The Sixteenth of January

ABIDE IN ME --- John 6:68.

"Abide in me." --- John 15:4.

"Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life." --- John 6:68.

"It is good for me to draw near to God; I have put my trust in the Lord God." --- Psalm 73:28.

To abide in Christ, who is our righeousness and strength, and not to be moved from him, is the very life and power of Christianity. We do this when our thoughts are going out after him, our hearts cleaving to him, and our minds stayed upon him.

Now, to know Christ, and thus to abide in him, as our righteousness, brings peace and joy; which joy in the Lord is certainly followed with strength to overcome sin and the world, which believers renounce the more readily, as they have found something better in Christ. May the Lord give me grace likewise immoveably to abide in him!

Christ is my life, my light, my care,
My blessed hope, my heavenly prize;
Dearer than all possessions are,
Chief of ten thousand in my eyes.

My God, and can a humble child,
That loves thee with a flame so high,
Be ever from thy face exiled,
Without the pity of thine eye?

Impossible! for thine own hands
Have tied my heart so close to thee,
And in thy book thy promise stands,
That where thou art, thy friends must be.