He now repeats the words. He would have us understand - note well the lesson (as simple as it appears, it is the key of the abiding life) - that the only way to obey the command "Abide in me" is to have eye and heart fixed upon Himself....(Gaze upon Christ)....The vision of Christ is an irresistible attraction; it draws and holds us like a magnet.....How much weary labor has been in striving to understand what abiding is, how much fruitless effort in trying to attain it? Why was this? Because the attention was turned to the abiding as a work we have to do, instead of to the living Christ, in whom we were to be kept abiding, who Himself was to hold and keep us. We thought of abiding as a continual strain and effort - we forget that it means rest from effort to one who has found the place of his abode...And so it sometimes comes that souls who have never been especially occupied with the thought of abiding are abiding all the time, because they are occupied with Christ....(Christ says) 'Come out of every other place, and every other trust and occupation, come out of self with its reasonings and efforts, come and rest in what I shall do.'" - Murray
So this is abiding:
being occupied with Christ.
Striving to know Christ, be like Christ, and rest in Christ is the key to abiding!
My home with Christ means that I am ever pursuing a relationship with Him. T
hat I'm constantly trying to understand Who He is.
That I am striving to be like Him in every action.
I need not worry whether I am abiding or not.
If all of my attention is focused on Christ, then I am abiding.
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