiding.

Abiding is resting in God’s grace. It is trusting God’s unconditional acceptance of us and delight in us as beloved children. It is living by faith, trusting God’s steadfast, faithful love for us. “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love” (John 15:9). Abiding is holding onto God’s love and grace in the face of our failure. It means we trust God to not abandon us even when we fail. It is claiming God’s forgiveness for how we failed yet again. It is resisting the guilt and shame of merit-based thinking that spirals down into self-condemnation and self-hate. Abiding is letting God love us when we feel we don’t deserve it. (Deserving language reflects merit-based thinking). Abiding is knowing we are held in a web of divine love and allowing that Love to hold us. 

Abiding allows the ways of God Jesus taught to shape how we think and live. “If you abide in me and my words abide in you” (John 15:7). As we abide in Christ, God’s grace and forgiveness — “my words” — begin to shape our thinking. We move beyond our default merit-based thinking to grace-based thinking. This shift in our thinking confronts the attitudes we harbor in our hearts toward others — attitudes that are the product of merit-based thinking. The Spirit cleanses our hearts by healing these critical, judgmental attitudes. As a result, the spirit out of which we live is transformed. A servant, grace-filled spirit replaces the competitive, what’s-in-it-for-me, self-serving spirit that merit-based thinking naturally produces.

Abiding takes place in the realm of the heart. It leads to the transformation of the heart — the thinking, the attitudes, the spirit out of which we live. Our behavior, in turn, changes as our thinking is transformed and our hearts are cleansed. (Our behavior always expresses what is in our hearts.) As we abide in Christ, his life flows through us, producing fruit. We love as Jesus loved. “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12).

Abiding is learning to live by faith in the steadfast, faithful love of God. It is learning to live by grace. It is resting in grace.