William Kelly

But here the Lord insists on more — the necessity and the importance of dependence on Him, of intimacy with Himself. This is to abide in Christ; and His word is, "Abide in Me, and I in you." It is not sovereign grace to the sinner, but His call to the disciple; and hence His abiding in us, as a matter of daily communion, depends on our abiding in Him. "As the branch cannot bear fruit from itself unless it abide in the vine, so neither (can) ye, unless ye abide in Me." Nothing simpler than the fact outwardly, nothing surer in our experience than that so it is inwardly. He, and He only, is the dwelling-place for the soul in this world of snare and danger, in this desert where no water is. Make Him the resource, make Him the object; and the sap, as it were, flows without hindrance, and fruit is borne. Without Him no teaching avails, and all religious excitement fails; bring Him in, confide in Him, and, no matter what the difficulty or the pain or the shame, no matter what the opposition or the detraction, He sustains the heart, and fruit-bearing follows.286 Apart from Him we can do nothing; with Him, all things. So said one who had learnt it well, "I have strength for all things in Him that giveth me power" (Phil. 4:13).