How abiding in Christ fits us for Ministry (Part One)
Jay Wegter
INTRODUCTION: Think with me for a moment about unfallen Adam’s effortless ‘planetary kingship’. I can hardly imagine the level of strength he must have had to be able to ‘landscape’ the Garden of Eden without power tools. I picture him building ‘infinity pools’; moving fig trees within reach of the hot springs; replanting towering trees as parrot perches.
After the fall into sin, when the curse was applied, Adam’s gender specific wound was so different from Eve’s. Hers would be the experience of marital strife; female insecurity; and multiplied pain in childbirth. Adam’s gender-specific wound was toil in labor; weariness in work (‘sweat’) (Gen 3:17-19). His efforts to provide order, fruitfulness, and leadership would be met with exhausting obstacles and resistance. His effortless planetary kingship was replaced with a ‘broken scepter’.
By reason of original sin (and its resultant curse), we as men have inherited Adam’s gender-specific wound—his ‘broken scepter’. Thus it has been said that the universal neurosis in men is the fear of being weighed in the scales and found wanting—coming up short in some or all of our roles; having our weakness and inadequacy revealed. For us as men, much of life is a compensation for this fear of inadequacy.
In the syndicated newspaper cartoon, Hagar the horrible, Hagar is a Viking warrior whose daily ‘work’ is to sack and pillage. He comes home; hangs up his sword and spear—and then comes the punch line of each episode—Hagar is a wimp at home: this bearded brute walks though his front door and becomes the proverbial hen-pecked simpering husband.
It seems that as men we always feel we have something to prove: my pastor friend, ‘Steve’, goes to Hume Lake each summer for a ‘vacation’—but once at the camp, he gets up at 4:30 am each morning to get to some secret lakes to make sure he catches his limit of trout each day. He hasn’t failed to catch his limit every day at Hume in the last five years! As men it seems so much of our lives revolve around issues of adequacy.
We enjoy doing things that make us feel adequate and we hesitate to do things that make us feel inadequate. Not long after Noah’s flood, Noah’s grandson, Nimrod was the local bad boy on the block. His accomplishments as a mighty hunter (Gen 10:9) made him a ‘man of renown’. But Nimrod took his reputation as a mighty hunter before the Lord—and used his influence to build Babel—a monument to man, not God (see Babylon as “the mother of harlots” in Revelation 17:5).
In a sense, nothing has really changed since mankind’s fall into sin. Men are still reaching for that pre-Fall masculine strength. We live in a world of hero worship. We have the strange optimism that original sin is not evenly distributed over the human race—so we look for a hero who has escaped the weakening effects of the curse—a hero through which we may live vicariously. If this were not true—we would not have a professional sports industry in our nation worth hundreds of billions of dollars.
Sadly, our propensity for hero worship doesn’t stop at the front door of the church. America has its celebrity pastors, many of which operate by mega-church values. Many in their congregations live vicariously through them—and in the process, the majesty and supremacy of Christ tends to be obscured by our fixation and captivation with dynamic mortal leaders.
The apostle Paul tells us in his Corinthian correspondence, “let no one boast in men” (1 Cor 3:21). The apostle goes on to say that the Adamic man is slated for replacement by the heavenly man (1 Cor 15:45-49). There is no way for us mortals to ‘repair’ the Adamic man—he is destined for demolition. Yet, every generation looks for its heroes who give hope that man, by humanistic endeavors, can recover his creational strength potential. The gospel reveals to us the opposite. The Adamic man is washed up. He cannot be put back together again and restored apart from the cross of Christ.
This is one of the reasons why the gospel is so radically humbling. It tells us that Christ died—not only for our sins—but also for our moral efforts and aspirations (even for our utopian quests). Fallen man, at his natural moral best—calls for execution under the wrath of God. Only in this manner can what was lost in Adam be restored. Through Christ, God is building and reconstructing a new humanity. Broken fallen sinners are being reconstructed around Christ— so that their completeness and wholeness are found in Another, in Christ alone.
Thus, the only human strength recognized by God comes through Christ. Paul shocked his Corinthian readers by stating that Christ was crucified because of weakness, and we as believers are ‘weak in Him’ (2 Cor 13:4). In other words, in this dispensation we are to be radically identified with Christ and His cross and His humiliation (and His ‘reproach’—Hebrews 13:13). The Corinthian believers had to learn that the heavenly man (glorified and strong) will have to wait until Christ’s return. Paul’s message in the Corinthian correspondence dropped a ‘bomb’ on the triumphalism of the Corinthian believers. They wanted strength, honor, authority, kingship, personal adequacy now—their view was condemned as a symptom of the impotent wisdom of the world (1 Cor 1:18-25).
Paul continually takes his readers back to the spiritual diet of the cross of Christ—the only source of spiritual maturity. In a word, the struggle we face is this: we long to be adequate and sufficient in ourselves (like the Corinthian believers who wished for the same). But, the gospel calls us to abide—to live upon Another, upon Christ (Gal 2:20). As men, we prefer to remain in our areas of expertise—lest our weakness should be exposed. And, there is nothing like attempting ministry to make a person aware of their limitations.
Ministry can make a man feel his severe limitations—his inadequacy. This is why abiding is so incredibly important—Christ is the not only the source of our salvation; He is the source of the Christian life.
The evil one knows that he can neutralize our ministry efforts by tempting us to engage in self-focus so that we become preoccupied with measuring our performance. Like the predators in the animal kingdom that go for the neck of their prey, so that communication between the head and the body are interrupted—the powers of darkness don’t want you communing with Christ—your ‘Source Person’. So, when we contemplate ourselves without Christ in view we tend to come to conclusions about ourselves that neutralize our ministry zeal: “Who am I to propose to tell another brother how to live?” In a word, we ‘bench’ ourselves—voluntarily taking ourselves out of the game.
The power to bear fruit means that you cannot focus on self as the primary spiritual resource. That of course is the central message of John chapter 15. Fruitfulness is predicated on abiding. Fearless confidence in your ministry efforts is directly proportional to seeking your security and satisfaction in Christ. Abiding is to draw near—we might add “dare to draw near”—because drawing close to Christ means having His cross applied to your self-life. That is a profound thing—it means that in order to begin to find your all and all in Christ; you will have to experience a degree of disillusionment with self (your self-reliance slain). There is no other way to have God’s power perfected through my weakness (2 Cor 12:9ff.). Your affinity for self-reliance will have to receive sustained ongoing death blows from the cross.
Abiding in Christ is living out our union with Christ (Jn 15:1-11). God’s placing the sinner into union with Christ brings us into all the benefits of His representative death and resurrection (united with Him in the likeness of His death—united with Him in the likeness of His resurrection—Romans 6:6). Calvin said in his Institutes, “The flesh of Christ is like a rich, inexhaustible fountain that pours into us life springing forth from the Godhead.”ⁱ The legal imputation of Christ’s righteousness produces in every believer a total sense of indebtedness in the very depths of their being. Union with Christ sets us apart as His possession. Our union with Christ also produces a social dimension of unity with other believers (Phil 2:1-2).
John 15:1-11 – v. 4 “abide in Me. . .” ABIDE (Grk. meno). To abide means to remain, to continue, to stay on—to hold fast and to remain steadfast. The lexical definition of the Greek word, meno (abide), doesn’t immediately strike us with anything profound. But as we examine the broader scope of the Gospel of John, “abide” refers to the closest possible relationship—the believer’s mystical union with Christ. To “abide” is to be held by Christ; it is to allow oneself to be owned by Christ, right down to the depths of one’s being—no hold-out areas—now that is profound. We are alive spiritually forever because we are united to Christ. The believer who abides is controlled by this spiritual reality.
When we abide in Christ, we “put on the Lord Jesus Christ” as our ‘sphere of life’ (Rom 13:14a, Gal 3:27). The believer has already clothed himself with Christ (being clothed with Christ is the “indicative” of Galatians 3:27). The imperative in Romans 13:14 commands us to keep putting on Christ; to do so is “to reach and hold [Christ] again and again, in faith and confidence, in grateful loyalty and obedience, to Him to whom we already belong.”ⁱⁱ
To put on Christ is to live in Christ as our sphere of existence. It is to abide in Christ as our soul’s prosperity. It is to love Christ; to live for Christ; to love the things of God. When we abide in Christ we are kept from returning to the world as a source of security, significance, peace, prosperity, comfort, ease, and freedom from suffering. When we put on Christ, we draw near, finding our identity, our purpose, and our direction in Him—so we won’t ‘go back to Egypt’ (back to the world as a source). Christ (and His imputed righteousness) is the perfect covering for our naked shivering sinful souls. When you ‘put on’ Christ—you are reckoning Him as your covering; your standing before God, your completeness in God’s sight.
I. The Purpose of Abiding in Christ (vv. 1-3).
Jesus explains abiding in the metaphor of the true vine (v. 1). True believers find their unity, life, and fertility in Christ. We abide in Christ to bear the fruit of the Spirit (Gal 5:22-23). You are united to Him that you might abide in Him and bear fruit for God (Rom 7:1-4). There is nothing more precious than union with Christ. When your life ends, there is only one thing you will take with you to glory: your relationship with the Lord. The Christian life involves the day by day living out of your union with Christ by means of abiding in Him—this is how God makes us happy and useful (2 Pet 1:8).
II. The Priority of Abiding in Christ (vv. 4-6).
A. The ability to abide in Christ is God-given (v. 4). God took the initiative in our salvation. Now as “new creatures” in Christ, He has given us the ability to abide. As ‘new creatures’ we have been reconstructed around the Person of Christ (Col 2:10; 3:4). The consciousness of that deep mystery of Christ in you and you in Him (mutuality) is produced by the Holy Spirit “Christ in you the hope of glory” (Col 1:27). We abide by the power of the indwelling Spirit—but it is our responsibility to abide.
B. Fruit-bearing is a function of abiding in Christ (vv. 4-5). The vitality and life source of the true vine is stressed again as in 15:1, “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” (v. 5). Those who are out of relation to Christ can do literally nothing whatever (lit. Grk.). Our relationship to Christ is one of utter dependency (v. 5). The fruit that is acceptable to God is produced by our abiding in Christ. The branch can only be fruitful if it has constant unimpeded contact with the vine. The PRIORITY of abiding is addressed to our will or volition—it involves a decision to depend upon Christ as the condition of fruitfulness. Abiding maintains our connection by faith to Christ who is the source of life and fruitfulness.
III. The Promise of Abiding in Christ (vv. 7-11).
A. Effective prayer is promised to those who abide in Christ (v. 7). Abiding in Christ means that the words of Christ are taken in and heeded. The words of Christ become the controlling dynamic in one’s life—so much so that they dominate exceptionally. Notice it is not just abide in My words, but My words abide in you. The one who abides believes Christ’s words and acts in accordance with them has the promise of effective prayer (14:13; 16:23).
B. The experience of Christ’s love and joy is promised to those who abide in Christ (Jn 15:9-11). The Father’s love for the Son is a pattern of Christ’s love for us. Jesus’ earthly life was characterized by His abiding in His Father’s love—the Father’s will was His meat and drink—His secret “food” (Jn 4:32-34). We should exert ourselves to abide in His love (Jude 21). We must allow ourselves to be drawn closer and closer to the Savior. Our love to Christ is a reflex response of His love to us first (1 John 4:19)—we love, because He loved us first. Now, His love is ever active in our love. His love precedes, accompanies, follows, and creates our love. When we consent to it, ABIDE in it, exercise it in return, we feel drawn ever closer to Him; and we are fitted for ministry.
This glorious truth is to constantly animate our walk with God. Christ’s propitiatory sacrifice is so perfectly sufficient that we now “walk in the light as He is in the light and the blood of His Son continually cleanses us from all sin” (1 Jn 1:7). We keep going back to the gospel in order to feed our faith on the truth that Christ gave His life so that we might have an uninterrupted love relationship with the Godhead. So perfect is this propitiation that Christ has wrought it removes every obstacle to an unimpeded flow of love to the believer. Thus the gospel clears away disputes in our conscience and allows us to drink in God’s love without our conscience ‘disqualifying us’ from such blessed treatment by our holy God.
Now the secret here is abiding—for in abiding we are reckoning the sufficiency of Christ’s work on Calvary. This enables us to be an unhindered channel of divine love back to God and to the brethren. This is God’s will for us—that we function in this way—that all our love is a reflex to His love for us. Reflexive love—“we love because He first loved us” (1 Jn 4:19). God’s love flowing through us unhindered is how His love is perfected in us (1 Jn 4:17). This is inseparable from abiding in Christ and His love.
IV. Let’s take a determined look at the “how to” of abiding in Christ.
We abide in His love by keeping His precepts (Jn 14:15, 21; 15:10). When we live to please the Lord by obedience, we continue in the possession and enjoyment of Christ’s love to us. When Christ takes up residence (comes to abide) in a believer, He brings His love with Him—your responsibility is to continue in His love (Jude 21). Jesus set the pattern; He kept His Father’s commandments. My experience as a discipler of other believers has taught me that men hesitate to attempt to spiritually influence others because it can make them feel rather inadequate. Thus, the man able to influence spiritually is the man in whom the Word of God is active— transforming him, controlling him, giving him discernment in all things, and enabling him to abide in Christ. Thus, the believer’s potential for fruit-bearing is by the strength of Another.
Abiding means living upon Another—He saved us by trading places with us (2 Cor 5:21); but that was just the beginning of the exchanged life. This exchange is now to characterize our whole Christian life. The Word of God defines the believer as the new man complete in Christ. This new creation is complete in Him; clothed with Him; full in Him—but never apart from Him.
Christ is the Architect; Contractor; and Blueprint of the new man (Col 3:10). Now these gospel realities are revolutionary; and they are appropriated by faith. They will change and revolutionize your walk, AND, they are perceived and appropriated by abiding in Christ.
THUS, by abiding in Him, the new man (created in Christ Jesus for good works) begins to assert himself. This is the answer to a crisis in leadership in the church today—a crisis in fostering male spiritual leadership. The gospel calls for a ‘rational abandonment’ of ourselves to Christ’s glory—the ‘good and the acceptable and the perfect’ are realized through a life surrendered and ordered as ‘a living sacrifice’ (Rom 12:2).
Completeness in Christ reckoned—is capacity in Christ realized. Out of pursuing Christ through abiding in Him comes the power and desire to pursue the brethren in the ministry of discipleship. This issue of pursuing our brethren for the sake of doing spiritual good to them is commonly the weak link in the chain of church ministry. Discipleship can only be perpetuated when the cycle of multiplication is the aim of ministry (2 Tim 2:2). But, we hesitate to be the pursuer who takes the risks and makes the diligent efforts to nurture relationships for the purpose of discipleship. Abiding in Christ is the “x” factor that answers that reticence to be a pursuer.
Abiding puts us in touch with Christ as Source Person: He is our sonship; status; favor; righteousness; wisdom; inheritance; adoption; sealing; access; completeness; standing; etc. Not one of these blessings functions as an independent spiritual commodity. Each is a benefit that is ours ONLY by virtue of being united to Christ. Abiding lets you see this. This is so closely tied to our ability and ‘want to’—in regards to being a blessing to others and a pursuer of others. Essentially we can only pass on what we are receiving in our spirit from the Lord.
The gospel spells out our union with Christ (shared life). Our premise is that the gospel keeps giving us permission to go to Christ for all we need: love; more grace and mercy; forgiveness; righteousness; power over temptation (2 Pet 1:3). You cannot consistently receive these blessings from Christ without YEARNING to see Christ formed in your brethren and thus making the sacrifices necessary to move them to maturity (Gal 4:19). That is being fitted for ministry through abiding in Christ. This is why abiding is the “x” factor. As we consent to be filled by Christ’s fullness, ministry to others is the ‘overflow’ (Jn 7:37-38).
We dwell on Christ from the perspective and vantage point of union with Him (the vine and branch organically joined—this is the shared life concept). As you receive security and satisfaction in Him—you are having fellowship in Him. This makes us strong in grace and thereby equips us for ministry (2 Tim 2:1). The discipleship mandate flows out of shared life in Christ REALIZED in abiding—otherwise, we risk seeing the discipleship mandate as a duty we grind out as a part of our ‘harness’ of obligations.
In terms of an experience, what does this abiding look like? First of all it is not merely a dutiful discipline; it is communion with Christ. Arthur Pink notes in his wonderful tract, Experimental Union: it seems too good to be true: that this union with Christ is for you. You were called into fellowship with the Son of God (yet we tend to be fixated on our ineligibility and disqualification)—often deeply disillusioned about our progress. Experimental union means that personal practical dealings with Him produce joy and confidence. How it would change us if we truly believed He was given for us.
Are you groaning, sin-harassed, poor in spirit?—to these the gospel brings the news of Christ’s perfect suitability, His availability, His virtue and efficacy—meeting you at the point where you are smitten with your wretchedness. You can’t trust in His blood too much. He is your sympathetic High Priest for sin-harassed souls. He mediates unending installments of grace and mercy (Heb 7:26). Bring Him to your troubled souls amidst disputes of conscience and He will give ample grace and mercy to help in time of need (Heb 4:16; 9:14).
i John Calvin, Calvin’s Institutes, Inst. IV, 17.9. ii C. E. B. Cranfield, Romans, a Shorter Commentary, 335.