Abide
7/21/2021
Written By: Christina Gregory
I was making Kraft mac and cheese for the 7,389th time in my life. It was for one of my picky kids who wouldn’t eat the other stuff I was making. Honestly, I was more focused on the meal I was making for my husband and I because it would be more delicious and more diverse than Blue Box. It was on the back burner literally and figuratively. I know how to make it, I don’t need to read the instructions. I turned the burner on high to get the water boiling, dropped in the noodles and a minute later it overflowed. So I turned it all the way down to stop the gooey, noodle water from dirtying up my stove top. A couple of minutes later I realized I never brought it back to boiling, so the noodles are just marinating in the lukewarm water. I turn the knob back to high and go back to cooking the other food. And it boils over again!
I seem to have the same issue with my car's air control. It’s either on low or high. I go from freezing my face off to burning my face off seven times in a one hour drive. Temperature isn’t the only thing I have issues regulating. I’m either getting in all 64 oz of recommended water that day or I’m dehydrated with coffee induced heart palpitations. I am either color coordinating everyone’s closets or I’m submitting an application to be on Hoarders. I live my life in two speeds - go or stop.
And unfortunately, sometimes my faith looks like this too. My commitment oftentimes resembles an overcorrecting semi. Circumstances in life derail me from the road, and I go spiritually overboard. Only listening to worship music, praying without ceasing, in the Word each and every day. It looks more like an obsession than it does a relationship. And I find myself wondering where God is, if He’s even seeing and hearing all of my spiritual work, why He still feels so far away even though I’m doing all the right things. And then one day I just stop. And I’m derailed again, but in a way that I look like the rest of the world, so it’s easy to get away with it. I’m still a good person, I still go to church every Sunday. But I’m not spending time with the Lord through worship, prayer and being in the Word, outside of Sunday mornings. And honestly, that feels fine. For a while. Until it doesn’t. Until the circumstances in life come back through again.
Using cruise control doesn’t come naturally to me. And if you find me setting the air in my car to 74, you should know that it took a pep talk with myself and that I’m probably at my mental and emotional best. I want to be a more happy-medium kind of girl, it just takes a whole lot more conscious effort for me. I don’t think the Lord minds that I can’t seem to find medium-high on the stove or that I am wishy washy on my water intake and housekeeping. They’re not Kingdom issues. But He is not passive when it comes to our relationship with Him.
In John 15:4-5 Jesus says:
“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.”
“Abide” means to remain or to stay, to accept without objection. It’s a verb, so it’s an action...a choice. It’s not indifferent or stagnant. It’s a conscious effort. Unlike that over-correcting semi, abiding isn’t obsessively doing all the right things in hopes that the Lord will fix something or hoping to feel better about a circumstance. It’s allowing His Word to be my true north in mundane, everyday life. Choosing to worship and praise Him, especially when I’m not looking for anything in return, but because He’s worthy. It’s praying through all things, because it’s a privilege to have direct access to the Creator of the world. It’s accepting the Word of God for what it is, and not being tempted by à la carte faith.
As I spend time with God, the vinedresser, my mind becomes an extension of the mind of Christ, the vine. And as the branch, the Lord produces fruit through me. These fruits are gifts from the Spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. And these gifts affect all areas of life, even making mac and cheese. It’s where I find my happy-medium.