Abide in Me - by Elizabeth Reynolds

If you believe you were created by God, intricately, intentionally and lovingly, then it follows that you believe He knows you, intimately, and that He knows what is best for you. You would believe that it is He Himself that you need fellowship and communion with day by day, second by second.

Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself. John 15:4

When a car is made, it is made to run on a certain fuel. In a similar way, we are like machines that were created to run on a certain fuel. And there are people everywhere around the world – quite often you and me perhaps – who are trying to run their machine on something else. Trying to ‘fill up the tank’ with things that will never work. When I say ‘fill up the tank’, I mean, of course, finding one’s happiness. It dates back to the Garden of Eden when Satan put it into our heads that we could stand on our own – be our own gods. We try to run our ‘machine’ on things – anything – other than God. Jobs, friends, wealth, attractiveness, youth, success, careers, hobbies/passions, even religion… but although the engine might seem to run okay for a little while, it always conks out because we’re trying to feed it the wrong kind of juice.
Our ‘machine’ was made to run on God Himself, and it will not run properly on anything else. “God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.” (C.S. Lewis)

Jesus wants us to enjoy a close, intimate, personal walk with Him. Many people’s response to this might be: “I just don’t have the time to give the energy needed for such a relationship and so Jesus must not understand the pressures of life, or maybe He’s just disinterested…”

This is far from the truth. The truth is, Jesus knows exactly what your pressures are, what your private world is like. He knows how busy and how tough and how crazy things can get. And THAT’S exactly the reason why He knows we need this intimate relationship. “He knows that the fountainhead of life is with Him.” (Jack Hayford).

God knows He is the fuel we need to run properly and smoothly. He is the source of everything. Wisdom, strength, endurance, comfort, grace, provision and understanding. He asks… no, commands you to abide in Him. It is for your own good, sanity, happiness, peace etc. etc. You name it.
Trust in Him, and feed on the stuff that will sustain you for eternity.

Elizabeth Reynolds