Abide
I woke up around 4 a.m. and a random word popped into my head. Symbiotic. I hadn’t opened my eyes yet but the word sat there. I’m lying there like what does this word even mean. Synonym? Symbolic? I didn’t know. So, through blurry eyes, I grabbed my phone, Googled it, and here’s what I found:
involving interaction between two different organisms living in close physical association.
denoting a mutually beneficial relationship between different people or groups.
There is something interesting about how God can drop a single word into our spirit and it opens an entire door of understanding.
While originally used as a biology term to describe organisms that help each other to survive, the word symbiotic can also be used metaphorically (my favorite way to use words). Here are a few examples of how the word symbiotic can take on meaning:
Faith + Discipline
Healing + Growth
Discipleship + Community
Macaroni and Cheese + Yams (don’t act like you don’t mix your food)
Reading the Word + Knowing God
God + You
The last one is the one I want to focus on. God’s inspired Word teaches us the importance of remaining in Him and building a relationship with Him. Like many of the relationships in our lives, we have to work with the other person in order to have a relationship that’s good and healthy. Why does our relationship with our Father not follow the same rule? After all, how can we know someone or they know us if we don’t spend time with them?
Jesus gives us one of the clearest pictures of this in John 15:4-5:
“Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me… apart from me you can do nothing.”
The branch doesn’t sustain the vine.
The vine sustains the branch.
And yet — the branch (us, if you missed that part) is still invited to remain.
Now, let me back up a bit because, if you recall earlier, the word symbiotic basically implies mutual dependence. For clarity, God does not depend on us. We depend on Him. He needs not a single thing from us to survive. The “symbiosis” (we’re using metaphors, remember) here is a sustained connection + chosen relationship. We are sustained by God and invited to walk with Him.
And that invitation alone is the beauty of God’s grace.
Because the truth is this ⤵️
Throughout the Bible, scripture shows a God who pursues connection, not because He lacks something, but because He is love and He loves us (1 John 4:8 & John 3:16). It shows how God continues to keep us as His people even when we turn away from Him (a common recurrence in the OT). God doesn’t need us to be whole or complete (Acts 17:25). But He still chooses relationship with us.
Acts 17:28 reminds us:
“For in Him we live and move and have our being.”
Not just when we feel strong or faithful. In Him — always.
Sometimes we treat our relationship with God like something we visit instead of something we live inside of. But scripture keeps pulling us back to dependence, not independence.
Because faith was never meant to be self-sustaining.
It was meant to be God-sustained.
And maybe that’s why seasons feel harder when we drift. Not because God moved. But because connection weakened on our side.
Now, what does this “symbiotic” life with God look like in real life?
It looks like:
✨Choosing prayer when you feel numb.
✨Choosing worship when you feel distracted.
✨Choosing obedience when you don’t understand.
✨Choosing faith when you don’t see fruit yet.
Because faith is not always proven by visible results.
Faith is proven by staying connected to the source.
And friends, Christ Jesus is that source.
So, maybe the truest spiritual version of “symbiotic” isn’t mutual survival but mutual nearness.
God gives life.
We give surrender.
God gives grace.
We give trust.
God gives presence.
We give attention.
And somehow, inside that exchange, we live in the dependence we were always meant to have with God.
Prayer:
God, remind me that I don’t have to be strong enough to sustain myself. Help me stay connected to You — in good seasons, in confusing seasons, and in seasons where I don’t see fruit yet. Amen.
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