Introduction - 👣 Abiding Is a Way We Walk

What does it actually look like for two people to abide in Christ together? Scripture gives us an answer that reaches far beyond praying together, attending church, or agreeing about theology.

The biblical image is one of walking—taking what God has revealed and embodying it in the ordinary movements of life. In the Jewish Scriptures, God's people were repeatedly called to walk in His ways, statutes, and commandments.

Jesus likewise taught His disciples not merely to hear His words but to do them. Paul carries that same framework into the life of the church: walk worthy, walk in love, walk as children of light, walk wisely.

When that language is brought into marriage and relationships, passages such as Colossians 3:18–19, Ephesians 4:31–32, Ephesians 5:3–26, and John 13:34 reveal something profound:

✨ abiding in Christ becomes visible in how two people walk toward one another. ✨

Their submission, love, forgiveness, speech, holiness, tenderness, and self-giving are no longer disconnected moral behaviors. They become the embodied expression of belonging to Christ.

The question is therefore not simply, “Do we love Christ?” but “Does the way we walk together look like we belong to Him?”

I. 1. Abiding means refusing to turn the relationship into a power struggle

Colossians 3:18–19 - “Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord . Husbands, love your wives and do not be harsh with them.”

The phrase “in the Lord” is crucial. Paul does not establish marriage as an independent hierarchy in which one person gets unrestricted authority over another. The relationship exists inside Christ's lordship.

✨ For the wife, submission is an act of allegiance to Christ. ✨

For the husband, however, the corresponding command is not “exercise authority,” it is “love.” And Paul immediately places a negative boundary around that love: “do not be harsh.”

That creates an important principle for abiding: Neither partner gets to use the relationship to escape Christ's authority.

A husband cannot say, “I'm the head, therefore you must obey me,” while behaving unlike Christ. Likewise, a wife cannot invoke submission as though it means surrendering moral discernment or tolerating ungodliness.

Both remain accountable to the Lord. The marriage becomes an environment in which each person continually asks, “What does faithfulness to Christ require of me toward you right now?”

2. Abiding means continually removing what poisons communion

Paul gets very practical:

Ephesians 4:31–32 - “Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.”

Put away → become → forgive.

Paul identifies relational toxins that cannot simply be managed indefinitely:

• bitterness
• wrath
• anger
• clamor
• slander
• malice

These aren't just unpleasant personality traits, they are ways of relating that contradict the character of Christ. They do NOT bear God's image, so as His image-bearers we cannot wear them.

Then Paul gives the replacement: kindness → tenderness → forgiveness.

This is especially important for a couple because resentment has a way of becoming a second relationship living underneath the visible one. Two people can remain physically together while internally keeping records against one another.

Paul's answer isn't simply, “Communicate better.” It is:

✨ Become the kind of people who forgive because you have been forgiven. ✨

The standard is not, “Has my partner earned forgiveness?” The standard is “How has God treated me in Christ?” That doesn't eliminate boundaries, consequences, or honest confrontation. It means that even confrontation occurs without malice.

3. Abiding means helping one another move toward holiness

Ephesians 5 becomes even more profound when Paul describes Christ's relationship with His people:

Ephesians 5:24–26 - “Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word.”

The husband's model is therefore Christ's self-giving love.

Christ doesn't use His position to extract something from His people. He gives Himself for them. And the purpose of that giving is striking: “that he might sanctify her.” The goal is holiness.

Hebrews 12:14 - Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.

That gives a couple a beautiful way of understanding abiding: I don't just want to make you happy. I want to love you in a way that helps you become more fully who God created you to be.

But there is an important reciprocal implication. If both people are abiding in Christ, both are being sanctified. Neither partner becomes the other's personal Holy Spirit. The husband isn't called to “fix” his wife, the wife isn't called to “fix” her husband.

Rather, both submit themselves to Christ and allow their love for one another to become part of Christ's sanctifying work in their lives. That means sometimes love says:

• “I believe in you.”
• “You hurt me, and we need to talk about it.”
• “I was wrong.”
• “I forgive you.”
• “This behavior cannot continue.”

All of those can be expressions of love when Christ—not fear, ego, control, or resentment—is governing the relationship.

4. Abiding means making Christ's love the operating system

Jesus gives the command that seems to gather everything together:

John 13:34 - “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”

The revolutionary part isn't merely “love one another,” it is: “Just as I have loved you.” Christ becomes both the source and standard of love. This gives the couple in Christ a question to ask perpetually:

✨ “How has Christ blessed me with His love, and how can that love flow through me toward you?”✨

That is precisely what makes Christian marriage—or any Christian relationship—different from simply having strong affection. Affection says, “I love you because I enjoy you.”

✨ Christlike love says, “I will seek your good because Christ has taught me how to love.” ✨

And that remains true when feelings fluctuate.

The four passages form a remarkably coherent pattern

Together they suggest that abiding in Christ as a couple isn't primarily about doing more religious activities together. It is about allowing Christ to govern the way the two people treat one another.

A couple can pray together, attend church together, read Scripture together, and still operate from anger, control, resentment, selfishness, and pride.

Conversely, a couple who continually practices submission to Christ, kindness, forgiveness, sacrificial love, tenderness, truth, and holiness is embodying what it means to abide.

The deepest connection

There is an especially beautiful progression here: Christ's authority → Christ's character → Christ's cleansing → Christ's love.

The couple doesn't make Christ the center simply by talking about Him. They make Him the center by allowing His way of being to become their way of being toward one another.

And that gives a very practical definition of abiding: A couple abides in Christ when both continually place themselves under Christ, receive His love, and allow that received love to determine how they speak, forgive, serve, confront, sacrifice, and remain faithful to one another.

That also connects beautifully with Jesus' larger teaching in John: the evidence that His disciples remain in Him is that His love becomes visible in how they love one another.

In a Christian relationship, the question isn't simply “Do we love each other?” It is: “Does the way we love each other look increasingly like Christ?” ❤️

II. 1. Analyzing the Greek: Anēkō and Prepō

Colossians 3:18 - “Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.”

The word translated “fitting” is anēkō. Its semantic range includes “to pertain to,” “to be due,” “to be proper,” “to be fitting,” and “to do one's duty.” It can carry the idea of something that belongs appropriately to a particular relationship or situation.

That makes Paul's wording interesting. He doesn't simply say, “Wives, submit.” He qualifies the behavior, “as is fitting in the Lord.” In other words, Christian conduct should correspond to the reality of belonging to Christ.

The phrase “in the Lord” is decisive. The standard isn't whatever a culture happens to consider appropriate. The behavior must be appropriate within the Lordship of Christ.

2. Prepō: what stands out as becoming

Ephesians 5:3 - “Sexual immorality and all impurity or covetousness must not even be named among you, as is proper among saints.”

Here Paul changes vocabulary. The word translated “proper” is prepō. Its more concrete sense is fascinating: to stand out, be conspicuous, be prominent, and consequently to be suitable, fitting, becoming, or proper.

So prepō has an almost visual quality. Something stands out because it belongs there. Paul's point is essentially: There is a way of living that visibly belongs among hagios—the holy ones—and there are things that visibly do not.

Sexual immorality, impurity, and greed don't merely violate an arbitrary rule, they are incongruous with the identity of people who have been set apart as God's holy people. That becomes even clearer when Paul proceeds:

Ephesians 5:4 - “Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.”

The same conceptual world continues: what belongs and what doesn't belong.

Putting the two words together

There is almost a movement from identity → behavior:

• Colossians 3:18: What is fitting for someone who is “in the Lord”?
• Ephesians 5:3: What is fitting for someone who is among “the saints”?

Paul is painting a picture of a person whose behavior corresponds to their belonging. That is enormously important for understanding Christian discipleship.

The Christian isn't merely someone who has been given a list of things to do and not do. The Christian is someone whose conduct is increasingly becoming congruent with who they are in Christ.

And notice the contrast:

“In the Lord” → anēkō → what is fitting for this relationship.

“Among saints” → prepō → what is becoming/conspicuous among this people.

So Paul is essentially asking: Does your way of living make sense if what you claim about Christ is actually true? That's a powerful test of discipleship.

This also illuminates marriage

This connects directly to the previous question about abiding in Christ as a couple.

Colossians 3:19 - “Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them.”

Rhis doesn't isolate the wife's behavior, Paul immediately addresses the husband: So the husband also has a “fitting” way of being a husband.

Ephesians 5:25 - “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her.”

The Christian husband should therefore ask: “What kind of husband is becoming for someone who belongs to Christ?” And the Christian wife: “What kind of wife is becoming for someone who belongs to Christ?”

And eventually the question becomes broader: “What kind of couple are we becoming because we belong to Christ?” That's where anēkō and prepō converge.

Who has the greater responsibility, the husband or the wife? The wife is called to emulate the church in submission, while the husband is called to emulate Christ...who DIED for the church. Somehow that seem either equally daunting, or the idea of submitting to her husband in everything is terrifying, in theory, to a wife.

The image Paul paints

Taken together, these words portray the Christ follower as someone whose external life increasingly matches their internal identity. Not perfect. Not sinless. But congruent.

• Their speech fits their allegiance.
  Their sexuality fits their holiness.
  Their money fits their trust in God.
  Their marriage fits their submission to Christ.
  Their treatment of others fits the mercy they've received.
  Their desires increasingly fit the Kingdom they claim to belong to.

Matthew 7:16 - “You will recognize them by their fruits.”

Fruit is visible evidence of an underlying identity. That is essentially Paul's concern with prepō: What belongs among God's holy people should become recognizable as such.

And anēkō adds the relational dimension: What should naturally flow from someone who belongs to Christ? So the image is not primarily “a person who follows the rules.” It is: A person whose life increasingly looks like it belongs to the One they claim to follow.

That is a much deeper conception of holiness.

✨ The goal isn't just to avoid what is improper, but rather to become the kind of person for whom Christlike behavior is increasingly fitting, becoming, and recognizable. ✨

And that makes Paul's language of “walking” in Ephesians particularly significant: Christianity is not simply about having the right identity; the identity is supposed to become visible in the way the person walks.

III. Halakhah: Walking As Embodied Torah 👣

The “walking” language in Ephesians becomes much richer when heard against the Jewish idea that Scripture is not merely something to believe or study, but something to walk out.

Paul is not inventing a metaphor disconnected from Jewish thought. He is drawing on a deeply biblical way of describing a person's conduct before God. The Hebrew Bible repeatedly uses the language of walking for living according to God's ways.

Halakhah comes from the Hebrew root halakh, “to walk,” and fundamentally refers to the way one walks through life in response to God's instruction.

In Jewish thought, Torah was never intended merely to be information stored in the mind; it was instruction to be embodied—how one eats, works, worships, treats neighbors, handles conflict, raises children, conducts business, and orders daily life.

This provides a rich backdrop for Paul's repeated language of “walking” in Ephesians. When Paul tells believers to “walk in love” (Ephesians 5:2), “walk as children of light” (5:8), and “walk carefully” (5:15), he is speaking in a conceptual world where revelation is meant to become a way of life.

The Christian equivalent is not simply knowing what Christ taught, but walking the teaching of Christ. In that sense, halakhah provides a useful lens for understanding discipleship: Scripture moves from the page into the path, from instruction into practice, and from belief into embodied obedience.

For a couple, abiding in Christ therefore means allowing His teaching to determine how they walk together—how they love, submit, forgive, speak, respond to anger, handle disappointment, and pursue holiness. The question becomes not merely, “What does Scripture say?” but “How do we walk this out together?”

Walking in God's statutes, judgments, and commandments

Leviticus 18:4 - You shall follow My decrees and keep My statutes and walk in them. I am the Lord your God.

Deuteronomy 5:33 - You shall walk in all the way that the Lord your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land that you shall possess.

Deuteronomy 10:12-13 - And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments and statutes of the Lord, which I am commanding you today for your good?

Deuteronomy 11:22-24 - If you will be careful to do all this commandment that I command you to do, loving the Lord your God, walking in all His ways, and holding fast to Him, then the Lord will drive out all these nations before you, and you will dispossess nations greater and mightier than you. Every place on which the sole of your foot treads shall be yours. 

This brings the imagery of walking into strikingly physical territory: “walk in all His ways” and “every place on which the sole of your foot treads” connect obedience, movement, and possession.

Israel does not merely receive God's ways as abstract instruction; they are called to walk in them, allowing God's Torah to determine the direction and manner of their lives. Then the imagery moves from how they walk to where they walk: “every place on which the sole of your foot treads” is given to them.

✨ The feet become almost a picture of embodied faithfulness—what God has spoken becomes something Israel physically carries into the land. ✨

This makes the passage especially illuminating alongside the New Testament's repeated command to “walk” in love, wisdom, light, and a manner worthy of the Lord. The biblical pattern is not simply hear → believe, but hear → walk → inhabit.

God's people walk according to His ways, and their walking brings His covenant purposes into the places where their feet actually go.

For a couple abiding in Christ, this provides a beautiful picture: the home, the conversation, the conflict, the decision, the ordinary Tuesday—all become places where Christ's way can be walked out.

The “sole of your foot” brings spirituality down from the abstract and into the concrete: wherever your feet go, your allegiance to God goes with you.

Ephesians turns “walking” into a discipleship framework

Notice how Ephesians organizes the Christian life around repeated uses of peripateō, “to walk”:

Ephesians 2:10 - “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”

Ephesians 4:1 - “Walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.”

Ephesians 4:17 - “You must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds.”

Ephesians 5:2 — “Walk in love, as Christ loved us.”

Ephesians 5:8 — “Walk as children of light.”

Ephesians 5:15 — “Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise.”

The progression is worthy of note:

• Walk in good works.
  Walk worthy.
  Don't walk like the nations.
  Walk in love.
  Walk as children of light.
  Walk wisely.

Paul is describing an entire way of life.

Jesus (and His brother) intensify this idea

Jesus does not present Torah as merely a collection of propositions to affirm. He repeatedly asks people to hear and do. The Sermon on the Mount culminates in:

Matthew 7:24 - “Everyone then who hears these words of Mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.”

That is remarkably close to the biblical conception of walking: Hear → understand → embody → become.

James makes the same point even more explicitly:

James 1:22 - “Be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.”

• The ancient Jewish distinction isn't simply: believer vs. unbeliever.
• It is often closer to: one who hears and walks accordingly vs. one who hears and does not.

This sheds light on “abiding”

John 15:10 — “If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love.”

✨ Abiding isn't passive, it produces a walk. Jesus' commands become embodied in the disciple's actual life. ✨

So you could describe the movement this way: Hear Christ → remain in Christ → receive Christ's life → walk in Christ's ways. And eventually other people should be able to see the One you abide in by the way you walk.

There is also a beautiful connection to Deuteronomy

Deuteronomy repeatedly speaks about teaching God's words so thoroughly that they become woven into ordinary existence:

Deuteronomy 6:6–7 - “These words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children…”

And then Scripture places them into the rhythms of sitting, walking, lying down, and rising. God's instruction isn't supposed to remain confined to the moment when someone opens a scroll. It accompanies you while you walk.

The ultimate goal is not simply: “I know what Scripture says.” It is: “Scripture has become the way I walk through the world.”

Now bring this back to a couple

A Christian couple doesn't just agree with Christ's teaching about love, they walk in that love.

• They don't just believe forgiveness is important, they walk in forgiveness.
• They don't just believe Christ is Lord, they walk under His lordship.
• They don't just affirm holiness, they walk as saints.
• They don't just read Scripture together, they practice Scripture together.

Colossians 3:18-19 - “Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them.”

The question becomes: What does it look like to walk this relationship out “in the Lord”? What does it look like to walk Christ's self-giving love toward this particular woman, or this individual man?

The remarkable thing about Paul's language

Paul doesn't tell Christians merely to walk toward Christ, he tells them to walk in Christ's ways because they have already been brought into Christ. That produces a very different understanding of obedience.

Obedience isn't: “If I behave well enough, perhaps I can become God's person.” It is: “Because I belong to Christ, I will learn to walk like someone who belongs to Christ.”

Identity precedes walking. And walking reveals identity. That takes us right back to anēkō and prepō:

• Does this behavior fit someone who is “in the Lord”?
• Does this behavior belong among the saints?
• Does the way I walk make visible the One I claim to follow?

In that sense, Christianity is a path before it is a label. The disciple doesn't simply carry Christ's teaching in the mind, the disciple puts it under their feet and walks it into the world. 👣

Conclusion

A couple that walks in Christ is one in which Christ is not merely the center of conversation but the pattern of conduct. Colossians calls what is fitting “in the Lord”; Ephesians asks what is proper among the saints; and both assume that:

✨ belonging to Christ should produce a recognizable way of living. ✨

That means a husband learns to love without harshness because Christ's authority does not produce domination but self-giving love. A wife learns submission not as servitude to another human being, but as faithfulness to Christ.

Both put away bitterness, anger, malice, and resentment because they have received forgiveness in Christ. Both pursue holiness because their lives are being shaped by the One who gave Himself to sanctify His people.

And both obey Jesus' command to love one another as He has loved them. This is what abiding looks like when it gets beneath the surface: two people continually bringing their steps, words, desires, conflicts, forgiveness, and love under the lordship of Christ.

They don't merely study the path—they walk it. And as they do, their relationship becomes a living testimony that the One they abide in is becoming visible through the way they love. ❤️ 👣✨