1 John 2:28
Memory Verse
And now, little children, you all abide in Him in order that when He appears we should have confidence and should not be ashamed before Him at His coming (1 John 2:28).
He is the vine and we are branches (John 15:1–4). The only way we produce fruit is by feeling at ease in Him. This sense of being comes from understanding all that He has given to us in salvation and using it so that we come to a full experiential knowledge of Him.
In order to abide, we must be spiritual. Spiritual refers to our frame of mind and conduct, which are a result of emanating the things from the Holy Spirit. Therefore, someone who is spiritual seeks after and fulfills the desires that come from the Spirit, rejecting the desires that come from the sin nature, Satan, and the world system. In this state, for he is walking by the Spirit, the Holy Spirit teaches him how to abide in Christ. The one who abides then feels at ease in the new man, working out righteousness, and therefore, will not be ashamed when the Lord comes.
As we learn to abide, we are diligent to add to our faith virtue, and to our virtue knowledge, and to our knowledge self-control, and to our self-control, patience, and to our patience, godliness, and to our godliness brotherly love, and to our brotherly love we add love. In doing this, we will never be barren nor unfruitful in the full experiential knowledge of Jesus Christ (2 Peter 1:5–8).