Christ gives us a staggering promise of power in exchange for just believing Him about Him and the Father. We are to believe Him when He says that the Father abides or dwells in Himself. “He who believes in Me [believes His word that the Father dwells and abides in the Son], the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do…” (John 14: 12). The Father will dwell in us and do the same miracles that the Son of God did—if we believe Christ’s words about the Father/Son relationship.
The Abiding is when the Father, who is the Holy Spirit of Truth, comes into us and walks around in us and performs the works that He has always done.
Moreover, Christ promises that the Spirit of truth “shall be in you.” We see a correlation here. The Father dwells in Christ and does the miraculous works. And then Christ says that He will send the Comforter, which is the Holy Spirit, and that Holy Spirit is the Father, for the Holy Spirit will dwell in us and do the works just like the Father dwells in the Son (John 14: 17).
This is the abiding, and it is our belief of the Oneness of God that engages all these promises. If we can’t believe that Yahweh dwelt in the Son Yahshua, then Yahweh will not dwell in us like He dwelt in the Son. If we obey His commandment and believe that it was the Father dwelling/abiding in the Son, then He will dwell in us, too. And with the Father in the form of the Holy Spirit inside us, nothing shall be impossible for us to accomplish. He calls this bearing much fruit (John 15: 7-8).
This is where it is at. This is the apex of the Christian growth cycle. You few who are reading this: This is rarefied knowledge that only a few are privy to. Study it out. Reread it again and again. Clutch it to your heart and cleave to its principles. Christ spent many hours expounding on these things. The apostle John got it down on paper for us.
The precepts and teachings about The Abiding have been ignored for centuries. Blathering voices on TV don’t teach it. Their desires do not reach to the higher realms of heaven. Most of the local pastors all over the world will not comprehend what John wrote about The Abiding. God ordains a spirit of slumber over the masses, and He will open the eyes of a few. He chooses to show mercy to a few, and He will harden whomever He chooses (Rom. 9: 18).
Only the few who are chosen will understand. The Spirit speaks about the few: Mat 7:14 “Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leads unto life, and few there be that find it.” Mat 9:37 “…The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few.” Mat 20:16 “…For many be called, but few chosen.”
If this teaching about the abiding makes your head to start reeling, I understand. I am there with you. It is because we have not heard it before. Yet His words are couched in the “simplicity of Christ.” It is difficult to wrap our heads around these truths because of all of the old leaven false teachings that we have been subjected to.
It Is About Understanding the Godhead
To understand the Godhead, we need to see it as an equation. It reads: The Comforter = the Spirit of Truth = Holy Spirit = the Father = who dwells/abides in the Son. Christ promised us that “another Comforter” would be sent to help the disciples. The first Comforter was the Father/Spirit that dwelt in Christ. The Father abode/dwelt in the Son. But the Son was being called back to heaven. And we know that by Christ’s own words, the Father dwelt in the Son. That is what Christ commands us to believe.
This is not a happy little Sunday school song that we sing and then go about our merry way. No. This is the real deal. This is what determines our spiritual Christian destiny. Will we remain “babes in Christ” always looking for a blessing from the Father? Or will we bear much fruit by believing and receiving the Father, in the form of the Spirit, coming down into our vessels and performing the miraculous works and thereby glorifying the Father. We are talking about the great Creator/Spirit named Yahweh coming down and dwelling and abiding in us (John 14: 16-17).
“And I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you forever.” [This should be our prayer—that the Spirit would be given to our brothers and sisters. The laborers are few with this access and knowledge. Our prayers should be for them, that the Father would abide in them.]
The Comforter = the Spirit of Truth = the Holy Spirit. Christ said, “But the Comforter, which is the Holy Spirit…” (John 14: 26). We know that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the Father Yahweh. And we know that “God is a Spirit.” Christ was speaking to the woman at the well about how we all should worship the Father. “True worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth…God is a Spirit.” So we have to worship the Father in a spiritual and truthful manner (John 4: 23-24).
Consequently, the Comforter = the Spirit of Truth = the Holy Spirit = Father = who dwells/abides in the Son and the members of the Son’s body—us!
How He Dwells/Abides in Us
When the Father sends us the Holy Spirit, He is sending Himself to take up residence in us, His temple. For He is an invisible Spirit. Faith and belief of these precious truths activates His Spirit within us. We begin to grow. Faith, like water, resurrects a dead seed, causing us to spring up toward the light of truth.
Obeying His New Commandments shows that we love Him. Christ’s own words, which are the Father’s words, say as much. “If you love me, keep my commands…Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father…Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them…[This is The Abiding.] Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching…” (John 14: 15, 21, 23-24).
He will abide in us by us taking in and obeying His words to us. And there is a beautiful conditional promise to us. “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you shall ask what you will, and it shall be done unto you” (John 15: 7). His words are His new commandments; if we obey them and they remain/abide/dwell in our thoughts, then we are in. We are in His will; we are doing His will. And He will show us what to ask for to accomplish His works in this earth. He will give us what we need and ask for to fulfill His plan and purpose. Of course He will. He will not send us out to battle without the proper armor and training.
We only need now to “continue [abide, dwell, remain] in the faith” (Col. 1: 21-23). All of this agape love and belief and the Father dwelling in us, and the abiding—all of this is a whole lot of invisible action going on. Consequently, it takes a lot of faith to believe that the invisible Creator Spirit God would or could take up residence inside our bodies. But this is what God is asking us to do—trust Him and His word and promises and walk in it.
The Key That Opens the Door (“I am the Door,” Christ Said)
The key in doing all of the above is to believe that it is not our puny faith in Him, but His powerful faith in us. It is the Son of God’s faith that will see us through to the end. It is not about us mustering up enough faith to believe the word of God. But rather it is His faith/belief in His own power to fulfill His own plan.
Sometimes we forget that we are dead and our life is hidden “with Christ in God” (Col. 3: 3). The following says it all: “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2: 20). These words of the Spirit through His apostle Paul is speaking to us. I died with Christ on the cross. But I am still living. Yet it is not the old me that is walking around, but it is the Spirit of Christ that lives in me. And this new life now that I am living in this earthly body, I live by Christ’s faith, “who loved me, and gave himself for me.” It is Christ’s belief in His resurrection that gives birth to our own resurrection with Him now inside our hearts.
This is how we will “abide in Him.” And He abides in us by His Spirit (I John 3: 24). He abides in us through us believing His word about all of the above.
And we will really need faith/belief when we arrive at the next step in abiding in Him, and He in us. Who is it that will dwell in Christ and Christ in them? Who will abide in Him, and He in them? Christ gives this direct yet enigmatic answer. “He that eats my flesh, and drinks my blood, dwells [abides] in me, and I in him” (John 6: 56). Man’s religions have totally butchered the meaning of His statement. “When the Spirit of truth is come, he will guide you into all truth,” and “He shall teach you all things…” (Jn. 16: 13; 14: 26). I am excited to see what the Spirit has to say about this mysterious subject called Holy Communion, the Eucharist, or the Lord’s Supper. Eating His flesh…drinking His blood. What a mystery that is about to unfold… Kenneth Wayne Hancock