If we were totally unfamiliar with the Bible and its teachings, and someone came and said to us, “I am in God, and God is in me,” we would probably think he was a mental case. How can a man be in God and God in him? Nowadays, however, we are quite familiar with expressions like, “Abide in Me and I in you” (John 15:4). We do not stop to consider what a mystery it is that God, the Person Himself, can actually abide in us and we in Him.
Who is God? Where is He? How can He possibly abide in us? It is not merely His power or His love which abides in us, but God Himself. It is easy to see that we are now abiding in this building or that we are abiding in our physical body. But a God who cannot be seen or touched or sensed-is it not sheer superstition to claim that we are now in Him and that at the same time He is in us? To the unbelievers this surely does seem superstitious; to us, however, it is a wonderful fact, which the Bible declares and which we also experience.
Prior to John 14, the Bible never tells us that man abides in God and that God abides in man. In Genesis we read of Abraham and Jacob, who eventually became intimate with God, yet there is no mention of their abiding in Him. In Exodus there is Moses, who stayed in God’s presence for forty days and was so infused that his face shone with God’s glory; nonetheless, there is no record that Moses was abiding in God and that God was abiding in him.
If we continue through the Old Testament, we still cannot find a verse indicating that God and man can abide in each other. Even in the Psalms, the most intimate book of the Old Testament, the psalmists were in the temple, beholding God’s beauty and enjoying the fatness of His house (Psa. 27:4; 36:8), but they were not abiding in God. (Although Psalm 90:1 says “Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations,” this is different from the abiding in the Lord which is revealed in the New Testament.) Even the prophet Daniel, who was so close to God, makes no mention of actually abiding in Him.
Thus it is throughout the rest of the Old Testament, and right on into the New. Matthew is a wonderful book, but there is no record of man’s abiding in God or of God’s abiding in man. Nor do we find this in Mark, Luke, or the first thirteen chapters of John either.
Hallelujah for John 14! “In My Father’s house are many abodes; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I am coming again and will receive you to Myself, that where I am you also may be” (vv. 2-3). When the Lord Jesus said, “Where I am,” what did He mean? The traditional Christian answer is, “In heaven.” If we read on in this very chapter, however, verses 10 and 11 tell us clearly, “I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me.” Then the Lord went on to explain to the disciples that they themselves could not yet be in the Father, that first the way had to be cut to give them the standing to be in God. Christ Himself would accomplish the removal of such obstacles as sins, sin, the old nature, the self, Satan, and the world. By His death on the cross, He paved the way for them to be in the divine Person. He removed all the obstacles and terminated all the frustrations. In verse 20 He said, “In that day you shall know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” He was telling the disciples that on the day of resurrection, after He had accomplished the death of the cross, they would be with Him in the Father. Where He was, there they would be also.
Who is in whom? “I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in You.” What we have here is a wonderful mingling of divinity with humanity. We are in God and God is in us.
John 15 is a continuation of the thought in chapter fourteen. Once we are brought into God, we must abide in Him and He in us (v. 4). We are in the Son, and He is in us. Our need now is to stay there. The King James Version translates the word for abide five different ways: abide (14:16; 15:4-7, 10); dwell (14:10, 17); being present (14:25); continue (15:9); remain (15:11, 16). The use of so many different words to translate one Greek word indicates how rich the meaning is. Now that we are in Christ, we must stay there; remain in Him; dwell in Him; settle down in Him; continue there.
In 1 John only twice does it say that we are in the Lord (2:5; 5:20). Most of the Epistle is concerned with abiding. With the Gospel of John we have already been put into Christ; thus, what 1 John is emphasizing is our need to remain where we have been put. We are to abide, not in the Word, nor His love, nor His power, nor His goodness, but in Himself. Do not think this is unimportant. The Lord Jesus prayed, “As you, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us” (John 17:21). To be in the Triune God is too marvelous for words.
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