Abide in Love

A phrase that's thrown around in Christian culture is Abide in love. Have you ever stopped and wondered what that means? What does the word abide really mean? How are we supposed to do that?

Well.... I was wondering the same thing. 

John 15:9 says, "As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love." I encourage you to read the big chunk of scripture in the first part of John 15. 

Here is the Greek definition for the word abide as it was used in John 15:

to remain, to be held, not to depart, kept, to wait for

Aren't all of those words so safe and beautiful? The key to abiding in God's love is to stay with Jesus, to wait for Jesus, to be held by Jesus. Let these words marinate in your brain for a little while. 

Now the real kicker is how do we do that? How do we abide? How do we stay with Jesus when we're constantly being pulled away by a different distraction every 5 minutes? You try. You stand. You choose to abide. You can choose to stand strong and secure on the Rock both when it's easy and when it's hard. The cool part is that if Jesus lives inside you, then He'll help you. You just have to let Him!

Use that visual example from John 15 to help you rest in the fact that you are connected to Christ. He gives life, supports us when we're struggling, and longs for us to grow in our faith.  Let's apply it!

Blessings, 

JJ