The Glory of Abiding in Christ

Andrew Murray (1828 – 1917) was a pastor, teacher, and prolific author. Born and educated in Scotland, Andrew Murray spent the majority of his life ministering in South Africa. With a passionate heart for missions (which he considered to be the “chief end of the church”), Murray spoke and ministered around the world all the while writing more than 240 books. One of his passions was talking about the “abiding life in Christ”—this article comes from his tremendous book Abide in Christ.

As the Father hath loved me, so I have loved you. Abide in my love, even as I abide in my Father’s love (John 15:9,10).

Christ had taught His disciples that to abide in Him was to abide in His love. The hour of His suffering is near, and He cannot speak much more to them. They would doubtlessly have many questions to ask as to what that abiding in Him and His love is. He anticipates and meets their wishes, and gives them His own life as the best exposition of His command. As example and rule for their abiding in His love, they have to look to His abiding in the Father’s love. In the light of His union with the Father, their union with Him will become clear. His life in the Father is the law of their life in Him.

The thought is so high that we can hardly take it in, and yet it is so clearly revealed that we dare not neglect it. We read in John 6:57: “…As I live by the Father, even so he that eateth me, he shall live by me.” And the Savior prays so distinctly in John 17:22: “…that they may be one even as we are one: I in them, and Thou in me.” The blessed union of Christ with the Father and His life in Him is the only rule of our thoughts and expectations in regard to our living and abiding in Him.

Think first of the origin of that life of Christ in the Father. They were one—one in life and one in love. In this, His abiding in the Father had its root. Though dwelling here on earth, He knew that He was one with the Father and that the Father’s life was in Him and His love on Him. Without this knowledge, abiding in the Father and His love would have been utterly impossible.

And it is only in this way you can abide in Christ and His love. Know that you are one with Him—one in the unity of nature. By His birth He became man, and took your nature that He might be one with you. By your new birth you became one with Him, and are made partaker of His divine nature (2 Pet. 1:3-4). The link that binds you to Him is as real and close as bound Him to the Father—the link of a divine life. Your claim on Him is as sure and always availing as was His on the Father. Your union with Him is as close.

And as it is the union of a divine life, it is one of an infinite love. In His life of humiliation on earth He tasted the blessedness and strength of knowing Himself the object of an infinite love, and of dwelling in it all the day. From His own example He invites you to learn that herein lies the secret of rest and joy. You are one with Him. Yield yourself now to be loved by Him. Let your eyes and heart open to the love that shines and presses in on you on every side. Abide in His love.

The Secret of Blessedness

Think then too of the mode of that abiding in the Father and His love which is to be the law of your life. “I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love” (John 15:10). His was a life of subjection and dependence, and yet most blessed. To our proud, self-seeking nature the thought of dependence and subjection suggests the idea of humiliation and servitude. In the life of love which the Son of God lived, and to which He invites us, they are the secret of blessedness.

The Son is not afraid of losing anything by giving up all to the Father, for He knows that the Father loves Him, and can have no interest apart from that of the beloved Son. He knows that as complete as is the dependence on His part is the communication on the part of the Father of all He possesses. Hence, when He had said, “The Son can do nothing of Himself, except He see the Father do it,” He adds at once, “Whatsoever things the Father doeth, them also doeth the Son likewise; for the Father loveth the Son, and showeth Him all things that Himself doeth” (John 5:19,20).

The believer who studies this life of Christ as the pattern and the promise of what his may be, learns to understand how the “Without me ye can do nothing,” is but the forerunner of “I can do all things though Christ who strengtheneth me” (Phil. 4:13). We learn to glory in infirmities, to take pleasure in necessities and distresses for Christ’s sake, for “when I am weak, then am I strong” (2 Cor. 12:10). He rises above the ordinary tone in which so many Christians speak of their weakness and are content to abide there, because he has learned from Christ that in the life of divine love, the emptying of self and the sacrifice of our will is the surest way to have all we can wish or will. Dependence, subjection and self-sacrifice are for the Christian as for Christ, the blessed path of life. Like as Christ lived through and in the Father, even so the believer lives through and in Christ.

The Impact of a Life in Christ

Think of the glory of this life of Christ in the Father’s love. Because He gave Himself wholly to the Father’s will and glory, the Father crowned Him with glory and honor. He acknowledged Him as His only representative; He made Him partaker of His power and authority. He exalted Him to share His throne as God.

Even so will it be with him who abides in Christ’s love. If Christ finds us willing to trust ourselves and our interests to His love, if in that trust we give up all care for our own will and honor, if we make it our glory to exercise and confess absolute dependence on Him in all things, if we are content to have no life but in Him, He will do for us what the Father did for Him.

He will lay of His glory on us. As the name of our Lord Jesus is glorified in us, we are glorified in Him (2 Thess. 1:12). He acknowledges us as His true and worthy representatives. He entrusts us with His power. He admits us to His counsels, as He allows our intercession to influence His rule of His Church and the world. He makes us the vehicles of His authority and His influence over men. His Spirit knows no other dwelling than such, and seeks no other instruments for His divine work. Blessed life of love for the soul that abides in Christ’s love, even as He in the Father’s!

Believer, abide in the love of Christ! Take and study His relation to the Father as pledge of what your own can become. As blessed, as mighty, as glorious as was His life in the Father can yours be in Him. Let this truth, accepted under the teaching of the Spirit in faith, remove every vestige of fear, as if abiding in Christ were a burden and a work. In the light of His life in the Father, let it henceforth be to you a blessed rest in the union with Him, an overflowing fountain of joy and strength.

To abide in His love, His mighty, saving, keeping, satisfying love, even as He abode in the Father’s love—surely the very greatness of our calling teaches us that it never can be a work we have to perform. It must be with us as with Him, the result of the spontaneous outflowing of a life from within, and the mighty inworking of the love from above. What we need is only this: to take time and study the divine image of this life of love set before us in Christ. We need to have our souls still unto God, gazing upon that life of Christ in the Father, until the light from heaven falls on it, and we hear the living voice of our Beloved whispering gently to us personally the teaching He gave to the disciples.

Soul, be still and listen. Let every thought be hushed until the word has entered your heart too: “Child, I love you, even as the Father loved Me. Abide in My love, even as I abide in the Father’s love. Your life on earth in Me is to be the perfect counterpart of Mine in the Father.” The thought will sometimes come: surely this is too high for us! Can it be really true?

The Divine Purpose in This

Remember that the greatness of the privilege is justified by the greatness of the object He has in view. Christ was the revelation of the Father on earth. He could not be this if there were not the most perfect unity, the most complete communication of all the Father had to the Son. He could be it because the Father loved Him, and He abode in that love. Believers are the revelation of Christ on earth. They cannot be this unless there be perfect unity, so that the world can know that He loves them and has sent them. But they can be it if Christ loves them with the infinite love that gives itself and all it has, and if they abide in that love.

I give a concluding word of advice: It needs time to grow into Jesus the Vine. Do not expect to abide in Him unless you will give Him that time. It is not enough to read God’s Word, or meditations and when we think we have hold of the thoughts and have asked God for His blessing, to go out in the hope that the blessing will abide. No, it needs time with Jesus and with God day by day.

We all know the need of time for our meals each day. Every workman claims his hour for dinner. The hurried eating of much food to last a long time is not enough. If we are to live through Jesus, we must feed on Him (John 6:57). We must thoroughly take in and assimilate that heavenly food the Father has given us in His life.

Therefore, beloved who would learn to abide in Jesus, take time each day before you read, and while you read, and after you read—to put yourself into living contact with the living Jesus. Yield yourself distinctly and consciously to His blessed influence. In this way you will give Him the opportunity of taking hold of you, of drawing you up and keeping you safe in His almighty life.

Lord, show us Your love. Make us with all the saints to know the love that passes knowledge. Lord, show us in Your own blessed life what it is to abide in Your love. And the sight shall so win us that it will be impossible for us one single hour to seek any other life than the life of abiding in Thy love.

From Abide in Christ by Andrew Murray.